If I understand your description (100 x 300-residue proteins) you have 100 models opened. It is quite possible rendering will not utilize the GPU or CPU fully in that situation with so many models opened because of the design of the Chimera graphics code. For each model it is issuing tens to hundreds of separate OpenGL graphics calls and using several different buffers to hold the data for each model. The overhead of thousands of graphics calls on small data could easily fail to saturate the CPU or GPU. What can happen is the graphics driver gets a heavy CPU load just marshalling all those calls and sending them to the graphics card, and that heavy CPU use many not be assigned to the Chimera application, instead it is operating system kernel time. So your situation of 100 models may be CPU bound but you are not seeing the CPU load because it is the operating system graphics driver. When you open the Side View the number of graphics calls doubles. But when you close it it should return to half the calls and render at the same speed as before you started side view.

On Mar 17, 2020, at 3:26 PM, Daniel P Farrell <danpf@uw.edu> wrote:

Hi Tom,

Thanks for your response.

I have a modest GPU, GTX780. ( i will attach the requested information below)
However, this should be more than enough to handle the workloads I am running with.

some points I should mention:
1. For me - the biggest problem is the reduction in FPS persists even after closing the side-view panel, and doesn't go away until a new session is started. This appears to happen on both a desktop, and a lesser, (linux) integrated-graphics laptop.
2. When monitoring the GPU usage, I see that even though view panel is away, gpu utilization still comes to a rest a 0%, and the framerate is still significantly decreased.
3. The only way to get my GPU usage above 50% given an intense scenario (large density map, 100x300-residue proteins) is if I turn on the publication 1 preset (easily maxes at 100% usage).
4. With the default viewing setting, I max out at ~30% usage if I run "turn x -100 1000" and randomly rotate the screen with my cursor.
5. With the default viewing setting and the side-view open, I max out at ~50% usage if I run "turn x -100 1000" and randomly rotate the screen with my cursor. however, the frame display is significantly more choppy

I think something definitely funky is going on with the side view panel....

OpenGL Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
OpenGL Renderer: GeForce GTX 780/PCIe/SSE2
OpenGL Version: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 430.26
/etc/debian_version:
buster/sid
/etc/os-release:
NAME="Ubuntu"
VERSION="18.10 (Cosmic Cuttlefish)"
ID=ubuntu
ID_LIKE=debian
PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu 18.10"
VERSION_ID="18.10"
HOME_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/"
SUPPORT_URL="https://help.ubuntu.com/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/"
PRIVACY_POLICY_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/legal/terms-and-policies/privacy-policy"
VERSION_CODENAME=cosmic
UBUNTU_CODENAME=cosmic
/etc/lsb-release:
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=18.10
DISTRIB_CODENAME=cosmic
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 18.10"
/proc/cpuinfo:
cpu: 8 GenuineIntel Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4770K CPU @ 3.50GHz (x86_64)
cpu MHz: 3595.237
cache: 8192 KB
/proc/meminfo:
MemTotal: 24632820 kB
Graphics:
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation GK110 [GeForce GTX 780] [10de:1004] (rev a1)
Subsystem: eVga.com. Corp. GK110B [GeForce GTX 780 SC w/ ACX Cooler] [3842:0784]
Kernel driver in use: nvidia

――――――――――――――――――――
Multisampling: False
Shadows: False

On Tue, Mar 17, 2020 at 12:40 PM Tom Goddard <goddard@sonic.net> wrote:
Hi Daniel,

Rendering the Side View takes about the same amount of GPU processing as rendering the main window, so when you show the Side View you are using twice as much GPU and it will slow down if you have enough models open so your GPU can only render 60 times a second then adding the Side View will drop it to 30 frames per second. But the 60 frames per second you see is because Chimera targets 60 since that what typical desktop displays refresh at. Maybe you have large molecules or slow graphics, or don't have a good graphics driver installed. On a 2019 MacBook Pro with Radeon Vega 20 graphics and Chimera 1.14 the 60000 atom PDB 1aon with initial ribbon display rotates at 60 frames per second but if I show Side View rotation drops to about 40 frames per second. With a nice graphics card like an Nvidia RTX 2070 I expect it would easily maintain 60 frames per second with hundreds of thousands of atoms.

To see what graphics driver Chimera is using use Help / Report a Bug.

Tom

> On Mar 16, 2020, at 7:40 PM, Daniel P Farrell <danpf@uw.edu> wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> I've been using chimera for a long time now, and I always thought there was some sort of memory leak because it was so slow after 30+ minutes of usage.
>
> Today I started a new session and somehow discovered it wasn't a memory leak, but the viewing panel!
>
> This is on Ubuntu 18.10
>
> I'm 'guessing' it's the side view sapping some computational power? but my CPUs aren't maxed out, and my GPU is also showing low usage so it must be some strange bug.
>
> Here i load the benchmark window and set it to continuously measure frame rate:
> >>> happily twirling large structure + lots of molecules
> Frame rate: 61.6
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 59.9
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 59.9
> Frame rate: 60.0
> Frame rate: 59.8
> >>> open viewing panel by clicking 'side view' icon on sidebar + continue twirling
> Frame rate: 29.6
> Frame rate: 27.1
> Frame rate: 11.8
> Frame rate: 19.4
> Frame rate: 19.7
> Frame rate: 19.7
> Frame rate: 24.0
> Frame rate: 30.0
>
> Even though I know ChimeraX is the main focus now, I would love this to get fixed!
>
> ~Dan
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