Dust multiplier- does it affect CPU or GPU?

[barns]

Hi, I am trying to get the best dust multiplier I can when running galaxy collision at no less than 30FPS.
A second target is to do the same thing whilst also running Nvidea 3D vision (this effectively halves framerate)


The main question is whether the dust is CPU intensive or GPU intensive.
To increase the dust multiplier I can run with, would I be better off upgrading my GPU setup or increasing my CPU clock speed?

If its the GPU that need upgrading, which aspect of the graphics card is the limiting factor? (e.g. more shaders, tesselation or amount of dedicated GRAM?) And would crossfire/SLI help?

If it is the CPU, then would an overclock improve performance?

Also, since the multi-core support was only added recently, does it make a big difference?
Would I be better off turning multi-core support in the game, or even turning off my physical cores?

[dhm794]

With a simulation like the galaxy collision, a very good CPU and GPU is required to run the simulation with 25x dust (the highest possible value). 

Unfortunately I don't have a lot of expertise with the different types and techniques of CPUs and GPUs.  I'm sure a lot of the other people here do though.

[Dan Dixon]

The main question is whether the dust is CPU intensive or GPU intensive.

Universe Sandbox currently only uses the CPU for calculations.

If it is the CPU, then would an overclock improve performance?

A little. Probably not worth the trouble (or the risk).

Also, since the multi-core support was only added recently, does it make a big difference?

It's very basic and currently buggy and hasn't yet been added for dust (only objects).


Does that help?

[barns]

Thanks for your post. You saved me from wasting time with GPU and multi-core settings.


So far I have been running the galaxy collision whilst overclocked to 4.5GHz. I will push on to 5GHz and see how that affects it. I really can't think of anything else I can do after that to improve my multiplier.


I would love it if future updates had better hardware support. Utilising GPU power will make a huge difference.