Question AMD vs nVidia for professional Unreal Engine 4 ???

[Sphiral]

Henlouuu there!!

I've a friend who is actually programming a game using Unreal 4, and in a future Unreal 5. Since it's an unknow world for me I came here for all your knowledge! :3
Apparently there is no much difference in CPU for this between Intel and AMD....but what about GPU's?

Thanks in advance! =)

 

[Paul98]

Unreal likes to have more cores/threads, especially when compiling shaders or building lights.


As for the GPU, right now doesn't feel like the best time to buy, especially with new stuff from both AMD and NVidia right around the corner. I would look at something cheaper for now, then not only when you have a bit more of a budget, but when new stuff comes out you can get something good with any new features.

If not and you must get something now, I would say the 2060 as it should at least allow most things to be tested.

 

[zlatan]

Henlouuu there!!

I've a friend who is actually programming a game using Unreal 4, and in a future Unreal 5. Since it's an unknow world for me I came here for all your knowledge! :3
Apparently there is no much difference in CPU for this between Intel and AMD....but what about GPU's?

Thanks in advance! =)

On the CPU side more cores will give you a better development environment. So get as many cores/threads as you can.

On the GPU side, it doesn't matter, if you use the main branch. Epic optimize for both AMD and NVIDIA. But if you want to integrate something specific, or want to use 3rd party plugins, than you should get a GPU that is more useful for your workflow. For example, if you want to integrate NVIDIA GameWorks effects, than use a GeForce. If you want to use a plugin that is depends on Radeon Rays, like Steam Audio 2.0 (3D audio), than use a Radeon. It is still possible to build a game that is run on everything, but you will have much less headaches developing on the supported hardwares.

If you want to modify the renderer, than it is a tricky one. For D3D12 it doesn't matter. You get good implementations on both sides, and PIX is a very good tool from Microsoft. On Vulkan I generally recommend Radeon. Their Vulkan implementation is much more robust, and they follow the specification very well, while Renderdoc works great with RGP. Ofcourse you can use GeForce for Vulkan, but you need to work much more to achieve good performance, because Renderdoc don't support directly the Vulkan profiler from NVIDIA.
Lastly if you want to modify the memory management for the renderer, I don't recommend it, but if you really want, than use an AMD GPU, because you need the Radeon Memory Visualizer to counter oversubscription, and detect memory leaks. There is no other way to do it.

 

[AtenRa]

I'm not sure what you meant, but I made a mistake. UE4 uses DXR, which still doesn't support Radeons, so that's why Nvidia GPU is required.
Anyway, even if it's already known that Radeons will be added soon (because Xbox), I haven't seen any info which older generations will be supported. So Nvidia remains the only safe bet at the moment if one wants to try RTRT in UE.

It had nothing to do with Radeons,
You said that RT is build on cuda (not true) and non RTX cards emulate RT , which is not how RT on those cards is working.

 

[piokos]

It had nothing to do with Radeons,
You said that RT is build on cuda (not true) and non RTX cards emulate RT , which is not how RT on those cards is working.

?
RT obviously can be calculated on GPGPU. I'm sure you've heard about GPU rendering before...
I don't know why you're so focused on RTX. It's not essential. Any GPU can do RT. Hardware acceleration's role is just to make it faster.

I admit the earlier comment wasn't perfect. I thought UE RT implementation uses something from CUDA and that's why Radeons aren't supported. I didn't know DXR still doesn't support AMD (which is quite weird...).

 

[Sphiral]

Unreal likes to have more cores/threads, especially when compiling shaders or building lights.


As for the GPU, right now doesn't feel like the best time to buy, especially with new stuff from both AMD and NVidia right around the corner. I would look at something cheaper for now, then not only when you have a bit more of a budget, but when new stuff comes out you can get something good with any new features.

If not and you must get something now, I would say the 2060 as it should at least allow most things to be tested.

I think 2060 is out of the actual budget atm....no way I can fit both 2060 and 3700x with 1000€ budget ^^'

 

[Sphiral]

I'm not sure why you're so focused on GPU performance here.
Compiling happens on the CPU - much like most (if not all) rendering. I'm not sure what use of GPU there is outside of testing. You'd have to look into UE4 documentation.
If 3D modelling will be done in 3rd party tools, they may utilize a GPU or not (higher chance of supporting Nvidia).

Depending on the size of the project, I'd focus on CPU and RAM. And since this is for learning and could be a one-off, I'd use cloud or a swarm setup from whatever was available (as pro game developers would ).

In fact, if you go into UE4 hardware requirements, GPU isn't even mentioned - other than having to support DX11/12.

Hardware and Software Specifications | Unreal Engine Documentation

On the bottom of this page they show an example of a workstation used by Epic developers - with GTX970.

Nvidia probably offers more support and it will be easier to find help in the dev community, so that's clearly the safe choice. But since developing on UE4 isn't very GPU-dependent, the buyer should be fine with an AMD card as well.

The only exception being...


This is incorrect. UE4 supports RTRT and it requires an Nvidia card, precisely:
"NVIDIA RTX and some GTX series cards with DXR support using the latest device drivers."

