Cyclone 600-2707

[Dustin Cross]

Anyone use the Cyclone 600-2707 PCIe expander?

http://www.cyclone.com/products/expansion_systems/600-2707.php

x16 gen 2 Host connection
3x x16 gen 2 slots
2x x8 gen 2 slots


I am planning to get one unless I hear someone has had a bad experience. The engineers told me they have customers using them with Red Rocket. Are any of those users here?


Thanks,
Dusty

[Nicos Ambatzis]

I am also interested to buy one 600-2707 PCIe expander. Any comment will be useful.

[Kaku Ito]

This one clearly shows the possibility for two GPUs and two Rockets without compromising. But peeps say Mac Pro only provides total of x40 lane. GPUs taking total of x36 and RRs taking x16 which totals 52. Host (Mac pro) would probably switch which ever slot down to x4 maybe?

[Dustin Cross]

I just ordered my 600-2707 today. There is a backorder, but I will let you know how it works once I get it.

Basically the Mac Pro has a total of 40 PCIe v2 lanes. 16 of those v2 lanes are used by the 600-2707 host adapter.

The 600-2707 has 64 PCIe v2 lanes that go through a switch and connects to the Mac Pro via 16 v2 lanes. So anything you put in the 600-2707 will be limited by what the switch can get though the host adapter. Until I test, I don't know how that is going to effect performance.

I do know the Rocket is only x8 v1 PCIe, which is the same throughtput as x4 v2 PCIe, so there is lots of leftover room for other cards.


Dusty

[Shane Betts]

Very interested in your findings Dusty. Yes, the Mac has a limited number of lanes but the number of actual slots is worse. Thanks for taking the plunge.

[Kaku Ito]

I just ordered my 600-2707 today. There is a backorder, but I will let you know how it works once I get it.

Basically the Mac Pro has a total of 40 PCIe v2 lanes. 16 of those v2 lanes are used by the 600-2707 host adapter.

The 600-2707 has 64 PCIe v2 lanes that go through a switch and connects to the Mac Pro via 16 v2 lanes. So anything you put in the 600-2707 will be limited by what the switch can get though the host adapter. Until I test, I don't know how that is going to effect performance.

I do know the Rocket is only x8 v1 PCIe, which is the same throughtput as x4 v2 PCIe, so there is lots of leftover room for other cards.


Dusty

Kudos to Dustin.

[Kaku Ito]

From my Magma experiences, many cards work fine in PCIe expansion.

So far, RED ROCKET, SmallTree 10Gb ethernet card, ATTO R380 (which works for Mac Pros and Xserve but not when connected to Mac Book Pro), eSATA card, Matrox MXO2 host card and so on. Only thing didn't work was LSI and ATTO fiber channel card.

[Dustin Cross]

I am planning to have these cards in my system:

GTX 285
PCIe Expander card
Red Rocket
Atto R60F
Sonnet PCIe for QIO
Matrox PCIe for MXO2 LE

I was planning to put my Sonnet eSATA card in, but the QIO takes care of that right now. Might still put it in.

Might add a Kona 3G if it doesn't interfere with the MXO2

If I get Resolve I'll need a second video card

With the 600-2707 I should be able to get all of this in one system and organize things so I have proper performance.



Dusty

[Tom.Wong]

Kaku if you don't mind me asking, can you write out your full set up at the moment? Which magma expander, what cards you have on your mobo, what slot you have connected with magma, and what cards are in magma right now? I want to expand out too, hopefully prep for a resolve soon, and would like to gauge to see results of what works, here and now.

[Kaku Ito]

Dustin,

Kona does not take any other similar card at all. You won't be able to run both MXO2 and Kona.

Tom,

I have the ExpressBox2 which expands one slot (so the box has two slots, take away one slot in the host computer). I chose this model because it runs at x8 when you connect it to Mac Pro and also works at x1 when you connected to Mac Book Pro.

I had the RR and an eSTATA card in the magma, they worked fine both with Mac Pro and Mac Book Pro. When I connect it to Mac Pro, I have the host card plugged in the second x16 slot and RR is recognized at x8 speed no problem. I was hoping something like R380 works for the Mac Book Pro combo, but unfortunately did not (it could be the firmware issue with R380, I should give a try again since it is working with Xserve right now).

