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Performance test results

13

Comments

  • Jake_RosenfeldJake_Rosenfeld Moderator, Onshape Employees, Developers Posts: 1,646
    edited August 2018
    @gkuhns @john_mcclary

    The GPU is definitely the most important piece of hardware for interactive performance in Onshape.  The largest piece of work that your CPU does is taking the graphical information from the server, unpacking it, and shuttling it over to the GPU.  One example of a case where a better GPU may make a difference is if you open a very complicated assembly after not opening it for a while.  Your CPU will receive all the graphical data for this model and then have to process it for viewing.  So, a better CPU will improve time-to-first-frame (a.k.a. the time it takes between opening the model and when it is displayed on screen).  Once it is displayed on screen, though, the CPU usually has negligible affect on the interactive performance (framerate when panning-rotating-zooming, or creating section views) compared to the GPU. In cases of very complicated assemblies, the CPU can start to have a noticable affect on interactive performance.

    Your CPU will have incremental performance gains/losses at any time when new graphical data is introduced.  Another example is when editing a feature in a part studio.  The CPU may have some very marginal effect on how long it takes to see the change when a parameter is changed (a vast majority of this time comes from calculating the actual geometric change on our side, though.  The affect of the CPU here is marginal at worst, and negligible in practice).

    @gkuhns It seems that you have nice hardware.  Are you experiencing performance problems?  We are happy to help diagnose them.
    Jake Rosenfeld - Modeling Team
  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    @Jake_Rosenfeld thanks for that bare metal insight. That helps paint a good picture of the system and will help when building our next computer upgrades
  • michael3424michael3424 Member Posts: 688 ✭✭✭✭
    @gkuhns @john_mcclary

    The GPU is definitely the most important piece of hardware for interactive performance in Onshape.  
    So what is a good GPU to get?  Is the NVidia Quadro lineup of cards any better than their game-oriented cards for apps like Onshape?
  • EvanEvan Onshape Employees Posts: 62
    edited August 2018
    "Professional" grade cards, like Quadros, will not give you a significant performance increase with Onshape.  So you tend to get the most value with a "game-oriented" card.  The specific card that you choose could depend on your model complexity, screen resolution, and how much your willing to spend. 

    Simple part studios and assemblies can typically be rendered around 60 fps (the browser limit) with a relatively modest GPU.  As the amount of data in the tab increases, as does the GPU workload.  So, for example, if you are loading assemblies with thousands of components consisting of millions of triangles, you may want to invest in a GPU with a higher number of shader cores and more memory.

    Screen resolution will also impact performance.  As display density increase, so does the demand on the GPU.  For instance, running a 4K display at native resolution will require storing and shading more pixels than a 1080p display.  So if you have a higher resolution display, you may want to consider a beefier GPU.

    Here are some top-reviewed options in different categories:
    https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gpus,4380.html
  • Don_Van_ZileDon_Van_Zile Member Posts: 195 PRO

    @even This is good information to know and should save users money thinking they require a Quadros for better performance. Many users held this belief that a Quadros card would improve performance (Pan, Zoom, Rotate etc..) using SW for many years which is false.
  • brett_heliesbrett_helies Member Posts: 1
    Browser seems to make quite a difference. On the same PC (i7 2600K @ 3.4GHz, GTX 670 2GB, 24GB RAM, Samsung EVO 840 SSD) at 2560x1200 resolution I get very different results with different browsers.

    Edge:  Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/58.0.3029.110 Safari/537.36 Edge/16.16299
    Measured triangles per second  144.9 million
    Measured lines per second        86.4 million

    Firefox:  Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:61.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/61.0
    Measured triangles per second  159.0 million
    Measured lines per second        137.8 million

    Chrome: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/68.0.3440.106 Safari/537.36
    Measured triangles per second  663.9 million
    Measured lines per second       177.1 million

    Guess I should be using Chrome then.
  • EvanEvan Onshape Employees Posts: 62
    @brett_helies - we do find that Chrome tends to be more efficient for real-time rendering than Firefox.  However, I would not expect to see such a large difference in results between the two.  You may want to run the test again in Chrome.  (One issue that is known to cause spurious results in Chrome is: if the rendering test goes off screen somehow.  In that case Chrome will "helpfully" skip all the work to do the rendering, which makes things appear much more efficient than they are in real world situations!)

