NVIDIA OptiX ray tracing engine examples

[Stefan]

The file downloads on this page are ready to use examples of interactive ray tracing using the upcoming OptiX ray tracing engine. To run these samples, you will need an NVIDIA Quadro FX GPU and an R190 or later NVIDIA graphics driver. Each is a self contained .exe file that you merely need to rename to ".exe" after downloading to make operational.

The OptiX engine runs entirely on the NVIDIA CUDA compute architecture. with its performance scaling as the number of computing cores within the GPU increases. In addition, the latest generation GPUs found in the Quadro FX 3800, 4800, and 5800 boards have additional compute capabilities that give OptiX a further performance boost. As a result, OptiX scenes will typically ray trace 3 to 4 times faster on these GPUs than on their immediate predecessors (Quadro FX 3600, 4600, 5600).

As with most ray traced rendering, higher resolutions take proportionally longer to render. A Quadro FX 3800 is recommended for basic operation, while a Quadro Plex D2 system is recommended for HD resolutions. Multiple GPUs are supported if they are Quadro FX 3800 or higher, and not in SLI mode. NVIDIA does not recommend trying these examples with GPUs having less than 64 CUDA cores.