Now I have a iStoragePro Express 1 with 1 slot expansion which holds RR better with same footprint of Mac Book Pro 17inch, so for portable DIT system, I take this for RR mobile use. So my magma went to Xserve to provide extra PCIe for connecting extra R380 and it is working fine.

For MacBookPro, something like Express 3 could be the best (http://www.istoragepro.com/prod.php?id=id8exp3). But for Resolve, I'd choose Cyclone if we hear good things from Dustin.

[Dustin Cross]

Just got word my 600-2707 will ship tomorrow. I'll let you know.

I have also thought about getting the iStorage Express 3 to use with my macbook Pro when I need to be more mobile. If I use the RR and Qio, then I just need to figure out what raid card to use in the Express 3 for the 8 internal drives. You are limited to a half height card in two of the slots in the Express 3.


Dusty

[Kaku Ito]

Great, can't wait to hear your report!

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Can't wait to hear the report here!

With proper PCIe switching, you can theoretically gain the benefits of the PCIe 2.0 bandwidth of the host system using PCIe 1.x cards in the expander. Theoretically, it means that expander could host 4 RED Rocket cards at full bandwidth.

There will be a performance hit from the switching and cabling in the form of latency, but how much remains to be seen. I tested an older Cyclone expander several months back -- The host card was PCIe X8 version 1.2. It worked fine, but it didn't offer me enough bandwidth to be worth the cost at the time. Essentially I was sacrificing a PCIe 2.0 X16 slot to cram 2 or 3 cards into an interface that had 1/4 the throughput, didn't make sense to me.

Anyway, I think this new Cyclone unit as well as the upcoming JMR unit with 3X PCIe X16 v2.0 slots look to be the most promising. I'd love to know if it switches and re-delegates bandwidth so we could indeed use multiple v1.x cards and capitalize on the v2.0 interface bandwidth... Or if it divides up access on a lane per lane basis. If the latter, then there's going to be wasted bandwidth no matter how you look at it.

[Dustin Cross]

Aloha,

I received my Cyclone 600-2707 today. Got it all connected and did a little testing.

My configuration is a MacPro4,1 Octo 2.26Ghz with 6GB ram

In the Mac Pro I have a GTX 285 in slot 1, Cyclone PCIe card in Slot 2, Matrox MXO2 PCIe card in slot 3, Sonnet Qio, PCIe card in slot 4.

In the Cyclone I have Red Rocket in x8 slot, Rocketraid 2322 in x8 slot, Decklink HD Extreme in x16 slot. I have two open dual width x16 slots. I put the cards in that order just because it seems the Red Rocket would get better airflow.

RAID TEST
I did a quick Decklink Disk Speed test with the 2322 in the Mac Pro x4 slot and in the Cyclone x8 slot.

Mac Pro x4 Slot Rocketraid 2322
Read 396.9MB/s
Write 446.7MB/s

Cyclone x8 slot Rocketraid 2322
Read 637.9MB/s
Write 518.7 MB/s

RED ROCKET TEST
Did a quick test of playback performance in RCX. Full resolution and Half resolution both at 100%.

Mac Pro x8 Slot Red Rocket
Full Res 27.96 fps
Half Res 29.97 fps

Cyclone x8
Full Res - wouldn't give me a reading
Half Res 29.68 fps

The Red Rocket seems a minor bit slower in the Cyclone, but it is very hard to see the difference.


My next test is to put the GTX 285 in the Cyclone and see how Color compares in fps.

What other tests can you guys think of?


Dusty

[Tom.Wong]

are you running rocket, to the raid all from within cyclone when you do the rocket tests?

how about using multiple areas at once, like decklink capture (if possible) or at least playback from a timeline, while rocket is encoding to the raid... etc. etc. Stress tests to see what's the farthest you can push it before it chokes out or takes a performance hit...

[Dustin Cross]

Tom - Yes, my Red Rocket is in the Cyclone. I tested it both ways.

So I just put my GXT 285 in the Cyclone and opened Color to see how many fps it would play and there was no difference with the GTX in tower or in Cyclone. 6fps at full resolution and 15 fps at quarter resolution playback in Color.

