Optimizing MSI GTX 980Ti w/ PD 365...

MarkS001

Newbie Joined: Apr 21, 2020 17:22 Messages: 10 Offline

Solved by

May 30, 2020 14:13

Hello,

I'd really appreciate some master level hardware help optimizing my GPU with PD365 to get the most out of it. I have an older rig I built 10 years ago but know what I'm doing. Been building my own since '89 and use first rate components and always have an upgrade path. In short, I'm no Master or professional builder but definitely an Advanced Amateur.

New to PD but not to video editing. Again, not a pro but not a beginner. I'm not doing exotic work. Standard 3-8 minute1920x1080/1280x720 or 1080x1080 vids at 30fps for educational/sales purposes with static or animated text overlays, a PIP graphic or two, maybe a PIP vid once in a while and two short intro/outro music clips. Output is rendered the same as .mp4.

I'm getting what I think are slow previews in the timeline on anything above High Preview mode and have to turn off effects/overlay tracks as the project develops.

I've included screenshots of my PD365 settings.

Here's my rig:

Win10-64 1909 always up to date
MB- Intel P5P43TD/USB3 w/ Intel10 chipset (BIOS & all drivers latest available)
PCI-E 16x 2.0
Twin SATA HDD: WD Black 720gb @7200rpm
CPU- Core 2 Quad 9650 @3000mhz OC- 3.76mhz (Max possible for board. Can OC to 4.2 but stability/temp issues not worth it)
8gb DDR3- 1333 (board supports max of 16gb @ 4x 4gb. System managed pagefiles on all drives)
All MB onboard peripherals, serial, lan, parallel, etc. disabled.
Audio is offloaded to Creative X-fi 24bit card.
Wi-fi offloaded to PCI card w/ Intel 9260 160mhz

GPU: MSI 980Ti 6gb 384mhz GDDR5
Nvidia Drivers latest: 446.14 WHQL
(see attached screenshots for PDR specific settings)
Windows: Settings > Display > Graphics Settings > PDR.exe > High Performance

Any help with the PD & Nvidia settings or other recommendations aside from the obvious one of a new computer build is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.


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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at May 30. 2020 15:11

JL_JL

Senior Contributor Location: Arizona, USA Joined: Oct 01, 2006 20:01 Messages: 6091 Offline

May 30, 2020 16:17

No real optimization that's pertinent for functionality.

Can you provide more info on what your timeline consists of edit wise and details of your footage? Pic of timeline would help with what effects you have used. 1920x1080/1280x720 or 1080x1080 vids at 30fps is not really adequate, can you attach MediaInfo txt results of say your most challenging timeline playback issue footage?

Bottom line, more than likely what you experience with timeline fluidity is probably not uncommon. PD is not real good at fluent timeline playback when any editing features have been applied. Low preview display resolution, shadow files, usually most common methods to aid somewhat. These issues are especially true if high bitrate source video is used. One can also use "Render Preview" to get a fluent view of some critical highly modified timeline section.

But yes, a Core 2 Quad 9650 will be a significant challenge.

Jeff

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at May 30. 2020 16:25

MarkS001

Newbie Joined: Apr 21, 2020 17:22 Messages: 10 Offline

May 31, 2020 11:28

Quote No real optimization that's pertinent for functionality.

Can you provide more info on what your timeline consists of edit wise and details of your footage? Pic of timeline would help with what effects you have used. 1920x1080/1280x720 or 1080x1080 vids at 30fps is not really adequate, can you attach MediaInfo txt results of say your most challenging timeline playback issue footage?

Bottom line, more than likely what you experience with timeline fluidity is probably not uncommon. PD is not real good at fluent timeline playback when any editing features have been applied. Low preview display resolution, shadow files, usually most common methods to aid somewhat. These issues are especially true if high bitrate source video is used. One can also use "Render Preview" to get a fluent view of some critical highly modified timeline section.

But yes, a Core 2 Quad 9650 will be a significant challenge.

Jeff

Hey Jeff,

Thanks for the help. You pretty much answered the question. I know it's a basic horsepower issue. The timeline problems are having to run previews at lower res, mismatched timing of vid vs. audio and an occasional crash if I leave all tracks on while editing effects, PIPs, motion texts, etc.

I just acquired the 980Ti at a great price in the hopes it would make a difference because it is way more powerful than my previous GTS450. PD says it won't really use a card with only 1gb like the 450. This sort of video editing is the only really heavy work I task the machine with. I haven't played PC games in 20 years thus it's still more than adequate for ny daily word processing, internet, social media marketing and even CorelDraw 2019 I use.

What I find annoying is why isn't PD coded to offload most tasks to the GPU especially since Nvidia's drivers allow you to elect "Basic Compute Functions" to their later generation cards?

Anyway, one last question maybe you can help with:

If I upgrade my MB and, say, a 10th Gen Core i7-8700K (Coffee Lake) with UHD630 graphics functions will that benefit vid/graphics work or will programs like PD still rely on basic compute functions of the CPU and whatever bone they throw to a dedicated GPU? In other words, is UHD630 only for systems using onboard graphics and bypassed if using a dedicated card? Will any graphics functions and programs take advantage of both UHD630 and GPU??

Thanks again.
Mark

JL_JL

Senior Contributor Location: Arizona, USA Joined: Oct 01, 2006 20:01 Messages: 6091 Offline

May 31, 2020 12:12

Quote If I upgrade my MB and, say, a 10th Gen Core i7-8700K (Coffee Lake) with UHD630 graphics functions will that benefit vid/graphics work or will programs like PD still rely on basic compute functions of the CPU and whatever bone they throw to a dedicated GPU? In other words, is UHD630 only for systems using onboard graphics and bypassed if using a dedicated card? Will any graphics functions and programs take advantage of both UHD630 and GPU??

