Bryce render farm almost ready.
Analog-X64
Posts: 110
I finally picked up a gigabit switch so I'm going to setup another Bryce render farm, last time I did this was back in 2010 using Bryce 6.3 and I was using Pentium 4 and Pentium D machines, with low ram.
You can read about those test in the forum archive: http://forumarchive.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php?t=157374&view=next
Render dedicated hardware is
1 x Intel Core 2 Quad Q8300 @ 2.50GHz / 8 GB Ram
3 x Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.66GHz / 2GB RAM
I have a 4th Core 2 Duo machine but the PSU is dead
optional addition if needed.
The main PC for all my other work
AMD A8-3870 @3.00 GHz / 8 GB RAM
I'll post some test results when I get it all up and running.
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Comments
Sweet - What are your rates?
After a bit of wrestling with Bryce Lightning (c++ 2005 issues) I manged to get everything up and running,
I tested with one of my images which took 25 minutes to render previously and via the render farm it was done in 5 mins.
@oroboros: I don’t know, I didn't set out to offer render services. I did this mainly to speed up the render of my own projects, if I were to offer such
service there is the concern of legality of the source files, which I have no way of providing a secure manner in which you can upload an image
to be rendered automatically. Especially if there is a 3rd party (customer) involved which may have an issue with the distribution of the content.
Make sure you have enough memory on all clients. If the client cannot handle the file, the result of the render will be disappointing. Also, use the fastest machine to distribute the tiles (use tile optimization for stills, but not for animations) and collect them. The slowest machine is usually the last that finishes. A large file needs quite a while to be sent to all clients, because it is not sent to all at the same time but rather to one only, and when that one has it, it is sent to the next client, and so on. Sending large files to the clients may take quite some time. Therefore, use network rendering only if it is a long render job (nothing wrong with small files that render fast gor testing purposes).
Thanks for the tips Horo, you and I have discussed this topic before :) I think this is my 3rd or 4th iteration.
at one point I had Pentium II, Pentium III and Pentium 4 machines for rendering and now Core 2 Duo and one day Core i5's :)
I plan to use this to render high res renders 5000x6000 resolution kind of stuff.
The core 2 duo machines have 2 GB of RAM each and the 4 Core machines have 8GB.
Everything is running on a 1gigabit network
I've been rendering one of my scenes since last Wednesday which is almost done.
In the Network Render Manger right now its showing.
Job Name
Sate: Running
Progress 100% complete.
But its not.
Clicking on "Settings" is showing me that the clients are still rendering and I've watched some complete their current
pieces and start a new piece.
So although progress is 100% complete, it isn't.
I also added a Core i7 laptop into the mix.
This was a laptop that someone spilled a drink into it. Battery is removed and using a KVM switch
to control mouse and keyboard. I'm also using a laptop cooler stand to keep the temperature under control.
Everything is connected to a couple of UPS unit so no worries in regards to a power failure.
I love the fact that I can add/remove computers from the render farm on the fly.
Yes, 100% complete can be deceptive. I usually have the Network Render settings open. Here, you can see which client has finished for good - it gets green and stays so. In my experience, 100% complete can appear when the slowest machine is still chewing on the last tile or frame.
Yes, Lightning 2c (the one that ships with Bryce 7.1 Pro) is very forgiving if you pull out a network cable on a client the tile it is crunching is lost but if you reconnect it, it gets another tile.
The important thing (in case I haven't mentioned it already) is that you have to set Priority to high on the machine from which you launch the network render. If this machine is a single core, you don't have the option and all clients that sport multi-cores will just idle in low priority, using only one core. This is also a reason why the fastest machine should assume the role of the server.
Thanks for the tip Horo, yes I make sure all my renders are set to High Priority so they utilize all 4 cores. Whats interesting is in previous versions of Bryce, it was recommended to use the slowest machine to run Bryce on, as that machine didnt do any render just assembly.
Ah, Lightning 1 that came with Bryce 5 did automatically render on the main machine. Subsequent versions didn't. But you can start Lightning on that computer as well and then it acts as a client and server.
Yes I run lightning on all machines, including the one with Bryce.
I looked at task manager on all machines during rendering and all cores on all machines were running at 100%.
@Horo if you need me to benchmark anything for you let me know.
Thank you. In fact, I have never run a speed test over the network, only on the individual machines. Since my test file renders rather fast on the newest machine (which is already old), it didn't make sense to run a network test. I have to use another test file and have to test on each machine separately first. My test file and the results can be found on my website (see sig), go to Raytracing > Test-old, and Test-new. The file can also be downloaded from there.