Now I am doing some stress testing. I have all my cards in the Cyclone (GXT 285, Red Rocket, Raid, Blackmagic). I am rendering prores files out of RCX, rendering prores files from Red footage out of Color, playing a Motion template in HD, running Black magic disk speed test, and playing a 1080p prores timeline in FCP. Everything is going great. FCP does stumble a bit on playback, but is responsive. I think the fact that this system only has 6GB ram is more of an issue than the Cyclone on this test.

So far the Cyclone is looking very good.


Dusty

[Tom.Wong]

"adding cyclone to my next thing to buy"... thanks Dustin.

did you get the 650 watt, or the 1500?

[Dustin Cross]

650 watt power supply. Hopefully that will be enough for all the stuff I plan to have in the Cyclone.


Dusty

[Jeff Kilgroe]

The Cyclone is at the top of my list unless the new JMR 3-slot 2.0 X16 comes in at a comparable price and has something more to offer. Still waiting for actual specs on that new unit and I'm only willing to wait a bit longer.

I'm thinking my configuration is going to be this for the Mac Pro:

1: GTX 285
2: PCIe Expander
3: AJA Kona 3G
4: ATTO R680

Inside the Expander:

RED Rocket
nVidia GT120
CalDigit 4-port eSATA

I'm thinking I may also do an ATTO H644 (in place of the eSATA card) in the expander and drop an internal LTO-5 inside the expander chassis.

How are the fans on the Cyclone chassis? Are they quiet or would I need to replace them?

[Tom.Wong]

You're probably still gonna need the BM card if you want resolve ( i assume you do since u have the video card set up for it) Since BM owns da vinci now, I earnestly think that Da Vinci will never have Kona support...

[Dustin Cross]

The fans are insanely loud and must be replaced!

I am planning to get the Atto R60F for in the Cyclone with 10x 2TB SATA drive raid 6, LTO-4, and Bluray burner all in the Cyclone.

I am putting the Cyclone in a different 4U case so everything fits better.

Atto is telling me the R60F will ship Sep 20. I start my next project Oct 11, so that is really tight schedule.

I am trying to decide if I should put the MXO2 and Qio PCIe cards in the Mac Pro or in the Cyclone. Seems like the Cyclone is the correct choice, but they are only 4x cards.


Dusty

[Jeff Kilgroe]

@Tom - I've been told by someone at BMD that they're working on AJA support now, just as they said they would when I spoke with them at NAB. But I may still have to go with the Decklink card and see what comes along later. I want to have Resolve up and running by November, I've just been waiting for a few final pieces to fall into place.

Hmm... Maybe I'll just order the Cyclone without their case and put it in something else. I'm not wild about theirs. Especially if I already have to replace the fans with something decent.

[Dustin Cross]

Jeff, they wouldn't sell me the cyclone without the case.

This is the case I got:
http://rackmountmart.stores.yahoo.net/nerm4urachwi3.html

Similar to the one from Cyclone, but allows me to put in 10 drives, full height LTO-4, and Bluray burner. And it is a little short than the Cyclone case. I was trying to find a 3u case, but haven't found what I want yet.

Quite fans are cheap. I just want more drives inside.


Dusty

[Dustin Cross]

I left the Cyclone on all night with the system churning away at stuff. Motion crashed, but everything else is good. I am very happy with the Cyclone so far.

My only complaint is I don't like the case it comes in and the fans are insanely LOUD!!!! But that is an easy and cheap fix.


Dusty

[Kaku Ito]

I left the Cyclone on all night with the system churning away at stuff. Motion crashed, but everything else is good. I am very happy with the Cyclone so far.

My only complaint is I don't like the case it comes in and the fans are insanely LOUD!!!! But that is an easy and cheap fix.


Dusty

I always replace RAID case fans with better ones to solve the noise issue but the fan for the power unit could still be the problem. I'd think you should get extenders and leave the CPU and the chassis somewhere else.

[Dustin Cross]

I posted updated pics of my DIT cart with the 600-2707 here:

http://reduser.net/forum/showpost.php?p=658572&postcount=113


Dusty

[Dustin Cross]

Update on the Cyclone 600-2707.

It is working great. I do have one problem. My Atto R60F has a conflict with the Cyclone. I am working with Atto and Cyclone to figure out which cards work and which don't. I might have to switch to an R30F, which wouldn't be bad.

