So I figured the first post on this new blog of mine should be about the thing that has taken up most of my free time, and that would be my render farm. What I am going to do is walk you through the steps I took to make this work… whether they were the right steps, I don’t know.

1. First I had to figure out what computers  I was going to use. Typically what I have seen through the web and with people I know who have set these up before is most of us don’t have money to just go buying new computers all willy nilly. So I started looking around at work and with friends to find some computers with the following minimum requirements:

1 GHz processor
512 RAM
Ethernet Card
KVM input
10 GB Hard drive

As I understand it these would be the minimum requirements to get this thing going. After a week or two search, something dawned on me… I work at a company that makes computers, why not see if I could get some old ones or ones not being used. Well boy oh boy did I score the jackpot! I got 7 computers with the following specs:

3 GHz processor
1 GB RAM
Ethernet Card
KVM input
80 GB Hard drive

One thing to note if you are trying to put one of these together, if you keep your computer count under ten you can keep this on a WORKGROUP if you go over you will have to set up one as a server.
2. Now that we have our farmers we need to figure out how we want this set up. I put together the below diagram to make it easier for my self seeing as I am very visual person. You can use this too if you want.

So what you’ll see is that I have the 6 workers that are strictly rendering. I have the “Mainframe” which is where the shared folders are for the maps, sounds, scenes, models and the renders and this will also be the manager of the farm. Then I have my workstation which is tied into the network where all the magic happens. Below is the run down of equipment:

6 Computers for rendering
1 Computer as the manager and Shared Library
I computer for the workstation (where you’ll be modeling)
1 8 port switch
1 Copy of 3ds Max (I used 7) with Back Burner
8 Ethernet cables
a 1 to 2 KVM switch

Time for step 3.

3. Now your ready to start setting this thing up.

So as I’m sure you have already thought to yourself is why am I only using a 1 to 2 KVM switch when I have 7 computers in my farm, well my dear friend we are going to be using an awesome tool called Remote Desktop.

To begin we’ll set up the first computer which will be the “Mainframe”. Hook up the KVM switch to this bad boy and turn it on. The following will need to be set up on this computer:

Static IP address
3ds Max and  Back Burner
Shared folders for models, maps, sounds, etc.
And of course Remote Desktop (We will set up Remote Desktop when the other computers are set up. )
Set up a network and add to the WORKGROUP then change the name of the computer
Now what you will need to do is set up each of the six farmers. So take the other part of the KVM cable and start with farmer one(you will change this to every farmer as you continue on).

Just as another note all computers will need 3ds Max installed but not registered.

Below are the things that you will need to set up for each farmer:

Static IP address
3ds Max and  Back Burner
And of course Remote Desktop
You will need to have a Windows username and password set up (this allows the “mainframe” remote desktop to log in to each computer )
Set up a network and add each to the WORKGROUP then change the name of each computer

Now that you have all your farmers set up and running, switch back to the “Mainframe”. Now what we will be doing is making sure all the farmers are on the network, we will do this by pinging all the static ip addresses you set up. Go to start > run> type in cmd and press enter this will open up dos, you will not type in ping (then the ip address ex. 192.168.100.10) and you should get a response. If not check your cables and connections and if you saved the static ip address. Once you have pinged all computers you can now set up remote desktop. You can see how this is done by going here. What I did was under options I checked allow me to save credentials, this allows you to remote into each farmer without typing in the user/password after the initial set up. Next what i did was save the connection to my desktop so I could access it fast and have them all in the same area.

4. Once you have all the farmers set and the “Mainframe” remoting into each computer you can start BackBurner. In all the farmers all you need to do is launch the server application in back burner. Keep the default settings for manager and server port and for the subnet mask if you are on a closed network you can do an automatic search for the subnet mask, however you can also turn off automatic and search by the manager ip address or name.

On the “Mainframe” you will need to launch the manager, monitor, and server. Most defaults will be fine and you can adjust as needed.

In the monitor you will now see all the farmers and their status should be idle.

5. You’re ready to render.

Make sure that you save all your 3ds max files in the approperiate spots on the manager/library machine. Then launch 3ds Max on your Work Station, locate your files and go to the render window. If you are trying to render a movie I found it easier to render image sequences then pull them together into a video editing software like After effects.

So set up the frames you want to render, the file type you want to render (this shoule be saved in the library) then select net render.
Once you press the render button the Network Job Assignment window will open.
Name your render job,  connect to the subnet mask or type in a ip or name, select the servers you want use and any other settings you want, and press the submit button. You will see that the job was sent to the “Mainframe” and has begun assigning frames to the other computers you’re rendering!

A few notes:
You will notice that the frames will be assigned in blocks so for example 1-10 on farmer 1 11-20 on farmer 2 etc. This can be changed in the Network Job Assignment window under advanced. This is set up this way to save on bandwidth by turning it off you will be able to have all servers rendering at the same time.
There may be some errors with your 3ds max installs especially with the program not finding a dll files there are easy fixes you will just after search google for you particular file

That’s it your ready to go!