Establishing work station between two or more computers

[MikeZPro]

Hey Guys,

Me and my flatmates doing some graphics designo and we decided to establish as best workflow for us as it possible (we're also runing weekend operating full time LANparty hardcore gaming). I was thinking maybe some of you guys have some tips on enhencing connection between computers. Right now we've established workgroup, and shared drives with each other. Is there any thing that comes to your mind guys and could do something more? We don't have any server for now, but we thinking about buying one.

 

BTW. Here's a photo of ouer "facilo" druing weekend lanparty, hope you like it!

 

 

[imPixelTV]

that looks sick. my setup looks like someone threw a turd at it through a mosquito net

[MrKickkiller]

1 minute ago, rrubberr said:

1 GBPS between computers minimum. They don't really strike me as workstations, so a full duplex isn't really an option, but for local transfers that can be good, too.

You probably mean 10 Gigabits per second aka 10 Gbps, which theoretically equates to 1.25 GBps.

 

Probably would be that their internal drives can't read/write at such speeds.

 

@MikeZPro: Although the suggestion of a 10 Gbps link between your workstations would increase the transfer speeds, perhaps look into getting somewhere fast to dump your media files. Old servers that are found on Ebay could be the answer here. Most of them already have a couple of fast SAS drives (although at lower capacities) and 1 or 2 10Gbps connections. Estimated budget for such upgrade would be a couple of 100's but probably still sub-1000, if you buy parts from ebay.

 

As for the switch however (since you're running more than 2 pc's, and a server 10Gb nic only features 2 ports max (the cheaper ones)), this will probably be the most annoying to find.

 

Perhaps all workstations get a quad-nic (intel quad gigabit nic: 40-70$). Then you'd need a switch that has a decent amount of gigabit ports and supports LACP (Found this one on Ebay, did not look at the exact specs yet, but prices are probably 200$- 250$: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cisco-WS-C2960G-24TC-L-V07-Catalyst-24-Port-Gigabit-Ethernet-Managed-Switch-/332048085416?hash=item4d4f9bb1a8:g:irwAAOSw2xRYPczr) And then the server with a 10Gbps connection to the switch. Then all your workstations would have a theoretical max 4Gbps link to the server.

[MrKickkiller]

1 minute ago, rrubberr said:

I meant a 1 GBPS duplex, but sure, if you can find a non-datacenter 10 GBPS router.

Again Bits vs Bytes  10GBPS is 80 Gbps, which is about double what Linus now has / put in his new NVME storage machine.

[SCHISCHKA]

there are ways to speed up file transfers but they are not user friendly or windows friendly. how about an extra nic in each computer for each computer to connect to. so you have three computers, get a quad nic card in each and connect each computer to each computer.

[MrKickkiller]

2 minutes ago, rrubberr said:

What are you even talking about? 1 gbps is 100 MB/s.

Upper case B means Bytes, lower case is Bits.

 

1 Gigabit (1Gbps) = 125 MBps (1000/8)

 

In your last 2 posts you have been using GigaBytes constantly. While A. all network speeds are commonly denoted in xBitsPerSecond

[MrKickkiller]

2 minutes ago, SCHISCHKA said:

there are ways to speed up file transfers but they are not user friendly or windows friendly. how about an extra nic in each computer for each computer to connect to. so you have three computers, get a quad nic card in each and connect each computer to each computer.

Then each pc would have to have 2 quad ports (if you want a 4Gbps connection between X & Y, Y & Z, X & Z (Yes you can get away with 4 Quad port nics, but then the middle pc (with 2 nics) would need to be on all the time.))

[SCHISCHKA]

1 minute ago, MrKickkiller said:

Then each pc would have to have 2 quad ports (if you want a 4Gbps connection between X & Y, Y & Z, X & Z (Yes you can get away with 4 Quad port nics, but then the middle pc (with 2 nics) would need to be on all the time.))

what? i meant get multiple NICs so each computer has a direct connection to each other, so theres no traffic hitting the router and traffic between X & Y does not hurt traffic between X & Z

[MrKickkiller]

1 minute ago, SCHISCHKA said:

what? i meant get multiple NICs so each computer has a direct connection to each other, so theres no traffic hitting the router and traffic between X & Y does not hurt traffic between X & Z

Well that's 2 NIC's for each PC

 

X<->Y

X<->Z

Y<->Z

 

Each pc appears twice in this list, with a seperate connection to the other pc's. So 2 nics per pc. Unless you meant for 1Gbps links between each PC. I was thinking 4Gbps links (seeing as you mentioned Quad Nic cards). You could get away with just connecting X<->Y and then Y<->Z, but then Y would have to be online for communication between X and Z.

