On a computer at work XSI 2.02 doesnt render the normal way (like a spiral from the center and out), instead it just renders out the buckets randomly. the problem with this is that I dont see the rendering result during the rendering progress. For example when I render a scene that takes 40 secs to render it "prepares" the rendering for about 15 seconds, then shows the buckets it rendered and prepares for another 15 seconds until the rendering is done. I want it to work in the normal way where it displays the rendered bucket as soon as it finished rendering it. Is there any way i can change this?
Also, on all computers I've tried XSI on it crashed when rendering hair that have a texturemap to controll its colors. This happens even in 2.02...
I've had the same problems. Sometimes, the renderer take upto three or four minutes, calculating the scene before rendering it on screen all at once. It's not very intuitive and has shown to be slower than XSI 1.5 due to the pre-processing. Bizarrely, I used to get this alot with hair but I managed (just twice) to get it rendering a complex hair scene almost straight away, updating the grids properly and everything. I can't get it working again.
I hate XSI as much as I love it. If my company had shelled out 11 grand on it, I'd be ready to sue by now.
MR3 is much faster I assure you. MR used to parse the scene and then render. MR3 parses the scene as it renders....hence the random blocks. It parses and renders the "lightest" areas first and then moves onto the more complex stuff. This is great for the render region as it improves interaction. It also is much faster when calculating radiosity and motion blur.