ONYX System Upgrade

[nmcgraw]

We just updated our Print computer from an HPz800 to a 16-core threadripper/16gb RAM/1TB M.2 SSD & GTX1080.
I was expecting a huge jump in speed but experienced diminished results.

We got about a 60% improvement in speed for Rips & ONYX is utilizing about 3% of CPU usage.

Don't get me wrong, this is a great improvement for Adobe and everything else, but this was disappointing for ONYX to say the least.

The only thing ONYX support recommend was turning on High Performance in the Power settings.
Anyone out there has another option for improving the speed with all this power I have under the hood?

I'm using ONYX 18 Production House & Windows 10 Pro.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

Anyone out there has another option for improving the speed with all this power I have under the hood?

Do you have more then 1 drive or just one drive? I think they recommend one drive for OS and programs and one drive (not setup as a RAID) for each printer.

Other then that, based on specs alone, that computer looks like it meets and/or exceeds the system requirements that I found.

 

[nmcgraw]

Do you have more then 1 drive or just one drive? I think they recommend one drive for OS and programs and one drive (not setup as a RAID) for each printer.

Other then that, based on specs alone, that computer looks like it meets and/or exceeds the system requirements that I found.

I have 2 m.2 SSDs, one for OS and one for ONYX. These things read & write much faster then any Standard HD RAID could perform.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

I have 2 m.2 SSDs, one for OS and one for ONYX. These things read & write much faster then any Standard HD RAID could perform.

RAIDs are designed for something else, which is probably why they don't suggest a RAID. That wasn't what I was trying to get with that.

Motherboard, BIOs everything up to date and compatible?

Bottlenecks are either software and/or hardware. Hardware specs, doesn't seem like there should be a bottleneck. So that would make me believe software bottleneck. It could mean making sure all the drivers, BIOs etc are all up to date. Or sometimes running the latest and greatest of hardware, means the software (specifically the program in question) has to catch up to better utilize it.

 

[bulldozer]

looks like someone is using it for video games instead of a printing machine...gtx1080? really? you spent $1000 more than you should have.

 

[Solventinkjet]

If I am understanding correctly, things sped up but just not by as much as you thought it would? The speed boost probably came mostly from the SSD as it makes file processing much faster. The issue is probably your perception of how much the processor was going to help. You have 16 cores but the RIP process cannot use multi-threading or utilize more than one core per file so it's not the amount of cores that matters in this situation but the processor clock speed. The higher the clock speed, the faster a file will RIP. You probably just thought, understandably, that the RIP could split the job between 16 cores which would make things faster but there are fundamental limitations in the RIPing process that make it so that is not possible. In other words, your rig is a beast but the process you want to run on it cant utilize it the way you hoped.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

In other words, your rig is a beast but the process you want to run on it cant utilize it the way you hoped.

Essentially a bottleneck of the program in question and limits that it has in the programming.

 

[nmcgraw]

looks like someone is using it for video games instead of a printing machine...gtx1080? really? you spent $1000 more than you should have.

We also do 3D Rendering... so actually this computer will soon have an additional 3x 1080Ti's to work as a network render machine for the other half of our office.

If I am understanding correctly, things sped up but just not by as much as you thought it would? The speed boost probably came mostly from the SSD as it makes file processing much faster. The issue is probably your perception of how much the processor was going to help. You have 16 cores but the RIP process cannot use multi-threading or utilize more than one core per file so it's not the amount of cores that matters in this situation but the processor clock speed. The higher the clock speed, the faster a file will RIP. You probably just thought, understandably, that the RIP could split the job between 16 cores which would make things faster but there are fundamental limitations in the RIPing process that make it so that is not possible. In other words, your rig is a beast but the process you want to run on it cant utilize it the way you hoped.

That's disappointing and kinda what I thought, that the software could only use 1 core to RIP, I though swithcing to a 64-Bit program would of fixed that. We were using PCI-SSD's on the last machine, but these are faster so maybe you're right that's were I noticed the speed boost.

 

[Solventinkjet]

We also do 3D Rendering... so actually this computer will soon have an additional 3x 1080Ti's to work as a network render machine for the other half of our office.


That's disappointing and kinda what I thought, that the software could only use 1 core to RIP, I though swithcing to a 64-Bit program would of fixed that. We were using PCI-SSD's on the last machine, but these are faster so maybe you're right that's were I noticed the speed boost.

