Rendering stops when Mac "sleeps"

Rendering stops when Mac "sleeps"

Hi guys,

I have a big render (nice quality) that takes time. However every time the monitor "goes to sleep" the rendering stops (and starts again when I log in / wake the Mac)

I have tried to go to power settings turning "off" HD go to sleep + turned "on" avoid the machine going to sleep when the monitor is off.

I have an iMac 27 Retina with the latest OSX.

Any ideas? The fan works hard the screensaver goes on and it stops the rendering (pauses it untill I login again).

Thanks for any answer on this. Usually in other programs I used my Mac as a rendering node so it constantly "worked" over night with the monitor switched off.

I use a prefpane called NoSleep that allows for any MacBook's monitor to be closed or prevent it from sleeping during processor intensive task. Here's a link: http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/37991/nosleep

There are other alternatives similar to it on the same site for your comparison.

Hope this was helpful.

Thanks for the tip. This is a solution that can help me but it is so weird that the setting under "Power" on my make states that it also has that "tag". Is this a Mac issue or should perhaps Cheetah3D be able to implement a feature in the rendering window to "prevent sleep"? (Is this possible?)

Thanks for the help! Love this forum and C3D

Are you explicitly sleeping or just letting it go to sleep on its own?

I'm inclined to think Pod has figured out why. Can you confirm that you are using the Apple menu and then selecting "sleep"?

I have a new 5k iMac here at work and I just tested two big still renders at the same time. I have my hard drive set to not sleep in the energy saver preferences. When I have big renders going that I have to leave for a while (usually overnight) I've just set up some hot corners to put my display to sleep (Sys Pref > Desktop > Screen Saver > Hot Corners). That seems to work and lets the renders continue while the screen is off. I didn't test choosing sleep from the menu, but I bet it overrides the system energy saver preference when selected.

Hi,
your Mac shouldn't fall into sleep while Cheetah3D is rendering. Are you sure that your Mac fall into sleep and not just your monitor?

Bye
Martin

Easy way to determine if rendering has truly stopped is to look at when the last PNG was saved.

I constantly sleep my MacBook Pro using hot corners (it's a work security policy) and leave stuff going on it. When I come back it's all kept on going. So that works. I'm too impatient to test letting it sleep by timeout...

podperson said:

I constantly sleep my MacBook Pro using hot corners (it's a work security policy) and leave stuff going on it. When I come back it's all kept on going. So that works. I'm too impatient to test letting it sleep by timeout...

Click to expand...

Just adding to Pod's statement:
You can add a "modifier key" (e.g., the "Command" key) to the hot corner sequence so that moving the cursor to the chosen hot corner does NOT sleep the screen unless you also push and hold the modifier key.
*
To add a modifier key, open "System Preferences", go to "Desktop & Screen Saver", choose the "Screen Saver" tab, and click on "Hot Corners…". Open the dropdown for the corner you prefer. Before clicking "Put Display to Sleep" hold down the Command key (or another modifier key*)* and then click "Put Display to Sleep".
*
Voilà! Now the display will sleep only if you hold down the Command key before moving the cursor to the chosen Hot Corner.
*
*I believe the only modifier keys available for this are Shift, Control, Option and Command -- you can use any one of them or combinations.

Thanks guys for the awesome response as always.

Firstly I of course also switch off all under power settings etc like the attached image states.

I use also hot corners with both turn off monitor & start screensaver.

The fan "blows hard" when I am using the computer rendering and I have noticed that OSX prefer the Cheetah3D app to be "in focus" to give it full resources so perhaps my mistake is to state that it doesnt render rather than to state that "it doesn´t give it 100% cpu" untill done.

I did find (and SO many people discuss this in regards of 3D rendering and OSX) an exciting comment on the web for Martin (if he ever reads this - as I am also of course eagerly awaiting v7 ;-)

Comment interesting for Martin in regards of implementing support for "non sleep" in the Cheetah3D code - perhaps not too late for v7?

https://discussions.apple.com/message/29516412#29516412

I know that this is / has been an issue for many users and the weird thing is that even such a streamlined HW / SW setup as a Mac can give mixed results. Don´t know why..