    One caveat to Chrome being the faster renderer: Chrome's per-tab memory limit is significantly lower than 64-bit Firefox.  So if you are loading very large assemblies, we will hold back display data to keep Chrome under the limit.  This should help maintain interactive performance in Chrome, but it comes at the cost of having to occasionally swap data in and out, which does have an interactive penalty.  That said, for a typical model, everything will fit into Chrome's memory allotment.
  • daniel_cookdaniel_cook Member Posts: 48 PRO
    Evan said:
    @brett_helies - we do find that Chrome tends to be more efficient for real-time rendering than Firefox.  However, I would not expect to see such a large difference in results between the two.  You may want to run the test again in Chrome.  (One issue that is known to cause spurious results in Chrome is: if the rendering test goes off screen somehow.  In that case Chrome will "helpfully" skip all the work to do the rendering, which makes things appear much more efficient than they are in real world situations!)

    One caveat to Chrome being the faster renderer: Chrome's per-tab memory limit is significantly lower than 64-bit Firefox.  So if you are loading very large assemblies, we will hold back display data to keep Chrome under the limit.  This should help maintain interactive performance in Chrome, but it comes at the cost of having to occasionally swap data in and out, which does have an interactive penalty.  That said, for a typical model, everything will fit into Chrome's memory allotment.
    Hi Evan,

    I have a question specifically about your comment re: per tab memory usage in Chrome. I am 100% using 64-bit Chrome and previously when using some of my larger models I could easily reach 3-4GB+ memory in a Chrome tab and the model would load perfectly fine. This exact model used to drive system ram to about 10GB utilisation. Now Onshape is really struggling to load these models and I see that Chrome is bouncing between 1.5 - 2.0 GB for the tab. Generally the model never finishes loading at all. Attached is a screenshot of my memory monitor.



    You can also see the CPU bouncing up and down (Core i7-6700HQ). I am just wondering if holding back data to keep Chrome under the tab memory limit is a new thing or it's always been there and I need to look for another issue?

    Thanks!
  • EvanEvan Onshape Employees Posts: 62
    @daniel_cook - memory metering on Chrome has been in for several months. Though we will unload graphics for some parts, the model should finish loading. (That spinner should go away.)  Currently we only do metering for assemblies.  Part studios should load all parts (which can cause issues in Chrome).

    I would suggest that you try loading your model in Firefox to see if it performs better.  If you continue to experience issues, please reach out to support through the "Feedback" option under the help dropdown.


  • brian_bradybrian_brady Member, Developers Posts: 505 EDU
    I tested my lowly 2014 MacBook Air (8GB RAM and Intel HD 5000 graphics) today using both Chrome and Safari. I was surprised to learn that Safari performed better; about a 20% increase in triangles per second and about a 60% increase in lines per second. Neither case was what anyone would mistake as speedy. I usually use Safari because I like it better and thought it felt speedier, now I have proof.

    GL renderer   Intel HD Graphics 5000 OpenGL Engine

    Measured triangles per second   115.9 million
    Measured lines per second   46.7 million

  • bill_danielsbill_daniels Member Posts: 278 ✭✭✭
    Interesting thread.  It prompted me to do a non-scientific test by launching Ubuntu System Monitor and Nvidia X-Server utility.  I have an 8 processor (Xeon) system with 32G, 4G GTX 1050 Ti GPU and cable internet. 

