CPU/GPU usage while rendering

[Jqke]

I'm rendering a video that is heavy on effects and layers + using 3d elements. The render time shows 5 hours and 43 minutes remaining after 7 minutes of rendering, which sort of makes sense, but it seems just a little longer than I would expect. 

My main question though is how can I get my CPU or GPU to be utilized more during renders? My CPU is only running at around 26% capacity and my GPU at 7%. 

I was able to get a new GPU recently (RTX 3060 Ti), and it should improve render times from a 1660 SUPER.. right? Especially if I use GPU acceleration... My render times are slower with my current GPU while using GPU acceleration, so my secondary question is, will this new GPU actually speed up my render times? 

Please also let me know after all this information if 5 1/2 hours of render times does make sense, because I don't really know if it does or doesn't.

My system:

Ryzen 5 5600X

GTX 1660 SUPER (upgrading soon to a 3060 Ti)

32 GB RAM

1 TB WD SN550 NVME M.2 SSD

Using AE CC2022 & ME CC2022

UPDATE:

Render crashed, now the project is taking forever to load the preview. This just started happening in the past couple days. My last render took around 15 hours, this did not used to happen before while equally heavy effects on projects.

The project has an imported .aec file from Cinema 4D, so a png sequence (duplicated 3 times with effects on different layers) and a camera. 

9 Adjustment Layers (including 3rd party effects, one is RSMB)

2 Optical Flares

5 Solids with Trapcode Plugins

Around 5 other things like a black solid, some blurs and a couple video clips using 3d layers. 

[RobShultz]

Maybe try going to edit/purge all memory and disk cache and see if it helps.

[Warren Heaton · Accepted solution]

As far as After Effects goes, you're likely to see faster render times by upgrading your CPU instead of your GPU.

Puget Systems publishes some great articles as well as benchmark tests to compare your setup to other setups.

• https://www.pugetsystems.com/all_articles.php?filter[]=After%20Effects

This blog covers good information about performance as well as a link to Adobe's Multi-frame Rendering benchmark project.

• https://business.adobe.com/blog/the-latest/multi-frame-rendering-now-in-after-effects-beta

Equiloud's AE Performance Test project is dated, but there are numerous comments from users about hardware setup and render time in the comments.

• https://vimeo.com/118053656
  
  

The After Effects user guide has helpful information to review as well.

• https://helpx.adobe.com/after-effects/using/improve-performance.html

[Jqke]

I had a slight feeling about this. I did find a little work around. The RSMB was causing the issue. I may try to see if theres a way I can maek the RSMB settings better. But for now, I can just add it post-render on the clip. It looks pretty much the exact same. Well at least I also do some gaming so it won't be completely useless ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Jqke]

If I'm not wrong the 5600X is one of the best CPUs for Adobe software. Is it worth it to upgrade to a 5900X later down the road? Honestly a 12900k probably isn't worth it for the amount of money it would cost to get a motherboard as well as the chip.

[Warren Heaton]

There's "the best" and then there's the "sweet spot".

Have you had a chance to run any of the benchmark projects?

Here are some numbers from a high-end system for comparison:

AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3990X 64-Core Processor 2.9 GHz

256GB RAM

Windows 10 Pro

NVIDIA GeForce RTX3090 24GB

Adobe's MFR Benchmark in AE 2020 (no MFR):

• 11 Minutes, 68 Seconds 

Equilouds's AE Test in AE 2020:

• 2 Minutes, 48 Seconds

It's important to keep in mind what fits your budget, balancing your hardware and software.  Do you invest in something more powerful?  Do you to dial back effects that are slow to render?  

[Jqke]

Yeah, that's what I meant to say. Best is the wrong word. It definitely isn't the best 😛

The price is pretty low for a pretty good CPU, so I would consider it a sweet spot for me.

I ran PugetBench for AE and here are the results:

This seems relatively low, especially for the score that is displayed in an LTT video. Is this possibly an issue?

I don't really have a budget right now. If there is a CPU that would be super beneficial that costs a lost more (that isn't a Threadripper), I will save up for it. If I HAD to name a budget, probably around $600-$700 as a rough estimate.

One last note: When I ran PugetBench, it said that I had to disable Cache Frames When Idle. Is this also something I should be aware of?

[Warren Heaton]

@Jqke 

Regarding "disable Cache Frames When Idle": render times are faster if After Effects has been able to cache frames before the render is started.  When working, we usually want this.  When benchmarking, we usually don't.

[Jqke]

I looked at results for PugetBench with the 5600x. My score was the lower than any of them. I believe there is something wrong with that. Maybe it has to do with memory? I should put my memory to 3200mhz. I thought it was on 3200 but it was only on 2133 😛

[Warren Heaton]

If faster rendering is what you're after, you want faster processors.

[Jqke]

So I should just get a better processor to get a higher score in PugetBench? I still don't understand how people are getting double the scores with the same processor.

If it isn't the processor that is causing low scores, then what is?

[nubnubbud]

it's adobe.
also their programs can't take advantage of modern hardware. get the fastest single core score card you can... basically ignore the GPU, and there you go it's as good as it gets.

[nubnubbud]

if you're not using rotobrush, I would suggest using CS6! it's blazing fast! It was back when Adobe's financial incentive was driven by indie artists, so it's slim, effective, and great at all the things a good editor needs, and even comes with a fully usable demo version of Mocha, for real deep tracks!

[Jqke]

Thank you for the reply, but if I have the CC suite, do I have access to CS6 as well or do I have to buy it seperately?

[Warren Heaton]

CS6 is officially discontinued.  

Also, it lacks the under-the-hood improvements that have been made to After Effects.

[Jqke]

That's what I thought though. Honestly I like old versions of AE a lot and would definitely use them if Adobe still had them available.