Renderfarm OS 2005-05-10 - By Andy Jones
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Hi Jordi,
Our farm is Windows 2000 on BatchServe.
That said, I'd go Linux. No question. If what you're saying about
being comfortable with batch rendering is true, you can probably get
away with that for now if you have to, and with Linux, it's a lot easier
to automate. Don't install Windows for the purpose of using
BatchServe. Even if BatchServe were great render queueing software,
you'd still be better off on Linux. The only reason I can think of not
to use Linux is if you absolutely need some sort of shader that you only
have compiled on Windows and you don't have access to the source. For
free open source render management, check out DrQueue. I don't know of
anyone who has used it yet. I'm still hoping someone will give it a try
and tell me about it (anyone?). If you're on a production deadline and
don't have time to experiment, maybe go with one of the other options --
Royal Render, Rush, etc.
For distributions, I can't speak from personal experience with XSI on
Linux, but Gentoo is likely to give you the fastest possible system.
Since you're installing on 10 machines, maybe it's worth the
semi-fictional "extra trouble." Just make sure there aren't any
proprietary drivers you need that will only install on particular distros.
If you do choose to go with windows, google "psexec". It's a program
that runs applications remotely, and can make your life easier if you're
comfortable putting together some scripts.
Here's something else that might be useful for you (one of many ways to
do this):
Procedure for imaging hard disk partitions:
Install software on one system.
Download and burn 2 Knoppix Live CDs.
Boot the machine you installed with Knoppix (call this "source")
Boot another machine with Knoppix (call this "server")
On server:
Become root
> su
Create a password for the user "partimag"
> passwd partimag
Partition the hard disk if necessary, with a Linux partition.
> cfdisk /dev/sda
Create a filesystem:
> mkfs -t ext3 /dev/sda1
Create a mount-point:
> mkdir /mnt/sda1
Mount the filesystem:
> mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/sda1
Run the following:
> partimaged --daemon --port 4025 --dest /mnt/sda1
You should now have a disk image server running on server. Make
sure you know the ipaddress of server (ifconfig eth0).
On source:
Become root
> su
Run imaging program
> partimage
Choose the partition you want to image, give it a filename, select
"Save partition into a new image file", enable "Connect to server",
input the IP address of server, hit next.
Log in as user=partimag, password=<whatever password you chose>
Follow the rest of the instructions. If you get confused, man
partimage.
Once you have an image file on the server, shutdown the source, and use
that cd to boot another computer (destination).
On destination:
Become root
> su
Run cfdisk and partition your hard drive.
> cfdisk /dev/sda1
Run the imaging program
> partimage
Do the same thing you did above, but choose "restore partition from
an image file". Be sure to enter the same filename you used above.
Log in as before.
Once the partition is imaged, you should also restore the MBR.
Follow the same options as before, but choose "restore an mbr from the
imagefile".
Hopefully I got all this right, and it's useful... Note, if you're
copying NTFS partitions, Linux's NTFS support is experimental, so don't
use this for transferring mission-critical data. Also, note that you
can restore partitions to multiple machines at the same time. And for
faster transfers, disable the SSL encryption option.
-Andy
Jordi Bares wrote:
>we are using Fedora Core 2 for our renderfarm and workstations and works
>really well.. some of the stats show the up and running time and tends
>to be many many days without any performance degratation nor crashes.
>
>jb
>
>On Tue, 2005-05-10 at 09:41, tony@(protected) wrote:
>
>
>>Hi all,
>>
>>I'm about to take delivery of a mini renderfarm (10 dual cpu ibms in a small
>>rack enclosure), but was wondering what the best OS for it should be. I'm
>>currently using xsi on winxp, so should I stick with that? How about linux?
And
>>is there a particular flavour of linux i should use? I have limited unix
skills,
>>but am sure i'm up to setting up a linux server.
>>
>>Also, I don't have batchserve. Up until now i've simply been using xsibatch
>>command line rendering to set off distributed rendering. I'm comfortable with
>>it and find it adequate for my needs, but should I consider investing in
>>batchserve or some sort of render management software now that i have this
>>mini-farm.
>>
>>cheers
>>Tony.
>>
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