    A very large assembly (1,221 Instances with may parts using best tessellation) loaded at the usual 5 minutes with Firefox with all CPU processors bouncing around between 10% and 100% utilization.  Once loaded, spinning this huge assembly around with the mouse showed 20-60 FPS with no more than 37% GPU utilization and 18% graphics memory utilization.  CPU utilization was the usual erratic shifting of work between CPU's with only one at a time running at 100%.  To my untrained eye, it looks like getting all CPU cores sharing the load more equally would help a lot.
  • 3dcad3dcad Member, OS Professional, Mentor Posts: 2,475 PRO
    I have seen noticeable difference on load times depending on time of the day. I suppose it depends on server loads and shared resources.
    Please correct me if I'm wrong and it's just my biological clock that makes load times feel different =)  
    //rami
  • daniel_cookdaniel_cook Member Posts: 48 PRO
    Evan said:
    @daniel_cook - memory metering on Chrome has been in for several months. Though we will unload graphics for some parts, the model should finish loading. (That spinner should go away.)  Currently we only do metering for assemblies.  Part studios should load all parts (which can cause issues in Chrome).

    I would suggest that you try loading your model in Firefox to see if it performs better.  If you continue to experience issues, please reach out to support through the "Feedback" option under the help dropdown.


    @Evan - I got back to my normal workstation and tried it again in Chrome - and you are right it did eventually load after maybe 5-7 minutes and several "timeout warnings" from Chrome.

    Tried the same model in Firefox and it loaded faster and used more "per tab" memory (checked the process memory usage) - all which I suspected would happen. My only gripe is that on large assemblies Firefox is just nowhere near as fast as Chrome but this isn't an Onshape issue.

    FYI - the model has 1,340 unique parts and 3,934 part occurrences.
  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    I also have a large model I have imported. I haven't managed to open the document without chrome crashing, on the other hand Firefox opened it within a minute. I'm starting to consider switch back over to Firefox after seeing other odd behaviors that are present in chrome but not in Firefox. 
  • john_rousseaujohn_rousseau Member, Onshape Employees, Developers Posts: 390
    Hi @3dcad. Can you give me the model ID and an example time when it was slow? We hear this complaint from time to time, but it's not generalized enough to diagnose. Our servers are automatically auto-scaled and should not be the problem. It's possible that it's the network near you.

    We've been working with some new performance monitoring tools and I'd like to see if I can pin this down.
    John Rousseau / VP, Technical Operations / Onshape Inc.
  • Don_Van_ZileDon_Van_Zile Member Posts: 195 PRO


    We've been working with some new performance monitoring tools and I'd like to see if I can pin this down.
    Will any of these in-house tools be considered to the public or packaged within Onshape in the future (potentially)?
  • john_rousseaujohn_rousseau Member, Onshape Employees, Developers Posts: 390
    These tools allow reporting from multiple places in the processing pipeline. This includes the client code in the browser and all server-side code. We are also looking into providing more, customer-visible performance tools to help diagnose hardware or network problems. Unfortunately, it's easy to mis-diagnose problems and we don't want to tell customers to get a new GPU or internet provider and find that doesn't provide any benefit. Stay tuned.
    John Rousseau / VP, Technical Operations / Onshape Inc.
  • Don_Van_ZileDon_Van_Zile Member Posts: 195 PRO

    Thanks for the feedback @john_rousseau
  • 3dcad3dcad Member, OS Professional, Mentor Posts: 2,475 PRO
    @john_rousseau
    I will put in ticket next time. 

    There's another factor too, when you try to show off something to a colleague/friend/customer it always makes things slow or even crash. Just like when your on phone and need to look some data it makes your whole computer freeze until you put off your phone. I'm not sure if it's about God or position of the Moon, need to run some more tests..  ;)
    //rami
  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    That's what you get for mooning God
  • tony_459tony_459 Member Posts: 206 ✭✭✭
    Very encouraging results from my new Razer Blade 15! This is technically a compact gaming machine. My 2018 Macbook Pro with its Iris integrated graphics card got me on the order of 65 million triangles per second.

    I can only imagine what the razer would do had I bought it with the GTX 1080 instead of the GTX 1060 (with Max Q technology for efficiency, meaning that its performance is about 15% less than a true GTX 2060 for the sake of better cooling and longer battery life).


