Backburner is not using all cores!

[kevinseven]

I have gotten in the habit of manually setting the memory and thread usage flags in the job setting for MR jobs with Backburner:

-rt <int>
Specify the number of rendering threads.

-art
Enable this option so that Maya automatically calculates the number of threads that should be used to best take advantage of the CPUs (or cores) on your workstation.

-mem <int>
Soft limit for the memory used by mental ray (in MB). A soft limit implies that mental ray may actually use more memory than indicated.

-aml
Enable this option so that Maya dynamically calculates the memory limit prior to the start of rendering. This feature can be enabled at all times to obtain better performance.

[Villijs]

I have gotten in the habit of manually setting the memory and thread usage flags in the job setting for MR jobs with Backburner:

-rt <int>
Specify the number of rendering threads.


Wow... this sounds like solution to my problem. Thanks man!
Only one question, where do i put it? :)

[rBrady]

For some reason I couldn't get the -rt flag to register the first time I used it. I used a -v 5 followed by the -rt 8 and it worked. Bizarre. Doesn't make any sense to me at all.

[Villijs]

Thanks!!! BIG TIME! :)
I just put it in additional options field, on submitting backburner job window!
You just saved not only mine, but our whole studio crew lives... Deadline is only 4 days ahead... :D
All servers are now using all cores... ! You`re the man!!! :)

[kevinseven]

I just put it in additional options field, on submitting backburner job window!

That's the place.

I've also had great luck with "-art" because I have a mixed farm...some machines have 8 cores and some only have 4. Using the "-art" flag tells MR to just use all available. I assume "-rt 8" won't confuse a 4 core system. I can't remember if I tested that. Hmmm...

[SreckoM]

Is it possible to DR (one frame on several machines) using Backburner and Maya?

[kevinseven]

I think you can render sections of a frame using x and y pixel values. But I assume you'd have to assemble the blocks manually. Might be worth it for high rez stills/print work but for animation it could be a giant pain.

However i just looked through the docs and I can't seem to find the flags so they may have been dropped.

[tharrell]

This just saved me a bunch of hassle... I noticed that with BB I was only getting on average 50% CPU usage on my farm machines, even though they knew how many CPUs I had etc.

Worth mentioning that if you use "renderer from scene file" you'll need to format the flag like:

-mr:rt 8

(for 8 threads)

Hope this helps someone :)

Edit: another hint (if your manager is on the same machine as a server running Windows)...

Launch your server with below normal priority, or hit ctrl-alt-delete and pull up your task manager and assign it that way. When it launches the render and mayabatch processes, they'll inherit the below normal priority level and won't cause the manager to choke by completely monopolizing the CPU.

Found this out when I was getting "manager stopped responding" failures last night.

On Mac & Linux, you don't need to nice the processes or anything as the OS remains responsive during renders (pet peeve with Win).

--T

[Bombata]

I seem to have gotten the -art flag going when I add it as -mr:art and the -rt works as -mr:rt 8 But what if I want to add a bunch of flags? -mr:rt 8 -mem 6144 ? or is it -mr:rt8:mem 6144? I cant seem to get it to work.

More importantly I would love to see some kind of render progress via verbosity. Im sure the flag was -v 5 but even if this is the case where does it display the messages?

EDIT: -mr:v /5 atleast doesn't give me a error but I still dont know where to look for the messages or log...

Any Ideas?

Im running Maya 2010 and launching BB from the render menu on a win 7 machine.
Thanks for any tips.

[aroestenburg]

Are these flag's typed into the Custom Command Options ?

Also, I have noticed that when I press the refresh button, some task restart from the first frame and proceed to overwrite already rendered frames. Is that normal?

Another question. My manager also acts as a server when I leave the office, so it can complete some tasks overnight. is it bad practice to render from the manager or host machine?

I do notice the other slave machines really slow down when the manager starts a task as a server.

Is there an error in my workflow here? I notice the servers only complete the first task they are assigned (at a reasonable speed) but the second task they are assigned do not complete they are really slow nut they are not much bigger. The Manager (server) handles the rest.


Set Up. :beer:

Maya 2011 64bit (On all nodes)
Backburner 2011 (on all nodes)
Windows 7 64bit Enterprise (On all nodes)

Manager (main_workstation): Intel Q9400 Quad 2.66GHz w 8Gb
Servers x 2(slave_machines): Intel E8400 Duo 3GHz w 2Gb

[atneworld]

I had the same problem, the server machines ran only with 50% of CPU usage.
this forum helped me with this script: -mr:rt 4 !!!

Thanks!!!

[aroestenburg]

Help :bounce:

Now for some reason on one of the servers maya is exiting with error status 210.

I have no clue as to why this happens now when It has worked fine in the past.

how could this failure have been triggered?

Adam.

[alexx]

btw:
-rt:mr 0

seems to work for maya 2011 at least to use as many threads as possible.

cheers

alex

[atneworld]

add this line into the Backburner Window's Additional options field:
-mr:rt 4

"4" means the number of cores. It works under maya 2010 network render.

[newguy4life]

Awesome guys, helped a bunch.

You can go to your maya scripts > others and find performExportToBackburner then go to the section that looks like:

string $additionalFlags=`textFieldGrp -q -tx bbExportAdditionalFlagsCtl`;
$exportSysCmd = $exportSysCmd + " " + $additionalFlags;

and change it to:

string $additionalFlags=`textFieldGrp -q -tx bbExportAdditionalFlagsCtl`;
$exportSysCmd = $exportSysCmd + " -mr:rt 0" + " " + $additionalFlags;

Now the flag will automatically use the max cores on the computer without having to type the flag in every time!

[itsmejab]

well there are a lot of issues while sending job but there are fixes as well pls follow my link to youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnG8buVUvsE&feature=youtu.be
;)

[itsmejab]

all u need to do is to turn off the ipv 6 and use ipv4 instead if u still have confusion check out this link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnG8buVUvsE
:thumbsup:

[Pinycho]

Hey there, I hope someone is still listening because I still can not make my backburner use more then 25%.

I tried all the ideas mentioned above, but still its stuck at 25%.
All cores are doing something - but together never more than that.

I have a quad core and I am using maya 2012 but its the educational Version (for non commercial use only).
I render with mental ray.
I am using only one workstation - so the manager and the server are one and the same.
aaand I work with Win7

any ideas please? :)

[newguy4life]

Are you using the 64 bit version? And are you rendering through backburner? If you are just batch rendering I don't know what the problem could be, but if you are rendering through backburner try this:

Click on the checkbox for "use custom command".

Scroll down and click "populate command"

In the text underneath, where you see the other flags (lines of code that say -priority 50 and stuff like that) add this flag: -mr:rt 0

See if that works for you

[Pinycho]

hey new guy!
thx for the answer!
im using 64bit und backburner :)

I tried what you said - and got some errors until i found the right position for the -mr:rt 0
But nothing changed.

After a lot of trying and changing I found a strange issue:
as soon as I render 2k oder bigger - no problem, rendering with 100% cpu.
That was surprising - never though resolution could be the problem
(since I am still rendering previews I used 720x1280).
I thought it could be the brackets or something like that - and I found out that in the batch render options my brackets were set to 1024 (cause of some hair problems month ago -.-). So I changed that to auto tiling - but the problem wasnt solved.. is there another place to change brackets? Rendering directly in Maya works fine with 100% cpu power btw.

So my next question is:
Is there another place to change brackets size?
Any other ideas why my 720x1280 images render with so few cpupower? (rendertime 20sec)

thanks a lot for help and support!! cg talk rocks! :)

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