network
Using Linux for Vue network rendering
10/08/06 04:51 Filed in: Graphics
I have run 4.22 Rendercows of the 3d software
Vue
Esprit using Wine on
knoppix. I
saved the Rendercows on USB pen drives and just
boot the systems off of a Knoppix CD. The
computers don't even have hard drives... just
memory, CDROM and the oh so tasty CPU. This
should make for cheapy rendercows.
You should be able to boot those additional render cows using only the pen drive (if the motherboard supports it) or off of PXE bootable ethernet cards (ideal if the motherboard has these built-in). For under a grand you would be able to build an ok x4 RenderCowBarn (well I guess adding power supplies and cooling might make it a little more than a grand.)
You should be able to boot those additional render cows using only the pen drive (if the motherboard supports it) or off of PXE bootable ethernet cards (ideal if the motherboard has these built-in). For under a grand you would be able to build an ok x4 RenderCowBarn (well I guess adding power supplies and cooling might make it a little more than a grand.)
Vue 5 Esprit network rendering
09/08/06 06:01 Filed in: Graphics
I use the Vue 5
Esprit software for making 3d graphic images
and animations. There is an add-on for network
rendering that, when it works, drastically cuts
the rendering time. Below are some of my tests
using it over a wireless network.
Below are the test runs of rendercows (Vue's networking client) using the included 4Seasons.vue sample animation file set for 391 frames and 160x120 preview rendering.
So this would seem to say the following things
That being said I do not find the rendercows in Vue 5 very network friendly or stable. For instance the status would be irregular: stopping an unused rendercow would always give an alert saying that it was in the process of rendering, from the main Vue 5 machine, some clients were not showing their idle status correctly, rebooting one of my rendercow clients caused the Vue 5 program to quit without warning, client manager only shows names of connected devices, not IP or port numbers used, no simple network check to see if the remote computer is available (they just appear magically if they were previously used, no pre-existing list of the expected rendercows.)
Since the network rendering is sold in packs of 5 I can run one additional rendercow. When I get the chance I will have that one be on the other side of a VPN network.
- A1/A2 3Ghz hyperthreading machine (simulated 2 processor)
- B 1.7 Ghz Pentium
- C 2Ghz Celeron
Below are the test runs of rendercows (Vue's networking client) using the included 4Seasons.vue sample animation file set for 391 frames and 160x120 preview rendering.
17m25s - no network rendering on machine A
25m57s - Machine A with one rendercow running
8m13s - Machine A & B running rendercows
7m42s - Machine A running x2 rendercows and Machine B as well
4m25s - Machine A running x2 rendercows and Machines B & C as well
So this would seem to say the following things
- If you do not have additional machines, you are better off not using rendercow
- The rendercow seems to make good use of the hyperthreading already but there was still a small gain in speed when running x2 rendercows on a hyperthreading machine.
- Even on a low speed network (yes it is a wireless 802.11g but actual signal strength probably is not allowing me more than 20mbps) benefits can be significant.
That being said I do not find the rendercows in Vue 5 very network friendly or stable. For instance the status would be irregular: stopping an unused rendercow would always give an alert saying that it was in the process of rendering, from the main Vue 5 machine, some clients were not showing their idle status correctly, rebooting one of my rendercow clients caused the Vue 5 program to quit without warning, client manager only shows names of connected devices, not IP or port numbers used, no simple network check to see if the remote computer is available (they just appear magically if they were previously used, no pre-existing list of the expected rendercows.)
Since the network rendering is sold in packs of 5 I can run one additional rendercow. When I get the chance I will have that one be on the other side of a VPN network.