Simulation extremely slow

[[No...]]

I'm currently trying to run a simulation on our offline seat (Calypso 2017, 6.4.2002) and even on the highest speed setting it's so extremely slow, I guess I could take a day off and it would still be running when I come back. On a real CMM the program takes 10 minutes or less, and the model is not very complex (no airplane or engine block 😕 )

The offline seat is a HP ZBook workstation with i7-6820HQ / 2.70 GHz, 16 GB RAM and an nVidia Quadro M200M gfx card.

I know that simulation is getting slower when the probe dives e.g. into a bore surrounded by many small faces, because collision detection has more work to do. But this is so ridiculously slow it looks like a slideshow, and the fans are running on hi-speed all the time. I can't believe this is supposed to be normal. Or do I need a mainframe for Calypso Sim?? 🤣

Does anyone know this problem and maybe a few tricks how I can tweak the system for better performance?

[[Th...]]

Hello Norbert,

we have nearly the same problem with another software. It looks like the origin are the background services, which are slowing the actual Windows down. We will not get them away, but I think a virtual machine with e.g. Windows 7 could be the solution. Just a naked OS even without any service packs or other patches.

[[Ri...]]

I'm running a Dell Precision 7720 with an i7-7820HQ CPU @2.90GHz; 16.0 GB Ram; 1TB SSD; Nvidia Quadro M1200.

I don't run into any issues with running Simulation.

When you are running Simulation, open up task manager and see what your performance looks like. Which area is topped out? CPU, Memory, Disk, GPU? Maybe that will help you find out what part is hindering performance.

I wouldn't absolutely say its the HDD, but man I know that on my personal laptop at home that when I switched from an HDD to a SSD it was a night and day difference. The read/write speeds of an SSD are incredible. They are pricey, but worth it in my opinion.

[[Ri...]]

Also - I'm pretty sure that most laptops have two GPUs in them. The Nvidia one is probably only in use when using an external display. The standard laptop screen typically uses the built in GPU.

You might try using the external screen only and see if that helps.

[[No...]]

Regarding the GPU use: I have the GPU usage taskbar icon active in the nVidia driver, and when Calypso is running, the counter goes up by one, so I'm pretty sure it's using the nVidia GPU.
The drive is a Hynix SC300 SSD.

I'll check task manager next time I'm at the offline seat.

[[Th...]]

Try to analyze your GPU with GPU-Z by techpowerup. This is freeware and portable, no install needed. On some systems administrator rights are needed.
You can run it in the background and see if your GPU is maxed or not.

[[No...]]

I'm currently running the sim again and have task manager open.
CPU load is at approx. 20% (almost all of it caused by Calypso), sometimes going up to to max. 40%.
GPU load is near zero (0.3) with occasional short high peaks, and memory is around 30%. But Calypso is slow as ever and the fans sound like the thing's about to lift off. I can't even move or rotate the CAD model anymore when it's running.

If I didn't know better I'd suspect Calypso is running single-core. 😱

Thomas, I'm not allowed to use 3rd party software that wasn't authorized by the company, and I don't have admin rights.

[[Th...]]

Norbert, I think I've found the problem: When the simulation slows extremly down, nearly to halt the whole system, my network is maxed. Calypso talks so much, that the ethernet works with 100 kbit/s at full.
I'll try to cut it off before starting the simulation.

(5 minutes later...)

Without network the simulation runs at hyper speed! No problems so far.
For calypso, the problem's origin should have been found. Now, it also took 70 seconds less. 🤠

EDIT:
It sometimes needs up to 500 kbit/s ❗
An investigation of this behaviour could be interesting.

[[No...]]

Sorry, but no luck here. I pulled the network plug and switched off WLAN, but it's running as slow as before (maybe a tiny bit faster). And even if it had been faster, I couldn't use it, because all our programs and SSC data are on the network. Without the network, I don't see any probes (THAT made it faster, but that wasn't the idea 😉 ). I managed to start sim first and pulled the plug afterwards. so probes were present, but otherwise no success.

I know that Calypso has speed issues when connected to the network. Startup is often much faster without it. But in this case it had no effect for me.