X4 Ray Tracing - Optimal CPU

[Ian Pellant]

It looks as if I may need to do close to a 100 home sales brochures which will include ray traced images.

A new computer is needed... the question becomes:

Has anyone done a comparison of elapsed times for ray tracing with CA X4 on multi-core processors?

Note: this a CPU benchmark question. RAM / HD or SSD speeds are not a factor.

Since the computer will run Windows 7 Professional 64 bit, the other question becomes:

Is there any speed difference between CA 32 bit and CA 64 bit performing ray tracing?
(The only true way to test this would be on a dual boot (Win 32 bit / Win 64 bit) computer - ensuring exactly the same hardware).

At the bottome end: the ATI Radeon X1650 in ye olde Sempron 3400+ baseline computer died recently... have an Innovision card on order... maybe next week... - I will use that for single core CPU tests against my P4 dual core 3.6 Ghz box. In most single task applications the Sempron is almost as fast as the Intel. Both computers are 2006 vintage.

From what I have seen using a new Intel i7 running up to 3.4 Ghz, it's not much faster than the old P4 3.6 dual core (which was the fastest Intel CPU in 2006... all they seem to have done is reduce heat and add more cores since (?))

Results to be posted here when available