Since we have already discussed it in our article called "Intel Pentium 4 3.06GHz CPU with Hyper-Threading Technology: Killing Two Birds with a Stone…", you should remember that Hyper-Threading technology emulates a dual-processor platform with only one physical CPU in the system. Therefore, I suggest that you also try to recall what the advantages of a dual-processor system are in 3ds max 5 application. Having hard time? Let me help you then :)

As you know, the final renderer in 3ds max is optimized exclusively for dual-processor platforms. It results into an 80% performance growth, which is quite a usual thing for 3ds max. Also dual-processor platforms have a few advantages for processing massive geometry in viewports due exactly to the fact that there are two CPUs instead of one: we all know that the geometry calculations in 3ds max are performed solely by the system CPU, and the graphics card chip has nothing to do about it (unlike the situation in games).

However, dual-processor platforms also have a big drawback: when the scene to be displayed in the viewports is built with not very much geometry, dual-processor platforms demonstrate somewhat lower fps rate than uni-processor ones. It seems to me that this phenomenon has a lot to do with the fact that two streams created by the CPUs cause certain delays required to shift between them. This way, when there is little geometry to be processed, these delays eat up the performance gain due to the use of two processors.

Now that we have singled out all highs and lows of the dual-processor platforms, let's turn to some tests, which will help us to find out how well this theory corresponds to real life.

Testbed and Methods

Since the work in 3ds max can be split in two major parts: creating the scene in viewports and performing the final rendering of this scene, the article will also have two parts. Namely we will dwell on tests ran in viewports and on testing the final rendering speed.

For our test session I used the benchmarks you are already familiar with, which are recommended by the 3ds max 5 developer. The tests in viewports were run at 1280x1024x32bit and the results were taken in fps. During the final rendering tests, the resolution was set to 800x600 and we measured the time it took each of the testing participants to complete the tests (so, the lower is the value, the better).

Testbed 1:

• Intel Pentium 4 3.06GHz CPU with enabled Hyper-Threading;
• ASUS P4PE mainboard;
• 1024MB DDR333 SDRAM;
• NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti4600 graphics card;
• 20GB IBM DTLA 7,200rpm HDD.

Testbed 2:

• Pentium 4 3.06GHz CPU with disabled Hyper-Threading;
• ASUS P4PE mainboard;
• 1024MB DDR333 SDRAM;
• NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti4600 graphics card;
• 20GB IBM DTLA 7,200rpm HDD.

We used the following software:

• Windows XP SP1;
• 3ds max 5 (OpenGL rendering), 1280x1024 32bit.

For GeFroce4 Ti 4600 we used driver version 30.82 with V-Sync off.

Performance: Viewports

Benchmark 1

This benchmark checks if the graphics card is capable of refreshing more than one viewport in 3ds max simultaneously. There is some animation played in all viewports, and to load the graphics accelerator even more each viewport is displayed in a different mode: from Wireframe to Smooth + Highlights.

• Polygons: 40088;
• Light source: 2;
• Mode: Wireframe, Smooth + Highlights, Smooth + Highlights + Edged Faces.

Since this 3ds max 5 benchmark is quite precise, we can state a slight performance increase (by about 2.5%) with the enabled Hyper-Threading technology, when there is animation played in viewports.

Benchmark 2

Here the graphics cards have to work with animation in a single viewport. During the test the camera is flying above the rocks and hills of the moon surface landscape, which is built by 400 thousand polygons displayed in Smooth + Highlights mode.

• Polygons: 400008;
• Light source: 1;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

The situation here is similar to that in the previous benchmark: the performance is growing a little bit.

Benchmark 3

This test is none other but the same moon surface picture from the previous benchmark. However, besides the landscape itself, we now have some flying objects, like pace crafts or planes.

• Polygons: 742128;
• Light source: 1;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

Here the systems proved equally fast, which is most likely to be because of the GPU, which had to visualize a great lot of polygons on its own. I would like to draw your particular attention to the fact that this benchmark checks how well the scenes with massive geometry can be displayed in viewports in Smooth + Highlights mode, which involves the graphics card chip to the full extent. As you may notice, the situation in Benchmark 13 is completely different, as it is run in Wireframe mode.

Benchmark 4

This benchmark deal with the processing of multiple light sources. Since most graphics cards do not support more than 8 light sources, this test as well as the next two work with 8 lights of different types. Here we will have 8 SpotLight light sources, which move and light some geometrical object.

We should point out that imitating the effect made by SpotLights is a much more resource-hungry process than the imitation of Omni or Directional lighting.

• Polygons: 60500;
• Light sources: 8;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

Well, this is finally the first benchmark where our system with Hyper-Threading appears slower. The reason for that is the drawback of the AGP OpenGL drivers, which we have described in the very beginning of the article.

Benchmark 5

Here we have the same object, but this time it is lit by 8 Directional lights. Directional lights in 3ds max 5 are the fastest unlike the previous package version.

• Polygons: 60500;
• Light source: 8;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

The situation repeats again with different light sources.

Benchmark 6

Again we've got the same object and 8 light sources. But this time these are all Omni lights, which involve average resources between SpotLight and Directional lights described above.

• Polygons: 60500;
• Light source: 8;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

In the last lighting benchmark the system with Hyper-Threading again appears the slowest. Summing up the performance in lighting tests we can conclude that Hyper-Threading causes about 5% performance drop here.

Benchmark 7

This scene boasts "easy" geometry and a couple of light sources. It is displayed in a single viewport on the entire screen thus being an excellent test of the rasterizing speed in Smooth + Highlights mode.

• Polygons: 40088;
• Light source: 2;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.

In rasterization benchmark both systems perform equally fast, which is most likely to be connected with the fact that this benchmark requires both: geometrical calculations alongside with the GPU visualization ones.

Benchmark 8

This test is intended to show how fast the graphics cards are when it comes to multiple textures processing. The file contains a lot of textures and very little geometry.

• Polygons: 224;
• Light source: 2;
• Mode: Smooth + Highlights.