[SCHISCHKA]

1 minute ago, MrKickkiller said:

Well that's 2 NIC's for each PC

 

X<->Y

X<->Z

Y<->Z

 

Each pc appears twice in this list, with a seperate connection to the other pc's. So 2 nics per pc. Unless you meant for 1Gbps links between each PC. I was thinking 4Gbps links (seeing as you mentioned Quad Nic cards). You could get away with just connecting X<->Y and then Y<->Z, but then Y would have to be online for communication between X and Z.

na i dont think I'm getting my message across to you. it will be 3 NICs per pc. one extra for internet.

X<->Y

X<->Z

Y<->Z

X<->internet router

Y<->internet router

Z<->internet router

i don't know why you think Y needs to be online. i think you're missing a NIC on each device for the internet connected router

[MrKickkiller]

1 minute ago, SCHISCHKA said:

na i dont think I'm getting my message across to you. it will be 3 NICs per pc. one extra for internet.

X<->Y

X<->Z

Y<->Z

X<->internet router

Y<->internet router

Z<->internet router

i don't know why you think Y needs to be online. i think you're missing a NIC on each device for the internet connected router

I would have connected the onboard nic (which they already should have) to the internet connected router.

 

And if the setup is 

X<->Y and Y<->Z, Y would need to be online for the 2 networks to communicate. Unless there's some server nic feature that allows them to operate over the PCIE bus while the main CPU of Y is off.

 

[SCHISCHKA]

3 minutes ago, rrubberr said:

I think this got out of hand when we hit 4Gbps for transferring between presumably hard disks which are presumably not in any sort of redundant array.

I have a NIC connected between each PC and it is handy because traffic between two computers can go at full speed. A second computer can access files on one of the other devices and not interfere. Its not 4Gbps either, it doesn't work that way. My setup does require fast drives to keep up with gigabit speed NICs

[SCHISCHKA]

1 minute ago, MrKickkiller said:

X<->Y and Y<->Z, Y would need to be online for the 2 networks to communicate. Unless there's some server nic feature that allows them to operate over the PCIE bus while the main CPU of Y is off.

 

i dont know why you think there needs to be a main pc. what I'm saying is each device will have a seperate network to each device, a direct link.

[MikeZPro]

We're students still and freelancers, so that why ouer workspace might not look "workspacy". As I own normal pc, both of my flatmates are using dell precision m6800, so when it comes to expanding their network capabilities the only option is probably ExpressCard. I was also thinking is it possible to establish quick look at someones screen or maybe share power for e.g. for rendering. By "designo" i meant we're mostly do 3d stuff (modeling, building scenes, environment for games etc.) in maya, but when it comes to it and rendering there is probably nothing we can do on system side, but maybe I'm wrong. (but still i think it depends mostly on render engine that is used)

[SCHISCHKA]

3 minutes ago, rrubberr said:

Also, I have to ask, is it hell trying to do graphic design on a laptop or should I open my mind to it?

laptops are 1/3 to 1/10th the power of a desktop. it can be done but if you dont need that portability dont get it

[MikeZPro]

1 minute ago, rrubberr said:

Also, I have to ask, is it hell trying to do graphic design on a laptop or should I open my mind to it?

For me is absolutely barbaric, but here's my roommate statement: "Actually, if u r using workstation kind of a laptop it is not causing to me any problems, it has enough power to have Ps, Ai, Maya, Unreal, browser opened and it still even works taking almost all ram. I'm level designer so i don't need long big renders ( everything mostly in real time ) but it is enough power to make some good AAA level weak point is CPU, everything else ifs fine for me ( i7-4940MX, 32 Gb RAM, Quadro 5100M ). For some bigger stuff i think better to buy server "

 

[MikeZPro]

1 minute ago, rrubberr said:

Realtime?!

I think he was meaning Unreal Engine.

Sorry for small misunderstandings english is not our first language.