The only ting I can say: IF I do as Podperson (thanks for the tip man) states to just simply use hot corner monitor off it also ends the fan and progress on the render. It doesnt "stop" it just turns to sirup..

I can also concur to the apple link above that this goes for more (most) software than Cheetah3D on osx by the way.

Thanks guys! Love this forum so much.

M.

Ps: "Are you explicitly sleeping or just letting it go to sleep on its own?" > Tried any angle. Setting the screensaver to 1 min and prevent computer from sleeping, hot corners starting screensaver OR black screen (screen off) etc.. Same. fan stops working hard and all turns to sirup. When I log in again: the fan starts all boosts and goes 100% (or almost close to 800% in our multicore days)

Forgot to mention that I used Carrara3D previously and never had that problem either with the app or the render clients (sub rendering app in local lan network). Carrara always made sure my Mac "worked overtime" no matter what untill complete. I did however also see an effect in that app (previous OSX installation) that it helped putting the app in focus.

So again: I tested it once more. The fan works hard, the C3D are in focus, I move the cursor to the top right (switches off the monitor) and a minute later the fan dies. I login see that the CPU are low on C3D but notice it immediately picks up the speed after login..

Hi,
there is a difference if you force your Mac to sleep (menu command or hot corner) or if it goes automatically to sleep.

If you force your Mac to sleep, it really should fall into sleep and halts all its processes. No application should block the commands of the user. Anything else would be quite a nightmare for MacBook users too.

Cheetah3D only prevents your Mac to fall automatically to sleep while a rendering job is running.

Bye
Martin

Do you have 2 forum accounts?

Strange. I just shut down the monitor with shift+ctrl+⏏. Because of security purposes the lock screen will be enabled after a few minutes (invisible because monitor is black).
Cheetah3d is still rendering - I have to log-in back of course to take over.

Cheers
Frank

What OS X version were you using with Carrara? Some research shows Apple did change OS behavior some time after Snow Leopard (increased emphasis on power savings as users move to laptops).

See this thread:

https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/1172694

tl;dr:

Go to your System Preferences/Energy Saver

• Computer Sleep: Set to Never
• Display Sleep: 30 min. to 1 HR.
• Make sure "Put the hard disk(s) to sleep when possible" is UNCHECKED.

Hey guys,

Thanks a bunch for all great tips. I will play with the system and look at it. I have also installed an SSH client on my ipad so I can test the "top" command surveilling the processes (by altering my way out of the system).

Great!

To Frank: Sorry dude, I have obviously had an old account at my ipad that I must remember to delete. Probably forgot I had an old account and re-registered later on my iMac (in the begging of my C3D journey). Solved with Dashlane I will delete that post so people don´t get "confused". Feel free to delete that account. Seems I can´t login on it on my ipad anymore which is not a problem as this is the account I use and will use.

Okey guys; I am satisfied. Seems that you were right and I partially are right (at least in my own iMac world): The rendering power on OSX drops both if the "app" is not highlighted; or if you "log out". Point being: when you return to the office the day after its true: the rendering are done IF you havent used obscene large settings in your rendering which in my case was needed for a print and there was the problem. I logged on saw that my iMac "boosted" from 3-400% to max on the CPU usage when logged in and by SSH into the iMac from my iPad I could use the "top -o cpu" to register the drop on all ways of "getting the screen dark". So both CTRL+SHIFT+EJECT, or Hot corners etc makes no difference. I thought it had "stopped" but was tricked by it turning to sirup and "boosting" up to max fan speed and CPU usage when logged in. My fault was that I then thought it "had stopped" or "paused" the rendering while away. The file was so big that it wasn´t the case.

I have concurred this by testing latest Carrara 8.5 on the same machine. Same response; however Carrara has some nifty rendering settings in that regard that comes into play like rendering farms (local net sharing resources).

Cheers!