I grabbed the bryce 5 file and rendered it on my main machine which has the Intel Core 2 Quad Q8300 @ 2.50 GHz with render priority set to high. and it took 1:03 to render
I then rendered the file over my network setup and the screen shot is below.
Quite a speed increase, thanks for testing. You will notice that the difference is greater if the overall render time is longer.
I've been reading this thread from start to finish, because I was curious as to how well Bryce Lightning works. I received it with my download of Bryce 7 Pro about 9 months ago.
I must say I am quite impressed with the speeds that are being achieved using the Render Farm that was assembled for the purpose. I have the one Laptop Toshiba with an i3 intel core processor which has 4 GB of RAM. I must say that large files take hours to render on my machine, and even with a laptop cooling pad, I have to break the render down into stages, What I mean to say is that I must stop the render after an hour or so, allow my system to cool, open Bryce and reload the file and then resume the render. The largest file I have rendered so far had to be rendered in 7 to 9 stages, for a total render time of over 8 hours.
I plan to get a home computer with a quad core and 16 GB of RAM in the near future. Once I have it, I will set up Bryce on it and use my laptop in a home render farm network via Bryce Lightning.
This has been quite informative. Thank you!
I'm glad you've found this thread informative. Since my last post, I've also added a Core i7 laptop that was damaged. The screen and keyboard are damaged, but the rest of the system is just fine.
I use a belkin usb powered laptop cooler, it has a single fan in the middle of it which keeps the laptop from getting too hot. The battery is removed as to reduce heat and possible fire hazard. I've also made sure the fan built into the laptop is nice and clean by using compressed air to clean out any accumulated dust.
The main quad core PC that I use for rendering, was purchased at a local computer shop for $450 but I upgraded the power supply from 450 watts to 650watts just incase the PC needs the extra power its there.
oh and I run everything off of a UPS as not to risk losing renders during a power failure.
If you haven't recently I would recommend using a can of compressed air to blow out any dust that might have accumulated in your laptop.
Make sure you blow the air outwards from your laptop. You dont want to blow into the vent and push the dust further inside. Blow the air in the vent area where the fan pulls the air from, and out from the side.
I'm glad you've found this thread informative. Since my last post, I've also added a Core i7 laptop that was damaged. The screen and keyboard are damaged, but the rest of the system is just fine.
I use a belkin usb powered laptop cooler, it has a single fan in the middle of it which keeps the laptop from getting too hot. The battery is removed as to reduce heat and possible fire hazard. I've also made sure the fan built into the laptop is nice and clean by using compressed air to clean out any accumulated dust.
The main quad core PC that I use for rendering, was purchased at a local computer shop for $450 but I upgraded the power supply from 450 watts to 650watts just incase the PC needs the extra power its there.
oh and I run everything off of a UPS as not to risk losing renders during a power failure.
If you haven't recently I would recommend using a can of compressed air to blow out any dust that might have accumulated in your laptop.
Make sure you blow the air outwards from your laptop. You dont want to blow into the vent and push the dust further inside. Blow the air in the vent area where the fan pulls the air from, and out from the side.
Thanks for the advice. I do that on a semi- regular basis. My machine has served me well for almost three years now. I keep it as free from dust as possible, and I also do constant maintenance with defragmenting, malware scanning and cleaning, And backing up my files on my two externals. My keyboard seems to collect a lot more dust than the internal parts. Eventually I want to upgrade my processor to 6 GB. I would have whatever is needed to accommodate that task done at the same time.
I know it has been some time since I last posted to this thread, but what I am doing now is working at grabbing several computers to create my network from. At the moment I have a good used tower I will be getting that has a better processor than my Laptop. I will need to upgrade the RAM on it and my laptop, to 6 or 8 GB for the laptop, and to 8 through 16 GB on the tower. The tower has an i5 or i7 processor. I will most likely need to do a factory reset on the Windows 7 OS, but I will check first to see if there are any useful applications included on the machine that I would like to keep. I figure I will have at least a couple of months work to get it up and running with all I have to install on it. Of course Bryce 7.1 Pro is gonna be on it, and Bryce Lightning. I may need instructional help on getting the render farm up and working right. If so I know where to come.
@Mage 13X13 - just a word of warning. In case you re-install Bryce, be aware that anything you have purchased or saved will be overwritten. This concerns all folders under the Bryce main folder. Make sure you save the Presets folder and any other you may have stored stuff after you had installed Bryce.
Since Bryce is a 32-bit application, it can only address 2 GB. You can make Bryce and Lightning large address aware, then up to around 3.2 to 3.5 GB can be addressed - provided the computer sports that much memory.