win7x64/max2011 DR nightmare

[KiboOst]

We have lot of problems with DR since we go to win7 pro x64, max 2011 x64, last vray. Indeed, we even can't rely on it anymore, when xp/max2010 was just a dream !

I start a new scene, put a sphere with some greeble and a vraymtl semi transparent (to get slow render to see everyone), set two DR (or one, three etc), and we get color problems, black DRs, etc.

Here a some errors I get in the log on slaves :
- Error receiving irradiance map 0: [VUtils::VRayRenderer::getRenderData] sendClientMessage() failed (0)
( the host is sending it, at least in vray msg box)
- Material returned overbright or invalid color (object "GeoSphere001", RGB: 0.231427 0.61325 5.28722e+018
- Subpixel color mapping is on: rendered result may have incorrect brightness.
- Error receiving DR scene (0), closing DR session

Also, sometimes DR just doesn't start, some start others don't, etc.

For info, every machines have exact same OS, 3dsmax, paths, network shares, and of course vray version.

Any ideas ?

Kib

[KiboOst]

Anyone have idea ?
Still have the problem, we don't use DR for a month now and it is a real pita ! I've see some post about a new maxdummy from Vlado but can't find the post.

[eyebee]

No Idea, we´re running exact the same system and it works like a charm...

"- Material returned overbright or invalid color (object "GeoSphere001", RGB: 0.231427 0.61325 5.28722e+018
- Subpixel color mapping is on: rendered result may have incorrect brightness. "

These are messages that appear very often. The second always appears when turning subpixel mapping on (only info)
For the first one you can try turning clamp output on.

The other errors may perhaps occur due to a firewall blocking vrayspawner?

regards,
Ingo

[KiboOst]

Thanks Ingo

No windows firewall, we use zonealarm free and all vray/spawner/max etc is explicitely authorized.
The main problem is often it doesn't work at all, and sometimes, when buckets appears, irradiance map is not loaded.

[vlado]

It seems to be a networking or firewall issue - have you tried disabling ZoneAlarm as a test?

Best regards,
Vlado

[KiboOst]

I think that if it was a firewall issue, it would never work. Not work sometimes ?

[vlado]

Not really; these things can be quite random.

Best regards,
Vlado

[Drawehn]

I agree that antivirus / firewall issues can be very random. We had the issue that our vray license would be dropping out every few minutes / hours. Even disabling Kapersky didn't solve it. Only when we uninstalled Kapersky entirely the problem disappeared.

So just for a test, you could try uninstalling zonealarm and then run DR.

[rmejia]

We have lot of problems with DR since we go to win7 pro x64, max 2011 x64, last vray. Indeed, we even can't rely on it anymore, when xp/max2010 was just a dream !

I have that same setup (Win 7x64 + Max 2011 x64) and DR works fine. Do all the computers have the plugins you are using (Greeble) installed?

[KiboOst]

Ok will try uninstalling zonealarm on a virtual machine

We have all maps and plugins on same network drive so yes all machines have an identical max/plugins

[KiboOst]

ok, here is some tests :

Normal windows on every machines :
win7 pro x64, max2011x64, vray sp5 x64
ipv4 and ipv6 active, ipv4 network
zonealarm free :
internet zone : medium
trusted zone : off
zones : 127.0.0.1 and 192.168.0.0-192.168.0.255 as trusted
3dsmax and vrayspawner authorized on trusted zone

Problems :
DR not reliable. work on very small scenes, rarely (if any) on big scenes

test :
disabling ipv6 : same result
disabling ZA on host only : same result
disabling ZA on client only : same result
disabling ZA on host and client : IT WORKS ! on big scenes !!!

When ZA runs, I have the vray msg on the host saying "Dr starting, xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx connected"
without ZA : "Dr starting, xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx connected" AND "scenes transfered to client" !!!!!!!!!

So now, how can I have ZA and DR working ? I had winxp32 with max2010 vraysp4a AND ZA working great

I've checked, when trying a DR with ZA, in ZA logs, no 3dsmax/vrayspawner etc are blocked, strange !

[vlado]

Since V-Ray needs to transfer a lot of data for the scene, zone alarm may be blocking the connection after a certain time. Maybe there is an option somewhere to adjust this, but I'm not familiar with ZoneAlarm.

Best regards,
Vlado

[KiboOst]

What is strange is that we work usually on 500Mb files, sometimes 1Gb files, larges max scenes, larges maps, do compositing with all that, and every files are stored on a raid windows server, so we should have this problem elsewhere ?
Does vrayspawner use a particular port (udp, tcp ?) ? I know windows xp and windows 7 don't use same ports in standard. But can't find where I can set rules for ports in ZA

[KiboOst]

I've seen some references to ip 0.0.0.0 in vray message window, so I put this IP iinto trusted zone in ZA, and now it works ! I would be sure it won't cause any problem on systems before doing this on all machines. I've tested on another machine (so, 1 host + 2 clients) and it works.

Can you confirm me that 0.0.0.0 is something you use ? maybe a broadcasting check ?

[vlado]

0.0.0.0 is just a system IP address that always means "this machine". We do use it in a few places (it is how a listening port is open on the render servers to wait for DR requests).

Best regards,
Vlado