CPU processing on iClone does not seem to take advantage of multiple cores, at least on my system. I have a 4 core i-7 processor that shows only about 17 - 20% CPU usage whenever it is doing operations like real-time smooth, rendering (even with hardware acceleration), etc. I am not sure if it is using multiple threads (I think that would be a max of two for now on Intel CPUs), but this means that the most powerful Xeon-based workstations would barely operate faster than my machine, since they generally have poor single core, single threaded performance.
Taking advantage of the processing power of GPUs is great, but the system still seems highly underutilized. I would like to see iClone take optimal advantage of the CPU resources available to a system. I am sure this will help with screen updates and other features as well.
I have a GeForce 770 GTX. I plan on adding a 1080 soon, but to jump to another system without multi-core processing seems wasteful. My old i-7 4790K is pretty high up there for a four year old processor, scoring 2,531 in single threaded performance on the "non-high end" CPU chart, and for all of the hype for the new multi-core AMD processors, none of them are near the top ten in single core single threaded performance: the "High-End" AMD Ryzen Threadripper 1950X (16 cores) only gets a 1,996 in single threaded (!) performance (Passmark doesn't make a chart for High-End CPU single threaded performance, only an aggregate, overall benchmark (you have to see the details for each processor to get that number). Even a relatively high clocked Intel Xeon W-2145 @ 3.70GHz (8 Cores), designed with less cores due to heat, only manages a single threaded score of 2,537. When we look at the overall multi-core, multi-threaded performance, we start to see some differences* (I included the current highest-end Xeon as well):
Intel Xeon Platinum 8173M @ 2.00GHz (28 cores) - Average CPU Mark: 28,860; Single Threaded Rating: 2,003; Price: $8,720
AMD Ryzen Threadripper 1950X (16 cores) - Average CPU Mark: 22,108; Single Threaded Rating: 1,996; Price: $775
Xeon W-2145 @ 3.70GHz (8 cores) - Average CPU Mark: 19,769; Single Threaded Rating: 2,537; Price: $1,295
Intel Core i7-8086K @ 4.00GHz (6 cores) - Average CPU Mark: 17,081; Single Threaded Rating: 2,875; Price: $425
Intel Core i7-4790K @ 4.00GHz (4 cores) - Average CPU Mark: 11,185; Single Threaded Rating: 2,531; Price: $320
Xeon motherboards can have multiple CPUs (an attachment below shows a Quad Xeon motherboard that can host four of those Xeon Platinum 8173M processors, but that would be over $32,000 in CPUs alone...).
CPU core performance advances have actually been pretty pathetic in the past couple of years. All we are really getting is more processing cores, albeit surrounded by fantastic peripherals and accessories. It would be great to take better advantage of these extras core and threads, especially with the AMD Threadripper CPUs coming in at such an aggressive price/performance point and what Intel will have to do to respond.
Thanks for your time and I look forward to your response and the response of the community in general.
*Benchmark numbers are from:
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/
