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Multi-computer simulations?

Question asked by Bengt Gustafsson on Jun 2, 2012
Latest reply on Jun 6, 2012 by Bengt Gustafsson

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Hi all,

Has anyone been able to dish out the Solver process on several computers?

Does anyone know of a software that could do this, for SW Simulation?

Being a SW teacher at the end of term, I have recently helped some of my students with Simulation/Motion/FloWorks for their thesis projects. Some have been quite massive - had one with some 5 million DOF's - and it bugs me that I am unable to use our classroom computers during nighttime. 3D Studio with its Backburner works just fine for rendering, and it would be nice to have something similar for SW.

I am aware that rendering a picture and computing a FEM analysis is not the same type of calculation, but shouldn't it be possible? Perhaps someone from SW staff can comment on this?

Regards,

Bengt

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Jerry Steiger Jun 3, 2012 10:26 AM

Bengt,

Check out the "More Like This" box on the right. I see at least one thread that looks like it talks about this question for FloWorks.

I seem to recall reading some threads here that said that FloWorks uses multiple threads, but Simulation is limited to two cores, so there may be hope for FloWorks but not much for Simulation.

I know that ANSYS requires the user to buy the capability to run more than 2 cores for simulation. This seems like a really blatant ripoff, but the rationale is that they had to spend a lot of resources rewriting the programs to use multiple processors. Still, the last time I checked, it was quite expensive and we decided not to go that route.

Running the software on more than one computer is even trickier. I think that normally requires another program to help handle the parceling out of the work, but I'm not at all familiar with the question.

Jerry Steiger

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Bengt Gustafsson @ Jerry Steiger on Jun 5, 2012 3:30 PM

Thanks Jerry, Flow Simulation has the in-built capability to assign jobs to different computers.

What I am after is the same functionality, but for Simulation. Since this issue must be something that any user of Simulation runs in to sooner or later, I hoped that there would be someone out there that is using, have come across, or just heard someone talking about it on the street: A software that is able distribute a simulation calculation over several computers in a network. What is known as a Render Farm in the film/graphics industry.

If there is no such software available, it would be an argument for getting a decent numbercruncher.

//Bengt

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Boyko Tchavdarov @ Bengt Gustafsson on Jun 5, 2012 5:45 PM

I have run Flow Simulation on remote PCs which have more RAM and CPUs than my local one. I hope now the process is well described in SW2012 as it was too poorly explained with SW 2009 when I did the runs. Each run can be send to a different node (PC). However, only one node (PS) can work on a single run - there is no distributed memory capabilities witH Flow simulation, i.e.distributing a single run on more than one node as Fluent can do it. This type of Solver capabilities requires mesh partition - not available with Flow Simulation. Mesh Partition is a great enhancement for linear speed-up on multiprocessor system, as well. I have no experience with other type of simulations.

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Bengt Gustafsson @ Boyko Tchavdarov on Jun 6, 2012 12:49 AM

Thanks for your input Boyko.

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Jerry Steiger Jun 3, 2012 10:26 AM
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Bengt,

Check out the "More Like This" box on the right. I see at least one thread that looks like it talks about this question for FloWorks.

I seem to recall reading some threads here that said that FloWorks uses multiple threads, but Simulation is limited to two cores, so there may be hope for FloWorks but not much for Simulation.

I know that ANSYS requires the user to buy the capability to run more than 2 cores for simulation. This seems like a really blatant ripoff, but the rationale is that they had to spend a lot of resources rewriting the programs to use multiple processors. Still, the last time I checked, it was quite expensive and we decided not to go that route.

Running the software on more than one computer is even trickier. I think that normally requires another program to help handle the parceling out of the work, but I'm not at all familiar with the question.

Jerry Steiger
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- Bengt Gustafsson @ Jerry Steiger on Jun 5, 2012 3:30 PM
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  Thanks Jerry, Flow Simulation has the in-built capability to assign jobs to different computers.
  
  What I am after is the same functionality, but for Simulation. Since this issue must be something that any user of Simulation runs in to sooner or later, I hoped that there would be someone out there that is using, have come across, or just heard someone talking about it on the street: A software that is able distribute a simulation calculation over several computers in a network. What is known as a Render Farm in the film/graphics industry.
  
  If there is no such software available, it would be an argument for getting a decent numbercruncher.
  
  //Bengt
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  - Boyko Tchavdarov @ Bengt Gustafsson on Jun 5, 2012 5:45 PM
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    I have run Flow Simulation on remote PCs which have more RAM and CPUs than my local one. I hope now the process is well described in SW2012 as it was too poorly explained with SW 2009 when I did the runs. Each run can be send to a different node (PC). However, only one node (PS) can work on a single run - there is no distributed memory capabilities witH Flow simulation, i.e.distributing a single run on more than one node as Fluent can do it. This type of Solver capabilities requires mesh partition - not available with Flow Simulation. Mesh Partition is a great enhancement for linear speed-up on multiprocessor system, as well. I have no experience with other type of simulations.
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    - Bengt Gustafsson @ Boyko Tchavdarov on Jun 6, 2012 12:49 AM
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      Thanks for your input Boyko.
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Multi-computer simulations?

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