Network File Setup

[Infrared digital]

Hi

I have just expanded the number of computers and want to know how other people setup their file systems so that there is an easily accessible and quick way for multiple workstations to access files for rendering, photoshop work and post production ?

thanks

N

[Da_elf]

http://www.elfpro3d.com check out my tutorial section

[Infrared digital]

Finally, getting round to setting this network up.

Anyway, I have done a few tests using one key drive for project files etc... This works brilliantly with max and VRay but when it comes to opening and saving photoshop files across a network - it is mind numbingly slow.

How can I speed this up ?

thanks

n

[mike.edel]

sounds like a bandwith issue
are you on gigabit?

[Infrared digital]

Your right, we're not. I will look into this over the weekend.

n

[DaForce]

yeah cause without gigabit your only really gonna bet getting max of 10mb/s so a 100mb PS file will take about 10seconds at best.

How long is it taking you currently and for what size files?

[mike.edel]

ps: gigabit can cause all sorts of problems, too
especially the integrated chipsets tend to eat tons of cpu if you run them on gigabit speed (weve had issues with that, leading us to buy a new card and disable the integrated one)

ive had lots of trouble with my marvell yukon chip - would lose connection when writing on other computers
somehow uninstalling the drivers and reinstalling them helped

i heard that addon cards seem to work better in that regard (but dont ask me for brands/chip-vendors - your answer implied that you dont yet use any gigabit components so you might have the opportunity to choose products (cards, switches, cabling) that work together
oh, and dont try to be too cheap on the switch - those tend to be the limiting factor in transfer speeds (they usually have a maximum internal transfer rate for all ongoing connections )

i guess when rendering you are opening a lot of smaller files (textures, scenes, xrefs) so you dont notice the lower bandwidth as bad as you do in photoshop

cu mike

DaForce: 10MByte/sec sounds realistic on 100mbit - thats what i usually get over here

[DaForce]

yeah the onboard ones can eat up your cpu.. but i found on my board it aint to bad... maybe 5% up to 10% (not not 100% sure)

Yeah although technically its capable of more up to 12.5mb i think generally you never get that because of system over heads ..etc..etc.
And in windows you also have to deal with that QOS shit taking 20% of your bandwidth... but thats easy enough to get around.

[mike.edel]

as far as i know (and read in magazines) qos isnt reserving any bandwidth except if you are currently downloading windows update patches
it may reserve 20% but normally doesnt

well, doesnt mean you shouldnt turn it off
which usually is a good thing in any case as there tend to be too many useless services running by default

cant say how much cpu my gigabit chip eats as im still running it on 100mbit
in theory the onboard ones should be more cpu friendly since all the data shouldnt have to go through the pci bus
dont know what went wrong there

[DaForce]

Im pretty certain it does reserver about 20% and the only way to fix it is thru a registry edit. Cause if you disable or remove it, the 20% allocation is still taken up.
There are heaps of pages on the net about this and how to get past it.

My friends and I have seen an improvement when using the registry fix.

[mike.edel]

http://dast.nlanr.net/Projects/Iperf/
seems to be a nice tool for testing maximum bandwidth

command line use only

cu mike

just found this document
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316666/EN-US/

Clarification about the use of QoS in end computers that are running Windows XP
As in Windows 2000, programs can take advantage of QoS through the QoS APIs in Windows XP. One hundred percent of the network bandwidth is available to be shared by all programs unless a program specifically requests priority bandwidth. This "reserved" bandwidth is still available to other programs unless the requesting program is sending data. By default, programs can reserve up to an aggregate bandwidth of 20 percent of the underlying link speed on each interface on an end computer. If the program that reserved the bandwidth is not sending sufficient data to use it, the unused part of the reserved bandwidth is available for other data flows on the same host.

For more information about the QoS Packet Scheduler, see Windows XP Help. Additional information about Windows 2000 QoS is available in the Windows 2000 technical library.

in my experience that statement is true
the only program i know using the windows builtin qos is windows update (which is disabled here)
ps: just ran a test and my measued bandwidth is about 95mbit/sec with generated traffic, might be lower with bi-directional traffic and real data though

[DaForce]

Well that clears that up then

Thanks

[Infrared digital]

Thanks for all your replies. I have just installed the gigabit hub and it goes so much faster.

Got all the main files on one machine which has a raid backup therefore leaving the workstations free.

thanks again

n