Terrible performance issues with Zbrush 2020 on macOS Catalina (RESOLVED)

MonsterCaesar · March 4, 2020, 2:26am

(UPDATE - The issue has been mostly resolved (with much the thanks to Mr. Paul Gaboury) Its not an issue with Zbrush at all, It’s the current Wacom drivers for Mac. The Wacom drivers lag the entire system but its most noticeable so when the CPU is put under a heavy load, such as with Zbrush or Keyshot.

Use the the 6.3.37-2 drivers, any newer drivers up to 6.3.38-3 will slow your computer or stutter your mouse inputs. Wacom said they are now working on the problem but are not sure when a fix will be out.)

I am having performance issues with Zbrush 2020 on macOS 10.15.2. I think have narrowed it down to being a multithreading issue. If I have my MaxThreads count at 16 (the maximum for my system, 2019 3.6GHz 8-core iMac) Zbrush stutters and lags every few seconds. If I lower the MaxThreads it seems to alleviate the issue. As it is, I currently get better performance using 1 thread rather than 16. Also. I am not sure if it is related but I noticed that just moving the cursor within Zbrush, without doing anything else, maxes out my processing power which is less than ideal…

Here is a video demonstrating the issues.

I have submitted a support ticket for this issues but have yet to get back a response. If you are a Mac user and experiencing the same problem, try lowering the MaxThreads and hopefully it will help with the issue until it can be fixed proper.

Spyndel · January 5, 2020, 4:27pm

Hi @MonsterCaesar

This is an issue for Support, for whom you’ve already created a ticket. The community boards arent well equipped to handle problems of this nature.

In the meantime, I do dimly recall mention of issues resulting from using too many cores which are being looked into. However the only two posted known issues I can find don’t fit your situation exactly. They may still contain useful information to consider:

https://support.pixologic.com/Knowledgebase/Article/View/243/89/maxthreads-cant-be-set-to-the-maximum-value

https://support.pixologic.com/Knowledgebase/Article/View/269/89/sculptris-pro-multithreading-performance-issues

MonsterCaesar · January 6, 2020, 5:24am

Yeah, I figured it isn’t really an issue anyone on here could resolve but I figured I would post to see if anyone has experienced the same issues or if it is just me.

Thanks for the links to the other issues. Seems like it may be related to or part of the same issue with the multithreading issue with Sculptors Pro.

Peter_Butler · March 4, 2020, 12:14am

I’ve just bought the exact same computer as you and having the exact same issue. Came from an old Mac Pro and that worked flawlessly in Zbrush so surprised to have this issue on a brand new iMac.

I found that if I use a mouse it doesn’t seem to have the same issue although that might just be because of the linear input and thus makes the problem less obvious.

Hopefully they’ll find a fix for it.

Peter

MonsterCaesar · March 4, 2020, 2:24am

I have actually resolved this issue (with much the thanks to Mr. Paul Gaboury) and forgot to update my original post. Its not an issue with Zbrush at all, It’s the current Wacom drivers for Mac. The Wacom drivers lag the entire system but its most noticeable so when the CPU is put under a heavy load, such as with Zbrush or Keyshot.

Use the the 6.3.37-2 drivers, any newer drivers up to 6.3.38-3 will slow your computer or stutter your mouse inputs. Wacom said they are now working on the problem but are not sure when a fix will be out.