In this episode we’re making four
Unreal Engine usage comparisons between two workstations,
an old 4-core Intel i7 machine
versus a new 12-core AMD Ryzen.
Although our Intel machine is 11 years old,
it’s still going strong for graphics and video editing.
Recently two of our patrons traveled across
the Atlantic for a visit, surprising us with a brand new
fully sponsored, AMD Ryzen workstation for our studio!
We did 4 tests to measure the performance
difference while doing identical Unreal Engine tasks.
The first test is to launch Unreal Engine 4.27
via the Epic Games Launcher, and then start a new blank project.
On both machines this was done directly after a reboot.
In these tests we’ll be looking at how much
time is wasted waiting for the old machine.
As you can see, by the time we start creating
the new project on the new machine,
the old one is still loading the Epic Games Launcher.
In the end, the old machine wasted 2 minutes and 51 seconds.
The new machine is very quick, at 4.3 times faster.
However, 16 seconds accounted for
user interaction in setting up the new project.
If we discounted that,
then the new machine is about 6x faster.
The second test is to load
the Truck and Trailers project,
which we got from the Unreal Engine Marketplace.
We sped up the screen capture video clips
to spare you the agony of waiting through all of this.
The task manager shows the
system specs and the CPU thread activity.
After initializing and loading, the old machine
opens the UE4 editor after 6 minutes and 50 seconds,
something which takes the new machine
only 2 minutes and 20 seconds.
After that, each machine compiles shaders,
something Unreal Engine users are familiar with,
8 threads are in use on the Intel CPU,
while 24 threads run on the AMD.
The moment the shaders are compiled,
we stop the clocks.
What one machine did in 15 minutes and 49 seconds,
took the other only 3 minutes and 55 seconds,
making it 4 times faster.
We wasted 11 minutes and 54 seconds on the old machine.
The third test is to launch the City Park Environment
Collection project, which has already been downloaded
and created, but with zero shaders compiled.
Each machine must simply reboot,
launch UE4.26,
load the project, and compile the shaders.
It’s good to quantify how productive you are
with the equipment you have,
to see where you can save time.
Time saved does not just mean work is completed sooner,
but it also results in more iterations
to achieve a far better version of your creative vision.
Take note that both workstation GPUs
have only 8 gigabytes of VRAM.
The one huge gain on the new workstation
is having more and faster CPU cores,
while the other gain is having lots more RAM.
64 GB of RAM on the new system,
offers far greater stability,
resulting in far less Unreal Engine crashes,
which saves even more time and frustration.
The results are in!
The old machine crashed after 1 hour
and 25 minutes, while the new one
took 29 minutes and 56 seconds
to successfully load the scene.
After multiple crashes on the old machine,
we gave up, with many hours wasted.
The final test is to have each workstation import
the same MetaHuman into a blank
UE4.27 project via the Quixel Bridge,
and then compile the shaders.
This is a custom MetaHuman we made in MetaHuman Creator,
already downloaded on each machine
so we’re not spoiling the test with different download speeds.
With UE4.27 already open,
the test started as soon as we
clicked the Export button in Bridge.
Once again this process is significantly
accelerated for your viewing pleasure.
The timecode on the old machine,
tells a terrible tale of woe.
It’s proof that over the period of a year,
all the hours lost may have accrued
to weeks, and perhaps even months.
On the old machine we wait to load the application,
wait to load the project,
wait to compile shaders,
and wait for renders.
If there’s a crash, which happens frequently,
you wait for all of that all over again.
On a slow machine, the actual time spent
on creative work inside a scene is just
the bare minimum to have something which works.
There’s hardly any time for refinements.
This tests your patience, your sanity,
your relationships, your resolve,
and even career choices.
Getting the bigger and faster machine early on,
is clearly the smart choice.
When it comes to Unreal Engine, we reckon the focus
should be lots of RAM first
(32 GB minimum),
then lots of fast CPU cores,
and a high-end GPU with
more than 8 GB VRAM if you can,
and of course SSDs or NVMe drives.
All this is expensive,
but well worth it if you consider
we’re doing virtual filmmaking on a computer!
OK, the results are in!
The old machine took a super long
57 minutes and 57 seconds,
while the new one took only 8 minutes and 26 seconds.
Waiting 8 minutes to load
a fresh MetaHuman is already a long wait.
Working on the old machine wasted
49 minutes and 31 seconds,
making the new machine 6.8 times faster.
As expected, gear does matter!
Do you struggle with Unreal Engine
on your hardware set up?
Please post your comments below.