Right now I am using my Rocketraid 2322 in the 600-2707 and it is working great.

Has anyone else taken the plunge?


Dusty

[Kaku Ito]

Update on the Cyclone 600-2707.

It is working great. I do have one problem. My Atto R60F has a conflict with the Cyclone. I am working with Atto and Cyclone to figure out which cards work and which don't. I might have to switch to an R30F, which wouldn't be bad.

Right now I am using my Rocketraid 2322 in the 600-2707 and it is working great.

Has anyone else taken the plunge?


Dusty

Hey Dustin,

Thank you for the report. I guess the R6xx series might have some glitch since it's just out. R3xx series always worked fine with my Magma chassis except using with MacBook Pro via PCI Express route.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

What sort of conflict do you have with the R60F? Does it work if installed in the tower and not in the Cyclone?

[Lonny Danler]

One of the engineers at iStoragePro I've been working with on my mobile rocket raid said the 6G cards are having some issues. Don't have any specifics but that would be true to the statement. I also bought an OWC/Newertech 2 port eSata card and it doesn't seem to talk to my computer as well as other cards--icon doesn't load completely with eSata logo and I have to retry connecting the hard drives a couple times before they mount.

[Kaku Ito]

The R644 that I've been testing is working fine in the Mac Pro at least.

[Kaku Ito]

I posted updated pics of my DIT cart with the 600-2707 here:

http://reduser.net/forum/showpost.php?p=658572&postcount=113


Dusty

With this, looks like you can grade features anywhere.

[Dustin Cross]

What sort of conflict do you have with the R60F? Does it work if installed in the tower and not in the Cyclone?

Jeff,

The R60F gets some sort of bus reset and locks up. It works great for a random amount of time. Sometimes five seconds, sometimes 30 minutes. Also when it locks up it sometimes looses drives. After a reboot it sees the drive again, but still needs a multi hour rebuild.

It won't work in a Mac Pro with the Cyclone attached. Works as soon as I remove the Cyclone card.

Plus it gets HOT! In my Mac Pro tower in a room with AC keeping in around 70F, the card over heats and locks up after about 90 min of use. Gets to 65C and stops. It really needs fans to cool it. Right now I have the case open with a fan blowing directly on the R60F to keep it running. Not something I want to take on set. I need to look more into replacing the two small heatsinks with fans.

In short, I don't think the R60F is ready for primetime just yet.

A few hours today my cart was in 90F ambient. Everything kept right on working. Well, the Qio is flaky, but that doesn't have anything to do with heat.


Dusty

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Hmmm... That doesn't sound good. I still haven't got to the purchase point yet, I'm waiting on a few other things to fall into place with the budget and whatnot here. But I'm planning to run an ATTO R680 in the same system as the Cyclone. It will be in the Mac tower. Looking at GTX285, Cyclone, ATTO R680, and BMD or AJA card in the tower. The expander is probably getting dual Rockets, a GT160 and an eSATA/SAS card -- the eSATA card will actually be an ATTO H344 (maybe H644) and I'll put an LTO-5 in the expansion chassis connected to it.. and run a mini-SAS to eSATA fan-out cable out for eSATA devices.

Thanks for the info... Keep us posted.

[Dustin Cross]

I am still waiting to hear from the guys at Cyclone if they have tested the R30F. If not, I guess I will just have to buy one and see. The R60F is going back. I just need to find a replacement.

What are you doing on the Mac that will use two Rockets?


Dusty

[Dustin Cross]

The R644 that I've been testing is working fine in the Mac Pro at least.

Do you have a Cyclone connected to the system with the R644?


Dusty

[Jeff Kilgroe]

I am still waiting to hear from the guys at Cyclone if they have tested the R30F. If not, I guess I will just have to buy one and see. The R60F is going back. I just need to find a replacement.

Looking back on your comments, I guess I'm wondering if you have tried replacing your R60F? The heat issues seem to point to another problem and possible reasons for the failure more than a conflict.


What are you doing on the Mac that will use two Rockets?

Faster processing. Dual streams for 3D... That's the plan anyway, but the software still needs to catch up a bit. Not sure if STORM supports multiple Rockets yet...

[Dustin Cross]

I haven't tried a different R60F yet.

