GPUBox Artist builds you an instant GPU render farm

Renegatt Software has released GPUBox Artist, a new tool for setting up and administering CUDA-based GPU render farms. The software, which is still officially in beta, works with both Blender and Octane Render.

(Full disclosure: it came out earlier this month, but we haven’t seen much coverage, and it’s an interesting tool.)

A simple GPU virtualization solution
GPUBox Artist “separates application and operating systems from the [physical] GPUs”, enabling a renderer to access GPUs in servers or other artists’ machines across a network.

To access a set number of GPUs, the user enters a simple terminal command ($ gpubox add n to access n GPUs, or $ gpubox drop all to stop using them again), or uses a web-based client.

CUDA renderers on the user’s machine can then access GPUs on the network as if they were installed locally. Several users can share the same GPU; and users can access GPUs from virtual machines.

Simple as that. The software also provides administrators with basic security and network monitoring options.

Pricing and availability
GPUBox Artist itself runs on most major Linux distros, while the web client also runs on Windows 7 and 8. It costs €99 (around $130) per GPU, including free upgrades to the 1.x releases. It works with CUDA GPUs only.

There is also a free trial edition, limited to a single user and six GPUs.

Read more about GPUBox Artist on the Renegatt Software website