Why no update to the DAZ Studio General Release?
nightwolf1982
Posts: 1,166
Has anyone else noticed this? The Beta has been getting updated almost constantly, but the General Release hasn't been updated for months now (not since May). In fact, the GR is roughly a full release version behind the Beta - 4.9.2.70 vs 4.9.3.128. Is the Beta now the official release?
Edited for Correction
Post edited by nightwolf1982 on
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Comments
No the beta is not the official release.
Beta remain betas until the bugs are fixed. That takes an unpredictable amount of time.
I've never seen a six month difference between the Beta Release and the General Release, though, and the Beta has been updated at least six times since the GR's last update. I'm at the point where I'm using the Beta almost exclusively, hardly ever even loading up the GR.
The changes were quite big, and the 128 Beta only introduced the support for Cuda 8 and NVidea10xx. I guess it will be 2017 before we see a new official release for 4.9.
Iray SDK 2016.2 (in the first public beta) had issues, they aren't fully fixed in the current beta of 2016.3 (crashes on soem CPUs, Macs not able to use cards that meet the requirements of iray) and in any event Daz is not likely make a non-beta release using a beta version of the Iray SDK.
At the very least the beta does offer 1080 GPU rendering after all, as the GR is still CPU only for us 1080 users!
It helps if you manually save backups for the beta installs as Daz overwrites them...Unfortunately, the Octane render plugin demo doesn't fully function with either builds, (At least on my machine) but no matter, as DAZ's very own Iray engine is pretty fast even in the beta, (Can't wait to see the finished version!) so I hope, I will not need to blow nearly $600 on that over-priced renderer+plugin!
I'd really like a new,non-beta, release that includes Iray support for nVidia Pascal cards as my new computer (which should be arriving soon) will have one. But, I'd prefer a stable release so will be content to either use 3Delight or CPU-only Iray until that happens.
Well, seeing as the beta has a functioning GPU renderer for the 1080, it wouldn't hurt to have a beta install as well as the general release version, that's what I did! So you'll be able do your main work in the General release, save it and re-open it in the beta when it comes time for you to render!...It's better than waiting for hours for the same scene to render in under an hour with the beta!
I also like being able to use my new 1070 with my 780's. Letting people choose to install or not install beta is a great way to try out new features before stable release.
Yeah a new general release would be good, since beta doesn't include manual installers.
I just purchased a GTX 1080 Founders Edition thru Amazon. My intention is to have it ready when the general release is released, but reading this thread it would seem like it may just sit here for a few months?
Keep an eye on the changelog - http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/change_log#private_channel . Note that the current beta is running a beta of the Iray SDK 2016.3, 2016.2 had issues so we are presumably waiting for a release version of 2016.3.
I can understand waiting for problems with the Iray SDK to be fixed, but there are a number of features and updates that have nothing to do with Iray that would be useful in the general release. Just having the auto login feature would be nice, as it allows me to jump right in to creating, rather than having to deal with dialogue boxes every time I start up DAZ.
It just seems odd to me that there've been so many updates to the Beta, but not to the GR.
Auto Log-in is in the release version - but it can lock you out if the site is down, as we found a few weeks back. In any event you don't need to be logged in to use DS.
I just realized that my motherboard is optimized for multible graphics cards, so I can keep using the GTX 960 and add the GTX 1080 and use the GTX 1080 for rendering only. I should be able to use all the 8 GBs of the GTX 1080. I shouldn't have an issue with the drivers as they use the same driver(?) as far as I know.
Both of my cards are made by ZOTAC.
There is a lot more, as it's practically much more functional than the actual general release! But Daz is like the lovable eccentric inventor that rarely leaves the basement due to obsessive tinkering!...It would be a good idea for them to poke their head out once and awhile, though, as it seems the beta has clearly surpassed the General release version, especially for us 10xx users!
Well, yeah - if you're not running a Mac with older Nvidia cards, or an older AMD cpu . . .
I wouldn't know about the mac issue, and as a former AMD user (Still have my r9 290x though) Iray would admittedly be the same, but there are still upgrades to SDL to warrant a General release update not to mention plenty of upgrades to the creation/morph tools and UI.