The guys at Cyclone said they have one other customer trying to use the R60F and having problems too. I am sending info to both Atto and Cyclone to see if there is a fix.

The problem I am having is not heat related. I opened the Cyclone enclosure and pointed an AC vent directly at the R60F and monitored the cards temp while I did test and it stayed well below the recommended 39C. Could just be a faulty card, but it works fine without the Cyclone.

They said several customers are using the R30F with no problems.

Atto tech support said they have lots of customers with heat problems and they recommend mounting a fan in the enclosure just to cool the R60F.


Dusty

[Kaku Ito]

Do you have a Cyclone connected to the system with the R644?


Dusty

Sorry Dustin, I missed this post.

I just wanted to clarify others that 6G based AtTO is working with Mac Pro alone. I know you are keen with all of these.

I think I'm going to get the Cyclone, too, it's just matter of few weeks I think. Anyways, thank you for all of your valuable posts.

[Dustin Cross]

I am returning my 6G card and getting an Atto 3G R30F. The 3G cards are working with the Cyclone. Sounds like a little extra work needs to be done for the 6G cards to work with the Cyclone.


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

Dear Dustin,

I just got my Cyclone 2027 today! Much to my disappointment, I can't get it to work with my MacPro 8-Core (MacPro 4,1) at all. :-(

I have the Cyclone HBA card in Slot #2 (on the Mac). In the Cyclone, I have REDRocket in the top 16x slot, an ATTO UL5D in the first 8x slot, and an ATTO R380 in the bottom 8x slot.

The Cyclone automatically powers up with the MacPro, but NONE of the cards (nor the HBA adaptor itself) show up in the system profiler. Any ideas?!?

- Jordan

[Kaku Ito]

I am returning my 6G card and getting an Atto 3G R30F. The 3G cards are working with the Cyclone. Sounds like a little extra work needs to be done for the 6G cards to work with the Cyclone.


Dusty

I guess it will be eventually solved by updating the firmware but it's too bad to find something not working within the PCIe 2.0 specification.

[Kaku Ito]

Dear Dustin,

I just got my Cyclone 2027 today! Much to my disappointment, I can't get it to work with my MacPro 8-Core (MacPro 4,1) at all. :-(

I have the Cyclone HBA card in Slot #2 (on the Mac). In the Cyclone, I have REDRocket in the top 16x slot, an ATTO UL5D in the first 8x slot, and an ATTO R380 in the bottom 8x slot.

The Cyclone automatically powers up with the MacPro, but NONE of the cards (nor the HBA adaptor itself) show up in the system profiler. Any ideas?!?

- Jordan

Jordan,

I don't have Cyclone, but from my past experiences with expansion chassis or anything to do with installing bus cards, you can start installing one by one, then see what is not working. I'd try to put RR in x8 slot though.

[Jordan Livingston]

Hi Kaku,

I'm already going down that road... Starting up with only one card (UL5D in the 8x slot) still yields no results. The odd thing is that the system profiler in the Mac isn't even seeing the HBA card itself.

Dustin: did you have any such experiences when you first getting started? Cyclone says there are no drivers to install, so I'm a bit stumped...

- Jordan

[Jordan Livingston]

Update... just booted up with the Cyclone alone (no PCI cards) and even it alone still doesn't show up in the System Profiler! I've also tried resetting the PRAM to no avail. :-(

Somebody help!!! ;-)

- Jordan

[Kaku Ito]

Hi Kaku,

I'm already going down that road... Starting up with only one card (UL5D in the 8x slot) still yields no results. The odd thing is that the system profiler in the Mac isn't even seeing the HBA card itself.

Dustin: did you have any such experiences when you first getting started? Cyclone says there are no drivers to install, so I'm a bit stumped...

- Jordan

Ah that is the root of the problem. I didn't see any of the Dusty's post expressing issue besides the ATTO 6G card. Would Cyclone send another host card right away? I'm curious how Cyclone handles when this type of thing happens.

[Jordan Livingston]

Unfortunately, Cyclone tech support is currently closed (they're on East Coast time) so I won't find out how they handle this until tomorrow AM.

- Jordan

[Kaku Ito]

PRAM zap?