  • tony_459tony_459 Member Posts: 206 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2019
    Correction—my 2018 Macbook Pro got me on the order of 30 million triangles per second. That's a, uh, 20-fold jump in performance and excuse me while I go scream for joy because now maybe I can finally work at a very respectable pace :D

    (Knock on wood.)


  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    edited June 2019
    Yea, I picked up an MSI GS75 Stealth a few months ago.

    It is powerful enough that I have retired my workstation at work, and my gaming station at home. Even handles Oculus Rift well. (With external fans of course)

    Performance in Onshape is pulling the same numbers as my GTX980 TI I ran at home, and the Quadro M4000 I was running at work.

    Laptops have come a long way, and Onshape still runs great even on the tired old laptop we use to host the big screen TV in the conference room... That thing takes a full minute to open chrome.. but once in Onshape.. you can hardly notice.



    Going to laser cut a better cooling base for work, hard to find a quality cooler with the fans feed directly into the vent



  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    @tony_soares459 did that Mac even have a discrete card?
  • daniel_cookdaniel_cook Member Posts: 48 PRO
    I also recommend a high end gaming GPU for larger Onshape assemblies - I have an RX 580 in my desktop and a GTX 1070 in my laptop - the 1070 is much faster in more complex assemblies in terms of spin and move - which makes life much easier.

    Onshape runs great on low end hardware for simple models, but the same adage holds somewhat true as traditional CAD  - at some point you need more power. When you hit that tipping point you'll know it.
  • tony_459tony_459 Member Posts: 206 ✭✭✭
    @john_mcclary---I knew I'd see others using gaming laptops for CAD work! Only an integrated card on my Macbook Pro. 

    Neat thing to make---a custom cooling base! Do you have your own laser cutter? I'm eyeing a Glowforge but I worry it won't last... and I hear their warranty is very modest (only 6 months, I think, and that's on a new product that is largely untested...)

    More results from my razer, now on Chrome and with GPU configured for maximum performance :D



    I won't lie, though, my models get very large and that razer still feels slow at times :/


  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    Triangle count is very high, your probably feeling slow because of the line count. Which is still a respectable amount. I would try hiding edges when you have a large assembly. It may help a little. At least it did in SW. 

    Yea we have a laser table at work. I have a cooling base but it is loud,under powererd, the fans are in a crappy place, it is slightly small so the laptop wants to suicide jump over the front lip, made of the cheapest quality plastic...  figured I'd just make my own out of scrap aluminum, add a thermal sensor and some noctua fans and a wall plug to free up a usb port and make it more permanent..

    So far I've got the same amount invested into the parts as I did the crap one, should have just done this to begin with.
  • michael3424michael3424 Member Posts: 688 ✭✭✭✭

    I'm eyeing a Glowforge but I worry it won't last... and I hear their warranty is very modest (only 6 months, I think, and that's on a new product that is largely untested...)


    You probably already know the pros so this is just a heads up on a few cons with the Glowforge - they (still) don't import DXF files directly, the built-in cooling for the Basic model is pretty limited and many folks have thermal shutdowns in warm weather, and they have had to replace several hundred units (or more) due to shipping damage or mechanical/electrical failures.  Quite a few users have gotten refurbished (used) units as warranty replacements, which would annoy me a great deal but doesn't bother some.  Their on-line tech support is quite spotty - some issues don't get officially responded to for 5 days or more and they offer no phone support at all  I had one on pre-order for nearly 2 years and finally canceled it for a Ruida-based import with more power and features at a slight upcharge and have been quite happy with the unit for 18 months now.

  • todd_bettenhausentodd_bettenhausen Member Posts: 8
    I've noticed the "Measuring Performance" window in System Check isn't showing all the parts any more. It's as if it's "zoomed in" and I only see a flash of something in the upper right corner. Could this be a DPI scaling issue?


    FWIW, I'm seeing appx. 500/240 (very consistently) on a Xeon-powered Dell Precision M5530 laptop with a Quadro P2000.
  • john_mcclaryjohn_mcclary Member, Developers Posts: 3,935 PRO
    looks right on my browser
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