Hardware Ray Tracing Tips And Tricks In Unreal Engine | Unreal Engine 5.4 Documentation | Epic Developer Community

A collection of topics to aid with development of projects using hardware ray tracing features in Unreal Engine.

docs.unrealengine.com

In other words: RTRT is built on CUDA and it may use RTX or be emulated on a non-RTX card.

"Cloud....Swarm".....I'm so ******* lost right now xDDD

 

[Sphiral]

There is so many of you who jumped in to help: my gratitude in advance!
Information that you guys mention sometimes is so unknown for me, so I'm gonna make it simple:
a) How do you feel with a Ryzen 7 3700x + RX 580 ?
b) Also their budget might shrink so: how difference would be between Ryzen 7 1700 vs 3700x? Money wise it's a ******* lot, both 8 cores 16 threats

Again, thank you all!! <3

Please. No profanity in the tech forums.
administrator allisolm

 

[marcUK2]

I develop in UE4.....it eats RAM, make sure you have at least 32GB, preferably more

 

[Hitman928]

There is so many of you who jumped in to help: my gratitude in advance!
Information that you guys mention sometimes is so unknown for me, so I'm gonna make it simple:
a) How do you feel with a Ryzen 7 3700x + RX 580 ?
b) Also their budget might shrink so: how difference would be between Ryzen 7 1700 vs 3700x? Money wise it's a ******* lot, both 8 cores 16 threats

Again, thank you all!! <3

Please. No profanity in the tech forums.
administrator allisolm

I would go with a Ryzen 3600 before going for a 1700 unless you are getting it for a crazy good price.

 

[Sphiral]

I would go with a Ryzen 3600 before going for a 1700 unless you are getting it for a crazy good price.

Ryzen 7 1700 = 150€
Ryzen 7 3700x = 330€

 

[Sphiral]

I develop in UE4.....it eats RAM, make sure you have at least 32GB, preferably more

My buddy is actually working on her laptop with just 8gb or ram....xDDDD

 

[Headfoot]

stick with 3000 series Ryzens before going to earlier models. The 3000's are way better. 3600 is probably the minimum they will want

 

[Hitman928]

Ryzen 7 1700 = 150€
Ryzen 7 3700x = 330€

What about 3600?

 

[Sphiral]

What about 3600?

Ryzen 5 3600 = 190€

 

[Sphiral]

stick with 3000 series Ryzens before going to earlier models. The 3000's are way better. 3600 is probably the minimum they will want

Now that we are on that subgect for video editing and streaming/recording & gaming, both Ryzen 2700X and 3600 have the same price, 190€. Which choice??

 

[Hitman928]

Ryzen 5 3600 = 190€

I would go for the 3600 unless you just can't fit it in the budget.

 

[Sphiral]

I would go for the 3600 unless you just can't fit it in the budget.

Also for the other question/use?

 

[Headfoot]

same answer. Stay 3000 series. You want to keep that high single thread performance for situations where more cores doesnt help. 3600 is basically a total sweet spot for CPUs right now.

 

[Hitman928]

Also for the other question/use?

It just depends on specific apps and priorities. The 3600 will be better at gaming. If you are streaming and gaming, I would think you would want to use the GPU encoder which means that the 3600 again should do better as you'll get better gaming performance. If mainly want to do video editing then it's a tougher choice, but personally I would probably still lean towards the 3600 as it's superior IPC allows it to get really close and sometimes even beat the 2700x in video editing depending on the program and usage scenario.

 

[marcUK2]

My buddy is actually working on her laptop with just 8gb or ram....xDDDD

It will work but it ain't gonna be pretty once she gets past the basics.

Personally on the budget, I would try to find a deal on a 2700 or 2700x, pair it with a 2060s and get 32gb ram, on a b450. And never underestimate the amount of HD space you will use in ue. Get a fast ssd and a huge HD for projects and assets.

Even better would be to wait until 4000 series ryzen and rtx3000 or navi, and try to pick up some deals on last gen parts.

Remember, creating games is not the same as playing them, and a well balanced system with excess memory will perform far better overall for the intended use than a few extra fps in testing.

 

[marcUK2]

When I work solo in ue4, I have ue4 open, visual studio, cinema4d, blender, affinity photo, affinity designer, a couple of webpages open, maybe quixel bridge and substanse....you get the idea, creation is not playing.

 

[marcUK2]

Ås the budget was i euros i prised up a system og mindfactory.de for 998 euros
You can get, note i didnt get the cheapest of everything, just reasonable.
Ryzen 3600
32gb
B450 motherboard
500gb ssd m.2
6tb hd
2060super
Cheapo case
700w psu chieftec

It can be done...just

 

[Sphiral]

It just depends on specific apps and priorities. The 3600 will be better at gaming. If you are streaming and gaming, I would think you would want to use the GPU encoder which means that the 3600 again should do better as you'll get better gaming performance. If mainly want to do video editing then it's a tougher choice, but personally I would probably still lean towards the 3600 as it's superior IPC allows it to get really close and sometimes even beat the 2700x in video editing depending on the program and usage scenario.

For streaming I use OBS; and for video editing I have Premiere Pro

 

[Juiblex]

I think most devs use Nvidia as they have better drivers and support.

Be thankful that is just the first page.

 

[Sphiral]

Be thankful that is just the first page.

LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL