Trying Out NVIDIA Isaac Lab Part 1 (Environment Setup, Windows 11)
管理人Introduction
In this post, I tried setting up the environment and launching NVIDIA Isaac Lab.
I had heard about Isaac Lab through digital twin research and corporate exhibitions, but I hadn't touched it because of the high GPU requirements. While I can't do anything large-scale with my resources, I want to explore it as much as possible.
▼The NVIDIA Isaac Lab page is here:
https://developer.nvidia.com/isaac/lab
▼Previous articles are here:
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Setting Up the Environment
▼System requirements and other details are described on the following page:
https://isaac-sim.github.io/IsaacLab/main/source/setup/installation/index.html#local-installation
It states that VRAM 16GB or more and RAM 32GB or more are required. Since my laptop has VRAM 4GB and RAM 64GB, my environment is lacking in VRAM.
▼I am using a gaming laptop purchased for around 100,000 yen, running Windows 11.
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First, I will install Isaac Sim. There seem to be various installation methods, but this time I will perform the installation using Pip.
▼I followed the installation steps on this page:
https://isaac-sim.github.io/IsaacLab/main/source/setup/installation/pip_installation.html
I use venv for the Python virtual environment.
▼I use venv on a regular basis.
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I created and activated the virtual environment with the following commands:
py -3.11 -m venv env_isaaclab
env_isaaclab\Scripts\activate
I also ran a pip upgrade.
python -m pip install --upgrade pipI need to install PyTorch-related packages, but the ones in the documentation were for CUDA 12.8. I checked my system's CUDA version.
▼Running nvidia-smi showed it was CUDA 12.8.
Since the versions matched, I installed the packages with the following commands:
pip install "isaacsim[all,extscache]==5.1.0" --extra-index-url https://pypi.nvidia.com
pip install -U torch==2.7.0 torchvision==0.22.0 --index-url https://download.pytorch.org/whl/cu128I launched Isaac Sim with the following command:
isaacsim▼It launched without any problems.
▼GPU and memory consumption were displayed.
Robot models were provided in the bottom section.
▼Names of famous robot-related companies are listed. There are Japanese companies as well.
I was able to place a model on the Stage.
▼This is the DENSO Cobotta Pro 1300.
It's a robot arm I've touched during my research, but I don't think the gripper was standard equipment. It is included in the model.
Next, I will install Isaac Lab. Download the GitHub repository.
git clone https://github.com/isaac-sim/IsaacLab
cd IsaacLab
./isaaclab.sh --help▼The help was displayed without any issues.
I'll install it using the bat file and try launching it.
.\isaaclab.bat --install
python scripts\tutorials\00_sim\create_empty.py▼It launched successfully.
Running a Sample
I executed a reinforcement learning sample with the following command:
.\isaaclab.bat -p scripts/reinforcement_learning/rsl_rl/train.py --task=Isaac-Ant-v0 --headless▼The training progressed.
▼It took some time, but it finished successfully.
When I was running 3D Gaussian Splatting, it sometimes force-closed due to insufficient memory, but this seems to have run fine.
The previous command had the headless option, so it only output to the terminal, but when I removed the option, the GUI also launched.
.\isaaclab.bat -p scripts/reinforcement_learning/rsl_rl/train.py --task=Isaac-Ant-v0▼As shown below, a massive number of models were lined up.
▼The actual movement looks like this:
The processing was heavy and the movement was slow on my PC, but I confirmed that it can be launched.
Finally
I managed to get it working, but I definitely feel the lack of PC specs. When I develop with Unreal Engine, I set all performance-related parameters to the lowest level, so I'm curious if I can also lower the rendering performance in Isaac Lab.
Since it launches for now, I plan to try various things.
