Tyflow too slow to simulate

[shadowkiller]

Thanks for the reply Shadowkiller,

I normally leave the caching option in the tyflow object ON. The scrubbing is okay in the beginning of the time range. But if I scrub around the end, say around 300-400, I have to wait a lot for the simulation update. 

That's why I thought maybe exporting PRT cache would be the best. I did Friday night before left my studio to export PRT 1-100 frames only, and again, my 3dsMax crashed at frame 81... This is the third time my 3dsMax crashes while exporting PRT files.

Does it have to do with my RAM ? 

So do you mean that if my supposedly RAM limitation is preventing me from exporting the PRT cache, I will have to disable the "Enable Caching" in TyFlow and only then export /Generate the PRT files ? But don't I need the "Enable Caching" ON in TyFlow to export the same cache ? 

I am not sure about what "partitioning caches" you mean, I think I have to research more about this topic. So Tyflow alone is good for small simulations and if I need large simulations like the one I am doing (a train pushing a bunch of snow out of the track), we will have to buy Krakatoa render ?

Thanks for the reply guys.

The more frames you need to save into memory the longer it can take, but once it is cached the timeline scrubbing should be smooth. Is it trying to recalculate those later frames even after it has done it the first time?

If you run out of ram while its saving caches to disk it can crash max. If you disable the playback caching (in the tyflow obj) it uses FAR less ram for the simulation while you're saving to disk because its not accumulating all the params of the particles into your ram for every frame. The downside is if you move the timeline at all it has to recalculate that frame, but that is irrelevant if you're saving a scene to disk. The playback caching in the tyflow object is only really needed if you want to be able to scrub the timeline back and forth without having to wait for it to update.

As for partitioning, it is a term used from the krakatoa renderer. It refers to caching a particle scene on the HDD, then automatically changing the position seed of the particles and then saving again. This way you can multiply your particles as much as you want and allow for final renders that contain more particles than you would normally be able to do. My largest sim had 500 million particles (5 million x 100 partitions) and that was done on an old 4930k with only 32gb ram. It took 2.5TB on my HDD though. Tyflow can also do this if you save as a PRT cache.

Using lots of bindings might get pretty expensive. Rendering a ton of verts can also be quite expensive. My gpu is struggling when im drawing 5 million tetra geom shapes in my view port.