VideoStudio X8.5 and nVidia

[Pavel_Kolotilov]

Hi,

I just upgraded to Quadro K600 card (Kepler architecture). I did it primarily for the reasons of being able to connect a couple of high resolution monitors. And also because it has 192 Cuda cores and a dedicated h264 encoder (nvenc). But it seems I cannot make them work with Videostudio x8.5.

I did everything recommended by the collegues from this post: http://forum.corel.com/EN/viewtopic.php ... 60#p304540 but it looks like VS cannot pick up the right hardware accelerator. Though I have hardware acceleration ticked, on the GPU-Z GPU load and Video engine load is at 0%. It is probably using the Intel i7 hardware accelerator? In the nvidia screen manager, the VS is registered though.

I also tried out a trial version of Cyberlink Powerdirector 14. There the acceleration is clearly working. The 1 min project is processed in about 40 sec. And GPU-Z shows the use of the GPU at about 12%, and video engine at almost 100%.

Did anyone manage to make Videostudio x8.5 use either nvenc (the new library) or nvcuvenc (old CUDA library)?

Help much appreciated,

Best regards,

[aljimenez]

No luck here with VS using most video graphic cards acceleration.

[Pavel_Kolotilov]

Hi,

Yes, I figured...

Anyway, on the positive side: I did some benchmarks with VS x8.5, Powerdirector 14 and Sony Movie Studio 13 and the results show that even without HW acceleration VS manages to beat the other two (on my Skylake i7 6700 CPU).

I took a 1 min Full HD 50P project that had several crossfades, but no heavy plugins/effects. And I was creating AVCHD 25 mBit file with 5.1 sound in 1 Pass.

1. VS X8.5:
With HW acceleration: 45 sec
NO HW acceleration: 45 sec.

In both cases Use of CPU around 90-100 (all 4 cores), GPU load = 0, GPU Video engine Load = 0

So, on my machine VS clearly cannot use HW.

2. PowerDirector
With HW acceleration: 49 sec, CPU around 40%, GPU load = around 12%, GPU Video engine Load = 70-100%
NO HW acceleration: 1,02 sec. CPU around 100%, GPU load = around 3%, GPU Video engine Load =0%

So, it looks like this one uses NVenc and not CUDA!!! But still, it is slower then VS.

Also, powerDirector gets really slow when you use newblue titler: this latter heavily uses GPU, so it can take much more time if you have titles. And generally PD feels much less efficient and heavy then VS.

3. Sony Movie studio 13
With HW acceleration (CUDA specifically): 3min 39 sec, CPU around 50%, GPU load = around 80%, GPU Video engine Load = 0%
NO HW acceleration: 1 min 40 sec. CPU around 85-90%, GPU load = around 25%, GPU Video engine Load =0%

Sony specifically says that it uses CUDA.

This has a real difficult learning curve, but feels really fast. Though clearly coding is not its strong part.

So, I guess, I will stop worrying and will learn to love VS X8.5 (C).

Best regards,

Pavel

[Ken Berry]

Privyet, Pavel! Kak ti dyelayesh?

This whole question of HW acceleration has been coming up for quite a few versions of VS now. Everyone asks if it works, and no one can show that it does (or not). At least you have done some comparative tests. Bolshoi spasibo!

One thing we learned several versions ago was that VS was using a very old version of CUDA and was not able to deal with more recent versions. I am not aware if Corel have ever updated this, but from other comments on the forum, I don't think they have!

I have no idea about NVenc since I had never heard of it before you mentioned it, though I am interested in your belief that maybe X8.5 uses it. Given the inability of VS to deal with recent CUDA, forgive me if I still have doubts about this. Only Corel would be able to tell us, but they have never shared this secret with us despite many requests.

Nice, though, that your tests still give good marks to VS whether or not acceleration works. I am sure, though, that there are other users here who will do their own tests. Coincidentally, I have both Power Director 14 and Sony Movie Studio Platinum 13 and like both of them, though prefer VS for various reasons. I have never tested the acceleration aspects of any of them, however, possibly because I am retired and have plenty of time for the renders. I just go and have lunch or dinner or whatever... and wait patiently for the result...

Yeshyo raz, spasibo! Molodyetz!

[Pavel_Kolotilov]

Не за что, Кен! (Do not mention it, Ken (Rus.)).

Clearly on my set up VS does not use any kind of HW acceleration. I am not sure if it has something to do with the driver or VS just does not support CUDA any more. The problem in my case that I cannot downgrade to old driver, because nvcuvenc (CUDA H264 encoding) have been removed long before Nvidia issued the first Windows 10 driver. So, I stuck with the latest drivers without nvcuvenc.

Also, as I understand, you need a lot of CUDA cores to be able to compete with i7. I have a relatively simple graphics card, which has "only" 192 CUDA cores. So Sony Movie Studio finishes two times faster with CPU, then when it is using CUDA. I guess you need 512+ CUDA cores to be able to compete with i7 CPU.

That is why, like in your case, I just have to wait

Cheers,

Pavel

[SoNic67]

Corel doesn't use hardware acceleration for video encoding.
As for your test, try to encode in PowerDirector something in h264 or h265 - that's where you will see a difference. Also your Quadro card is not so great for video editing, better one is the newer GTX960 or 950.

[Pavel_Kolotilov]

Hi SoNic67,

Thanks for the tip. And in the PD I was using AVCHD, witch is H264, so I guess on my system it is as good as it gets.

On the other hand, I have a low profile system so I cannot use anything more powerful . Maybe quadro k620 later.

Best regards,

Pavel

[SoNic67]

None of those customer-grade NLE software (Corel, Cyberlink) make use of Quadro's capabilities, don't waste your money on them. Like I said, the GTX 950 or 960 are better for video editing because they have the latest video encoder hardware (third-gen NVENC, in Maxwell 2gen). And they are very low power and some might even be half-height/low profile (if you need that).
Sure, it still requires Corel to do something on their part to use it, like CL did.
Until then you can try this trick on Corel - installs portions of an older nVidia driver, dll's that still employs the CUDA encoding versus the NVENC one, it might work on your card.
Let me know if it did.

[Pavel_Kolotilov]

Hi,

In my first post I was mentioning that I did everything you proposed to enable CUDA. But somehow it does not work on VS (but does on Sony Movie Studio).

On the other hand I had a look on what I can get for the low profile system and support for DP at 4K resolution. Maximum is GeForce GTX 750 Ti OC 2xHDMI DP 2GB or Quadro K620 , which both use the first generation Maxwell. Geforce is 60W and quadro is 45 (and generally I hate noise). So, maybe in the future I will consider one of them.

Thanks a lot, and in the meantime I bought PowerDirector 14. I will play with it for a while

Pavel

[SoNic67]

Good luck! I guess I'll see you on the "other" side