PD will use the GPU (Nvidia, or AMD, or iGPU) discrete SIP core to decode the timeline video during playback if set in pref and timeline content is supported by GPU decode capability and no PD anomalies occur. Some Fx will use the GPU cores to assist render the effect for timeline playback or produce if configured in pref, else CPU does it. Most other timeline items like transitions, titles, color adjustments, speed adjustments, shadow file generation, waveform generation, render preview,.....on and on, are all CPU based activities.

GPU capabilities can be especially helpful performance wise when producing H.265 content, however, if timeline content has color adjustments or the like, they are handled by the CPU first prior to encoding so net gain often driven by CPU performance. Also keep in mind not all GPU models support the same encode formats, as an example, a Nvidia GTX 1070 will support H.264 60i formats while a Nvidia RTX2070 will not in PD18. Also what a particular NVidia card supports, AMD, Intel can be different, quality too.

Also, keep in mind, for the most part PD only utilizes a single GPU interface. So, if using the Intel UHD630, any other discrete GPU will do very little while PD timeline editing or producing. There are few exceptions, but generally not the norm at least for most typical percentage of timeline edit content.

Jeff

MarkS001

Newbie Joined: Apr 21, 2020 17:22 Messages: 10 Offline

May 31, 2020 13:15

Quote

PD will use the GPU (Nvidia, or AMD, or iGPU) discrete SIP core to decode the timeline video during playback if set in pref and timeline content is supported by GPU decode capability and no PD anomalies occur. Some Fx will use the GPU cores to assist render the effect for timeline playback or produce if configured in pref, else CPU does it. Most other timeline items like transitions, titles, color adjustments, speed adjustments, shadow file generation, waveform generation, render preview,.....on and on, are all CPU based activities.

GPU capabilities can be especially helpful performance wise when producing H.265 content, however, if timeline content has color adjustments or the like, they are handled by the CPU first prior to encoding so net gain often driven by CPU performance. Also keep in mind not all GPU models support the same encode formats, as an example, a Nvidia GTX 1070 will support H.264 60i formats while a Nvidia RTX2070 will not in PD18. Also what a particular NVidia card supports, AMD, Intel can be different, quality too.

Also, keep in mind, for the most part PD only utilizes a single GPU interface. So, if using the Intel UHD630, any other discrete GPU will do very little while PD timeline editing or producing. There are few exceptions, but generally not the norm at least for most typical percentage of timeline edit content.

Jeff

Hey Jeff,

So, if I understand correctly, most editing tasks are always functions of the CPU while some playback and rendering may or may not be offloaded to a discrete GPU, depending on the GPU? And I suppose it depends on the particular GPU variant within a series, no? As always it seems figuring it out is a Gordian Knot untangled only through trial and error.

Well, I've been doing that beginning with the 286 platform running DOS 3.3 up to 6.22 and determing compatible yet alone optimal hardware and efficient TSR load-order since the mid-'80s. My first graphics card was the industry leading ATI Graphics Ultra with ONE whole MB of VRAM! Bought to run Falcon 3.0. Cost $430 and worth every penny at the time.

Does PD put out a recommend GPU compatibility list?

I did notice the H.265 option in Produce lit up after installing the 980 so perhaps I should go that way to render especially since it reduces output file size, no?

And sorry to be dense about it but I'm still unclear if the Intel UHD630 will or won't assist overall with PD given it's integral to the CPU?

I really appreciate you taking the time to help out.

Thanks again.

JL_JL

Senior Contributor Location: Arizona, USA Joined: Oct 01, 2006 20:01 Messages: 6091 Offline

May 31, 2020 13:53

Quote Does PD put out a recommend GPU compatibility list?

The best is this: https://www.cyberlink.com/support/faq-content.do?id=24396 but not too helpful on what is exposed by using any particular GPU.

Quote I did notice the H.265 option in Produce lit up after installing the 980 so perhaps I should go that way to render especially since it reduces output file size, no?

Really end user dependent and where/how you plan on playing your content. H.265 is extremely expensive to encode and has considerable demand on hardware and likewise to decode. But yes, for similar quality, one can typically have a smaller file size when compared to H.264.

Quote And sorry to be dense about it but I'm still unclear if the Intel UHD630 will or won't assist overall with PD given it's integral to the CPU?

PD18 will use the UHD630, it will use Intel Quick Sync Video, Intel's brand for its dedicated video encoding and decoding hardware core and have the features of these associated with UHD630 exposed in PD. High level QS overview here, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Quick_Sync_Video and so on for unique Nvidia SIP block features as well as AMD's own unique SIP block features. When platform configured to use the UHD630 in PD, your 980Ti will essentially do nothing during that editing session for PD.

Jeff

SoNic67

Senior Contributor Joined: Sep 27, 2014 14:14 Messages: 1308 Offline

Jun 02, 2020 02:18

Quote
I did notice the H.265 option in Produce lit up after installing the 980 so perhaps I should go that way to render especially since it reduces output file size, no?

See capabilities here (for full list that include the 980Ti, click on that page below on GeForce):

https://developer.nvidia.com/video-encode-decode-gpu-support-matrix#Encoder

Scroll down for the hardware decoding capabilities.
Note that a GeForce GTX 1050 has better video encoding (NVENC) and decoding (NVDEC) capabilities. For example, the 980Ti doesn't decode H265 in hardware...

This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at Jun 02. 2020 02:26