Here are some clarifications about speed gains using multi-threaded renders (based on issues and questions from previous users):
- The speed gains will be much more pronounced on comps with several effects, especially if they are CPU-Heavy. Comps with no effects render at the same speed as a single thread because they're limited by the transfer speed of the hard drive or network, not by the CPU. And for video outputs, they can be slower because of the additional step of converting the frames made by all the threads into a single file.
- In the automatic thread modes (Relaxed, Balanced, Demanding and Dictator) Render Boss will try to find the optimal level of threads with different levels of aggressiveness. However, it's not perfect. If the automatic modes are not working, try setting the thread numbers manually and seeing what results you get. We're currently working on a new version of the automatic thread management that uses A.I. to learn, but it's in early stages.
- The optimal number of threads is high enough so that your CPU is at 90-100%, but not so high that each thread is starved of RAM. For example, with 32GBs of RAM, running 4 threads means each one gets up to 8GBs, which works well for small to medium comps, but for big comps less threads is better.