I am using Maya 7.0 along with Mentalray.  I am finding that the rendering engine does not use a lot of my ram but instead seems to be hitting a swap file.  This is a problem that we have been struggling with for a while with Mentalray.  I would like to know if anyone has experienced a similar situation and if there is some “tweak” I can do to fix this.  Thanks.

Your computer will create a swap file regardless of how much system RAM is available, it’s the nature of current operating systems…
What is the “problem” that your refering to?

n8skow [FA]

I guess what i am saying is that when I watch my physical memory it does not go up or down as i start a rendering. Why is Maya not using any of my physical memory first?  isnt the physical memory faster than a swap file?

hiiiiiiiii plz help me i have quad-core intel xeon proocessor 5300 series supermicro

my speed render is fast in de vray pal help me

my system is server

feri_yakuza 19 February 2008 03:17 PM

hiiiiiiiii plz help me i have quad-core intel xeon proocessor 5300 series supermicro

my speed render is slow slow slow slow slow in de vray pal help me

my system is server

what the hell is your question feri_yakuza? and according to vray you maybe ask in max forum!

dhart2 19 February 2008 02:25 PM

I guess what i am saying is that when I watch my physical memory it does not go up or down as i start a rendering. Why is Maya not using any of my physical memory first?  isnt the physical memory faster than a swap file?

Yes, system RAM is mucho faster than a swap file, (be assured, Maya ‘is’ using physical memory), but there’s several reasons you’ll always have a swap file… and several reasons Maya will never have access to all of your RAM, (operating system overhead, background applications/processes, etc.)

Do you believe your having performance issues related to memory? There’s quite a bit of tweaking that can be done to optimize your maya projects:

http://www.cgtantra.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1152

n8skow [FA]

Thank you so much for the info.  I have been searching for some of this data for a long time.  Does the info still apply if i am using Mental Ray Sattelite?

dhart2 27 February 2008 04:20 PM

Thank you so much for the info.  I have been searching for some of this data for a long time.  Does the info still apply if i am using Mental Ray Sattelite?

a MR Satellite machine will have access to a little bit more memory compared to a machine running Maya, but that’s about it…

n8skow [FA]

I think it is a Windows problem. It tries to put some to swap.. Always. It as annoying sometimes. Normaly your sytem uses half of your ram and your programs use the other half but you can set it to 3:1 so your programs can access 3gb of ram. I have heard that using 3:1 switch also forces your system to use your ram. So Windows will not use swap file that much. Also if you have enough ram you can set your swap file Max 16mb maybe 256 so your system will use your ram but i tried. Windows mostly increases the swap even if you set it.  There is nothing much to do but you can tweak render settings.. maybe bsp so it will use more ram . The main solution is in Microsoft