[Jordan Livingston]

Looks like there is definitely something wrong with the supplied HBA card. First, I noticed that the jumper settings were NOT in the "default" positions according to the online documentation. Adjusting them made no difference. Even booting up with ALL other PCI cards removed (except for the video card, of course), the HBA never showed up in my System Profiler, and the green lights on the card and on the cable never illuminated. I will obviously have to call Cyclone first thing in the AM. I'll let you know what happens...

- Jordan

[Jordan Livingston]

PRAM zap?

Tried that several times - no avail... It seems the HBA card is likely dead on arrival. The physical LEDs on the back never illuminate and the LED on the cable itself doesn't illuminate either.

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Jordan,

Sorry to hear about that. Must be a bad card, cable, or expander board. If you don't even see the card in slot two, I am guess it is the card.

Mine came right up. I am on Mac Pro 4,1 Octo 2.26 OSX 10.6. Expander card is in slot two, next to my GTX285.

I have attached a screen grab of my System Profiler showing the Cyclone.

The only problem I have had is with the ATTO R60F. Right now I just have two Rocketraid 2322 cards and a Decklink card in the Cyclone. My Rocket is on another job and I don't need it for this Alexa job I am doing.

I am having tons of problems with my Sonnet QIO, but I have problems with it in my Macbook Pro, so I don't think that is the Cyclone, and the QIO is not in the Cyclone.. Sonnet thinks I have a bad QIO.

Hope Cyclone gets you a new card fast.


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

Dustin,

Thanks for getting back to me... Since I've never seen the 2707 working properly, perhaps you can tell me some things.

- does the LED on the back of the HBA card light up?
- do the LEDs on both sides of the cable light up?
- do you know the jumper switch configuration that shipped with your card?

Thanks in advance!

Best,

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Jordan,

The two LEDs on the HBA just above the cable do light up green.

No light on my cable. Either end.

I am on set rendering right now so I can't easily check the jumpers. I will check when I get a chance.

Let me know if there is anything else I can do to help.


Dusty

[Kaku Ito]

Oh no, I'm sorry, I feel you pain.

[Jordan Livingston]

Hi Dusty,

So, I don't get those HBA lights - not even with nothing else connected but the HBA. Sounds like possibly a dead card to me... Odd that the card shipped with the jumpers out of place. Please do check on that for me whenever it might be convenient. Thanks!

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Any word from Cyclone?


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

Update: 10/22/10

Two nights ago, just after I finished posting my last post here, I heard back from Eric Breeden, the Senior Technical Sales Engineer via email. He was VERY attentive, especially considering that it was after hours on the East Coast, and he was likely at home. After numerous late night emails exchanged back and forth, Eric was unable to diagnose my problem, and told me he would talk to the engineering team first thing in the morning.

At 7AM PST (Cyclone had been "open" for an hour on the East Coast) I received an email from Eric stating that the engineering team was stumped, but that the product designer would be getting involved. At 8AM, I was on a conference call with Eric and the product designer, who's name unfortunately escapes me (my apologies). In any case, neither of them were able to figure out what the problem was, so it was decided that they would ship an entirely new unit.

At 8AM this morning, the replacement unit arrived via UPS's "early" morning delivery option. By 8:30AM, I had everything up and running perfectly, and was torture testing the REDRocket. I transcoded about 80 minutes of 4KHD to Apple ProRes 4444 (I realize that's not the most "pro" test in the world), but at least initially, it worked perfectly - and at full (or at least not-noticeably-less-than-full) speed. I then installed my two ATTO RAID controllers and was pleased to find that they both worked as expected also.

So, it appears that I had a defective unit. The replacement unit seemingly works perfectly, right out of the box, as I had initially expected. No one knows why the original unit was bad (Cyclone swears they test everything before they ship it), but in any case, the customer service was nothing short of exceptional.

Before I get too lovey dovey about the Cyclone, I definitely need to do some more real world testing. I start a 13-day shoot tomorrow that will involve daily transcoding, so we should see how the REDRocket performs in the Cyclone over a prolonged period. I will be sure to report back here if there are any significant problems.

In the meantime, I really couldn't be happier with the product, and although the defective unit unfortunately cost me two days of downtime, I think Cyclone responded as well as can possibly be expected.

Best,

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Jordan,

Great to hear everything was taken care of. Eric is great to work with.

