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Sorry if this sounds a bit stupid, but network rendering is all new to us. :p Our office is looking into buying a rack-mounted render node and setting up a network. Two things that came up while we were talking about it were:

1. If a job is set up on the main workstation and goes to render out on the node, does the main workstation also need to be running that render?
2. If not, is it possible to have a set of renders rendering to the node, and a completely different set rendering from the main workstation at the same time?

Obviously an extra Maxwell Render Node license will be bought too and we're pretty up to scratch on how everything else works. It was just that query, really.

Any help on this would be great! Thanks.

RobMitchell wrote:1. If a job is set up on the main workstation and goes to render out on the node, does the main workstation also need to be running that render?

No, unless you set it to operate in co-op mode.

RobMitchell wrote:
2. If not, is it possible to have a set of renders rendering to the node, and a completely different set rendering from the main workstation at the same time?

Yes.

Splendid. Thanks, dmeyer!

Another thing I've been asked to ask is, can it be cross-format? Could we have the main workstation as a Windows PC and another node installed on a Mac machine connected to the network, to help power the render along?

As Maggie stated, yes you can mix platforms. You may run into more issues that way - i'd recommend avoiding it if possible - but it is possible. Just make sure you use UNC paths for everything...

Thanks very much for the help, Maggie and dmeyer. I'll keep what you said about the potential issues in mind if we go down that route.