No change with 3dsmax SP update speeds then?

[Morbid Angel]

How do you do that? I need to update 12 machines to Max 2017 and Vray 3.5 in the next month or so. I've been doing it manually. The joys of not having an IT guy eh?

its quite easy. If you have deadline, or any other render manager (its easier in deadline though) you can execute a command line script, basically I have the max installer create a max image (create deployment) its called). The pass the installation link line into the .cmd file for example deployMax2017.cmd After that in deadline you can submit a command line script, so lets say you have 12 machines - you set 12 frames (1 for each machine) with the script in the path as submit it. It will execute an installer on each machine, do the install then complete the frame.

Same goes for service packs, you just create a cmd with above mentioned command line and repeat that step, so I have a whole bunch of cmd scripts sitting in deadline as suspended, and enable them when either get a new machine or have to do an upadte.

Vray also has a silent option, its a bit different you can look it up in docs.

[Donald2B]

You can also setup installation of plug-ins as well with your 3DS Max deployment. I use that on my renderfarm. The deadline route is definitely a little more automated, which is VERY nice.

The hardest part is just getting the deployment setup with the correct plug-ins and settings. I have a test machine I use to test out the deployments before mass distributing it across the workstations / render farm.

[eyepiz]

If they change it, you know they will break it and take another hour long service pack to fix it.

The wrapper around the service pack does the trick, I say we leave it alone.

[AC5L4T3R]

its quite easy. If you have deadline, or any other render manager (its easier in deadline though) you can execute a command line script, basically I have the max installer create a max image (create deployment) its called). The pass the installation link line into the .cmd file for example deployMax2017.cmd After that in deadline you can submit a command line script, so lets say you have 12 machines - you set 12 frames (1 for each machine) with the script in the path as submit it. It will execute an installer on each machine, do the install then complete the frame.

Same goes for service packs, you just create a cmd with above mentioned command line and repeat that step, so I have a whole bunch of cmd scripts sitting in deadline as suspended, and enable them when either get a new machine or have to do an upadte.

Vray also has a silent option, its a bit different you can look it up in docs.

Could you possibly show me how the cmd is written? I have a small understanding of cmd (from when I played DOS games back in the day) but I've never written a script for it.

[Morbid Angel]

Could you possibly show me how the cmd is written? I have a small understanding of cmd (from when I played DOS games back in the day) but I've never written a script for it.

Yeah its just this line:

msiexec /update 3dsMax2017_SP3.msp /quiet /l* 3dsMax2017_SP3.log
pause

so you create the cmd in the same folder where 3ds max service pack msp lives. This forlder should be on a mapped drive not unc, since cmd can't be run on unc path. The mapped folder should be accessible by all network machines.

For the actual max install, when you install 3ds max though UI, you have an option to create deployment. I usually create that image in the same location where the service packs live. Then the cmd just points to the installation link:

"Z:\bunker\deploy\3dsmax2017\image\deploy.lnk"

pause

I use pause command so that machines which complete install do not grab new frames, so once they all complete a frame (one install per machine) then I just suspend the job.

[AC5L4T3R]

Thanks, I managed to get it working on my machine and it installed all fine and dandy. When I tested it on one of our slaves it, it just said "Setup initialising" for an hour so I gave up.

[Morbid Angel]

Did you do the submit cmd command via deadline?