I am finishing the second week of a feature with my Cyclone and everything is working great. This is an Alexa shoot, so I haven't been using my Rocket, but I have two Rocketraid cards and a Decklink in my Cyclone with no issues. It has also been pretty warm (over 90F) a few days here and no heat problems with the Cyclone either.


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

Great to hear! I held off on Expansion Chassis for a loooong time, waiting for the 2707 to come out. It is "exactly" the product that I want... Now my fingers are crossed that my cards play nice.

- Jordan

[Jordan Livingston]

So I'm noticing that my REDRocket card is performing slower than expected in the Cyclone 2707. For example, it's taking about 30 minutes to transcode a 5 minute clip. That just doesn't seem right. I currently have the REDRocket in the 16x slot, but my system profiler correctly identifies the card as running at 8x and 2.5GT/s. That seems "right."

Any suggestions?

Best,

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

That sucks. My Rocket is not in my system right now, but when I did a little testing with it, I did not notice much speed difference. I'll see if I have time to put my Rocket back in this system this week and see if I can figure anything out.

If you remove the Cyclone and put the rocket in the x16 slot in your system, how fast does it do the same render?


Dusty

Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

Hi Dusty,

I will have to perform a comparison test, as you describe. I haven't had a chance to do so yet. This particular transcode is a little unusual. It's a 2.40:1 Anamorphic shot (2112x1728) converting to 2592x1080 ProRes422 HQ. I'm "hoping" that the extra math involved is what's causing the slow down. I'm also reading and writing to the same drive, which I know causes a slowdown as well. Neverthless, I do expect to be getting much closer to realtime than this (~10:1). I don't recall my REDRocket ever working this slow when it was in the MacPro tower directly

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

I do remember something about Rocket not speeding up upscaling. 2112 to 2592 seems like upscaling, but it is anamorphic.


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

The "proper" Anamorphic pipeline is somewhat nebulous. This client wants a 1920x1080 'pan and scan' version, which is why we are transcoding in this manner.

But is it really considered "upscaling" if the vertical pixel resolution is decreasing (1728 down to 1080)?

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Vertical is downscaling (1728 to 1080)

Horizontal is upscaling (2112 to 2592)

Not sure if that has anything to do with your slowness, just thinking outloud.


Dusty

[Jordan Livingston]

So, I just finished a decent size batch; ~2 hours of material took ~3.5 hours to transcode. Not too bad actually. Much better than I thought in my previous post... For some reason, however, the last few clips saw a dramatic slowdown (about ~10:1). I wonder if the 2707 starts out at top speed and then progressively slows down? Or is that just crazy talk?

- Jordan

[Jordan Livingston]

Vertical is downscaling (1728 to 1080)
Horizontal is upscaling (2112 to 2592)
Not sure if that has anything to do with your slowness, just thinking outloud.


My understanding was that the vertical resolution was what "counts" when it comes to processing / scaling Anamorphic footage with the REDRocket. Would love it if somebody at RED could weigh in and let us know definitively.

The job in question only has the budget to generate one set of "universal master" dailies. Both versions of the project will online in ProRes HQ. So, the same files that will become a 2.40:1 deliverable also need to work in a 1920x1080 'pan-and-scan' deliverable.

My solution was to deliver 1080 vertical height files which can be both 2.40:1 as well as 16x9 (with the sides chopped off) with no further downscaling required.

So now, the question that remains, is my REDRocket slow because I picked a bad 'upscaling' resolution... or is my REDRocket slow because it's in the Cyclone 2707. OR... maybe it's working just fine and Anamorphic footage just takes longer?

- Jordan

[Dustin Cross]

Sounds like your transcode took just over 1.5x realtime. Right at 1.5x realtime is about as fast as I have ever gotten RCX to transcode.


Dusty

[Jeff Kilgroe]

A lot depends on what format you're transcoding to and what storage you're writing to. The Rocket can de-bayer the R3D in re-scale in real-time. Beyond that, it's entirely up to the rest of your system to be able to feed the Rocket and keep up with its output.

Even though the Cyclone technically has 4x the bandwidth that a single Rocket card could potentially use, I still have not received a direct answer as to how that bandwidth is distributed. Is the full PCIe 2.0 bandwidth re-allocated so multiple v1.x cards in the expander can capitalize on it? There is also the inherent latency associated with the expander and there will be a performance penalty with any device that is inside it... Or at least that shall be the case until someone invents a PCIe transport that can defy the physical laws of our universe.

