R8 Issue with Clipping Sections, GPU Tessellation, and Wireframe Display

Hi, I work with a small team of designers who all use Rhino as our primary CAD tool for our services. Rhino 8 has been a big boon to us, but has also introduced a few new bugs that really crippled our workflow: such as, expanded layers consuming a lot of system resources and vector printing breaking on certain blocks (leaving us only able to print in raster).

The biggest issue myself and another team member are facing at them moment is one with clipping sections (section cuts) and GPU tessellation.

When section cuts are made, regardless of model size, Rhino locks up and eventually crashes. This gets worse the more section cuts we use. Fresh reinstalls did nothing to solve the problem. This will happen on nearly any model with few exceptions. A quick google search produced a work-around for the issue: disable GPU Tessellation.

We both have disabled GPU Tessellation and also needed to downgrade from Max OpenGL to OpenGL 3.3 to get this fix to work for us. Not only did it solve the R8 freezing and crashing, but also improved performance noticeably across the board.

Unfortunately, this work-around came with a severe and debilitating side-effect of wireframe models that use clipping sections becoming completely invisible. Currently we are switching everything we touch to shaded mode as a stop-gap, but this has crippled our workflow to a costly degree. We work on large architecture-focused models that require a significant layers and resources and can’t afford to go without wireframe.

I’m currently running on a fully updated NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU, and the other staff member is has a NVIDIA GTX-1660 Ti.

Rhino Version 8 SR5

NVIDIA Corporation
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU/PCIe/SSE2
OpenGL version: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 551.86
Render version: 4.6
Shading Language: 4.60 NVIDIA
Driver Date: 3-12-2024
Driver Version: 31.0.15.5186

Maximum Texture size: 32768 x 32768
Z-Buffer depth: 24bits
Stencil depth: 8bits
Maximum Viewport size: 32768 x 32768
Total Video Memory: 8 GB

13th Gen Intel(R) Coreā„¢ i7-13700HX 2.10 GHz
64.0 GB (63.7 GB usable)
Windows 11 Pro (23H2)

If further system specs or clarification of the issue is required please let me know and I’ll be more than happy to provide.

Hi Rob -

When Rhino crashes, does the crash reporter pop up? If so, please always send in those reports, and make sure to include your eMail address so that a developer can contact you.

You write that this gets worse the more section cuts you use, but, when starting from a factory-default template, drawing a simple box, and making a section cut, are you already at that point experiencing lock ups? The ā€œregardless of model sizeā€ seems to suggest that.

If something more is involved, please post a model that is as simple as possible but still shows this behavior. You can also upload a file if you’d rather not post that in public - Rhino Accounts. Make sure to add a link to this topic in the comments field if you use that option.

Please copy-paste the complete report from the Rhino SystemInfo command.

Also, when experiencing problems, I’d make sure to change the update frequency to Service Release Candidates in the Rhino options and let that download a current 8.7 version.

It would be good if you could start new (and separate) threads about these issues.
Thanks,
-wim

Hi Wim,
Thanks for the comprehensive reply!

Yes it does, and I’m not sure if I submitted a report when the crashes happened. They happened so often that I was really just try to rush to find a patch and didn’t think to log details to forward. The only reason it came up is because the wireframe visibility is very difficult to work with, and staff member today was having a particularly difficult time.

I’ll be sure to submit a crash report next time it happens.

You’re absolutely right; I failed to mention that the templates we work with are somewhat robust and to say ā€˜model of any size’ is inaccurate. To better drill down on at what threshold Rhino ceases to work I’ll try a few test models with GPU Tessellation turned back on to see if I can replicate the problem. It’s a bit of a toss up where and when the crash happens, but without a doubt even a single clipping section will cause R8 to chug.

Just updated, but here is my systeminfo.
Rhino 8 SR6 2024-4-10 (Rhino 8, 8.6.24101.05001, Git hash:master @ 32c244aa711e0034e75bec2e87d093c764820b96)
License type: Commercial, build 2024-04-10
License details: Cloud Zoo

Windows 11 (10.0.22631 SR0.0) or greater (Physical RAM: 64GB)
.NET 7.0.0

Computer platform: LAPTOP - Plugged in [98% battery remaining]

Hybrid graphics configuration.
Primary display: Intel(R) UHD Graphics (Intel) Memory: 1GB, Driver date: 4-18-2023 (M-D-Y).
> Integrated graphics device with 4 adapter port(s)
- Windows Main Display is laptop’s integrated screen or built-in port
Primary OpenGL: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Laptop GPU (NVidia) Memory: 8GB, Driver date: 3-12-2024 (M-D-Y). OpenGL Ver: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 551.86
> Integrated accelerated graphics device with 4 adapter port(s)
- Secondary monitor is laptop’s integrated screen or built-in port

OpenGL Settings
Safe mode: Off
Use accelerated hardware modes: On
Redraw scene when viewports are exposed: On
Graphics level being used: OpenGL 4.6 (primary GPU’s maximum)

Anti-alias mode: 4x
Mip Map Filtering: Linear
Anisotropic Filtering Mode: High

Vendor Name: NVIDIA Corporation
Render version: 4.6
Shading Language: 4.60 NVIDIA
Driver Date: 3-12-2024
Driver Version: 31.0.15.5186
Maximum Texture size: 32768 x 32768
Z-Buffer depth: 24 bits
Maximum Viewport size: 32768 x 32768
Total Video Memory: 8188 MB

Rhino plugins that do not ship with Rhino
C:\Users\user\AppData\Roaming\McNeel\Rhinoceros\BlockEditNew\BlockEditNew.rhp ā€œBlockEditā€ 1.0.0.0

Rhino plugins that ship with Rhino
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Commands.rhp ā€œCommandsā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\rdk.rhp ā€œRenderer Development Kitā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\AnimationTools.rhp ā€œAnimationToolsā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\IdleProcessor.rhp ā€œIdleProcessorā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\RhinoRenderCycles.rhp ā€œRhino Renderā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\RhinoRender.rhp ā€œLegacy Rhino Renderā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\rdk_etoui.rhp ā€œRDK_EtoUIā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\NamedSnapshots.rhp ā€œSnapshotsā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\MeshCommands.rhp ā€œMeshCommandsā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\RhinoCycles.rhp ā€œRhinoCyclesā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Toolbars\Toolbars.rhp ā€œToolbarsā€ 8.6.24101.5001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\3dxrhino.rhp ā€œ3Dconnexion 3D Mouseā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Displacement.rhp ā€œDisplacementā€
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\SectionTools.rhp ā€œSectionToolsā€

Will do. One thread already exists and I see you’ve already address it today, thank you!

Hi Wim,

I just updated Rhino 8 SR6 2024-4-10 (Rhino 8, 8.6.24101.05001 right before I replied.

After which I turned ā€˜Use Max OpenGL’ back on as well as GPU Tessellation and tried to generate a crash report by opening previously unopenable files that had numerous clipping sections. All of these files loaded and ran fine, in fact, they ran smooth as butter.

I’m not sure what changed, but it appears this solution has been resolved in the newest update.

I’ll let the other staff who were experiencing the issue that they should update to R8.6 and see if that solves the problem for everyone.

If not, I’ll report back here. I appreciate that you took the time to look into this. Thank you.

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