Still a great machine especially for the 3D rendering! When a file is being RIPed the process relies on certain information processing before others in a linear fashion. That is the reason it can't be split up and processed in separate chunks. Onyx would have already programmed that in if it was possible. 3D rendering however can be parallel processed and mostly utilizes the graphics card but the 16 core thread ripper will come in handy because if you are going to have multiple GPUs they need a solid processor to keep them fed.

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

We've had the same issue for the last 12+ months. Upgraded from 10.2 to 12.2 expecting lightning RIP speeds as promised in all of their advertising. Onyx peaks at using 12% of our 16 core setup. Quite the disappointment.

 

[nmcgraw]

We've had the same issue for the last 12+ months. Upgraded from 10.2 to 12.2 expecting lightning RIP speeds as promised in all of their advertising. Onyx peaks at using 12% of our 16 core setup. Quite the disappointment.

I did RIP three files at once yesterday and it did take up 63%... so I guess I just need to wait and RIP everything at once

 

[SignMeUpGraphics]

Yeah, ripping multiple files simultaneously will get the percentage up, but for a single job it's been hard to see it go higher than 12%.
I guess it's just not optimised for multi-core processing.

 

[jasonx]

Samsung 970 Pros and the Intel I7 7700k I've found the best combo for max speed for Onyx.

I Rip hundreds of files a day with a lot of 50m long banners.

Only thing that sucks in Onyx is their layout tool. God its slow.

 

[AF]

Multi threading will use more than one core (excluding hyper threading). The latest APPE is multithreaded and will use more than core if there are enough threads for a single file rip. This doesn’t mean that Your rip will need 16 threads to rip a single file. We need a huge test file to compare rips. I suspect that onyx isn’t configured to use all available cores. I recall someone had a similar issue and there was a way to enable multi core in onyx. Tech support should know what to do.

 

[Bly]

Samsung 970 Pros and the Intel I7 7700k I've found the best combo for max speed for Onyx.

I Rip hundreds of files a day with a lot of 50m long banners.

Only thing that sucks in Onyx is their layout tool. God its slow.

I looked at their layout tool once and forgot it.

All our tiling layouts are done in the Zund prepress app then just sent to Onyx to rip and print.

 

[nmcgraw]

Multi threading will use more than one core (excluding hyper threading). The latest APPE is multithreaded and will use more than core if there are enough threads for a single file rip. This doesn’t mean that Your rip will need 16 threads to rip a single file. We need a huge test file to compare rips. I suspect that onyx isn’t configured to use all available cores. I recall someone had a similar issue and there was a way to enable multi core in onyx. Tech support should know what to do.

I called tech support before posting here, in simplist terms, he said I was SOL, Ripping was a single core process. I know 18.5 is getting a new/updated APPE, maybe multi core??? It took them so long to get to 64-bit and I feel they didn’t utilize it, except maybe the RAM limits. It’s like they are still building for 2010 XP machines. I did try Caldera, and that ripped hell’la fast, but there were other parts of it we were not fans of.

 

[WildWestDesigns]

It took them so long to get to 64-bit and I feel they didn’t utilize it, except maybe the RAM limits. It’s like they are still building for 2010 XP machines.

One of the reasons for Win 10 bloat is actually due to this. Programmers still using outdated system calls and APIs that should have been removed or they shouldn't be calling at the very least.

Be thankful that they at least got to 64 bit. There are some programs that are still 32 bit.

 

[AF]

APPE comes in 32 and 64 bit. If Onyx is using 32 bit and single threaded, they are leaving a lot of performance out of the equation.

In comparison, Colorgate uses 32 bit APPE which limits how much memory it can access, but they have implemented it in a way that uses multiple APPE copies to access multiple cores and therefore taps into much more memory. The speed improvements when ripping massive single files is night and day under the multi-core system. Colorgate licenses their product in such a way that you can activate multiple APPE rips. Our copy uses up to 5 APPE rips at a time. So if ripping 5 files simultaneously, Colorgate will put an APPE instance on its own core to allow for huge speed gains. If ripping one file, Colorgate will use idle APPE rips to speed up single file ripping. I have a large test file that would take about 8 minutes to rip before the speed update and now takes about 90 seconds. It is quite fast on a machine that is 5 years old running Win7.

 

[tooler82]

Been wanting to try Onyx but they won’t be me anymore programs since I have just about everyone they make.