I would be very curious in some actual benchmark testing with the Cyclone unit. As of right now, I'm still on the fence. And I'm still holding out to see if more info comes out regarding the ATTO 6Gbps adapters and compatibility in the same system, either in or out of the Cyclone expander.

[Albert Astorga Zepeda]

I posted updated pics of my DIT cart with the 600-2707 here:

http://reduser.net/forum/showpost.php?p=658572&postcount=113


Dusty

Hey Dustin. that is one sweet setup. but I have one question. are the golden metal things the shock absorbers? if so di you get them with the case? if not where did you get them? and what are they called?. I Need to put some of my equipment on something specially my Computer to avoid killing hard drives.
Thanks.

[Dustin Cross]

I got the isolation mounts from here:
http://www.starcase.com/isolation_mounts.htm


Dusty

[Albert Astorga Zepeda]

I got the isolation mounts from here:
http://www.starcase.com/isolation_mounts.htm


Dusty

Thank you very much Dustin. I will mode my case with them asap.

[CBRzilla]

There is a solution to the ATTO 6G card issue with the Cyclone system. You may contact Cyclone if you require an update to your expander system.

[Mel Matsuoka]

Hmm. I just got my Cyclone 600-2707 yesterday and I seem to be having the exact same problem Jordan was having. My early-2008 Mac Pro does not even see the Cyclone HBA card in slot 2. And the only light or activity that happens on the chassis itself is the red LED on the back of the power supply. Dead as a doorknob.

I do have to say though that Cyclone techsupport is nothing short of amazing. Eric Breeden just responded to my support email which I sent an hour ago (9:45PM EST)! I hope he can figure out what's going on :(

[Jordan Livingston]

Hmm. I just got my Cyclone 600-2707 yesterday and I seem to be having the exact same problem Jordan was having. My early-2008 Mac Pro does not even see the Cyclone HBA card in slot 2. And the only light or activity that happens on the chassis itself is the red LED on the back of the power supply. Dead as a doorknob.

I do have to say though that Cyclone techsupport is nothing short of amazing. Eric Breeden just responded to my support email which I sent an hour ago (9:45PM EST)! I hope he can figure out what's going on :(

Hi Mel,

My Cyclone was dead on arrival, most likely due to damage during shipping. After speaking with Eric at Cyclone tech support, they promptly replaced my unit with an entirely new one. I'm sure Eric will take good care of you.

Good luck,

- Jordan

[Chris Bouchard]

We have a Cyclone 2707. It didn't work with the Mac Pro 3,1 but works fine on Mac Pro 4,1. Something to do with PCI-e slot compatibility...

[Jordan Livingston]

We have a Cyclone 2707. It didn't work with the Mac Pro 3,1 but works fine on Mac Pro 4,1. Something to do with PCI-e slot compatibility...

Mine is indeed the MacPro 4,1. It's not the very latest iteration, but the second-from-the-latest (8-Core). Since they replaced the initial defective unit I've had no issues. I was unaware that certain MacPros have a fundamental PCIe slot incompatibility... Does this hold true for other Expansion Chassis products as well?

Best,

- Jordan

[Mel Matsuoka]

Just following up with my Cyclone issues for the sake of anyone else wanting to use it with a 2008 Mac Pro.

Eric from Cyclone was amazing in following through trying to get my problems solved, and he even sent me a new version of the PCIe interface card which they just made which improves channel switching problems etc etc. No amount of hardware or software tweaking (including a fresh OSX/Resolve reinstall) would allow the Cyclone to reliably work with Resolve. It would either freeze up or randomly Kernel Panic whenever you played back the Resolve timeline. Oddly enough, the instability only happened when I used Resolve. When I used the Cyclone with After Effects, RCX (which properly used the Rocket board I had put in the Cyclone) or other apps that didnt access the GTX 285 GPU, everything worked smoothly.

I just gave up and ordered a 2010 Mac Pro, and now everything works perfectly.

So bottom line here is: The Cyclone PCI chassis DOES NOT WORK with the 2008 Mac Pro, if you want to use it to house GPUs for DaVinci Resolve. Buyer beware!