topic 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10 in 3ds Max Forum

3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Thu, 05 Mar 2020 16:10:14 GMT

Hey everyone, I hope I can get some insight on this problem that is plaguing our render farm. I have extensively troubleshooted this issue and cannot figure it out.

We have 4 render nodes - 32gb of ram, dual xeon gold 16 core, etc. Running Windows 10 (The problem Machines)

We have 16 render nodes - 32gb of ram, various xeon processors etc. Running windows 7 (No issues whatsoever)

All machines are running 3ds Max 2019 - latest updates.

Whenever we send a job to the render farm via deadline and Vray the 4 trouble machines will pick up the job, run some processes and then crash. The error we get in deadline is -
Error: Monitored managed process "3dsmaxProcess" has exited or been terminated"

When I remote into the machine to watch this process, the computers crash before even hitting max ram or even starting to render, and the process continues over and over again until the job fails in deadline.

I have searched the forums and came up on an article - https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/3ds-max/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Launching-3ds-Max-as-a-service-under-Windows-10-and-the-AWS-Deadline-Slave-Service-crashes-Max.html

All of the links corresponding to the article are dead and offer no support. I think this may be part of the issue, but each computer has admin rights.

Does anyone have any information for this issue and how we can fix it?

When we first got these machines, they were beasts and picked up jobs perfectly. Im not sure what to do anymore.

Thanks!

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

jon.bell — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 02:17:53 GMT

Hi Spencer,

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. I've gone back to that article you reference and fixed the broken links; they should be live by tomorrow.

In the meantime, here are the fixes suggested in that first link if you can't run 3ds Max under a non-Admin account with Deadline:

To proceed with using 3ds Max as a Service in Windows 10, try the following:

With 3ds Max closed, go to:

C:\Program Files\Autodesk\3ds Max 2020\stdplugs

Find the file PhysX.dlm.
Remove the PhysX.dlm file from the current folder. Place the file somewhere safe on the machine (other than within the 3ds Max installation folder).

Important Note: If the issue persists after removing the DLM file, repeat the same steps with the (MassFX) folder as well. Should the renders utilize the MassFX plugin (rigid bodies, cloth simulation, etc.) these will no longer be available with this render method.

Please let me know if this helps!

Best regards,

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 13:27:05 GMT

Hi Jon,

Thank you for taking the time to answer this issue. I have tried both steps and neither seem to work. Currently, the computer grabs the job and then after about a minute or so, it throws and error and gets rid of it and restarts on grabbing a frame of the animation.

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 13:36:10 GMT

Here is another error log after completing both of the steps.

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Fri, 06 Mar 2020 13:43:58 GMT

I found this post on the deadline forums - Not sure if its the case but seems likely.. The comment at the bottom from jrosen seems to fix his issue. Im not too sure how to change the admin rights etc - https://forums.thinkboxsoftware.com/t/deadline-10-and-3ds-max-submit-error/13962/19

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

jon.bell — Tue, 10 Mar 2020 00:10:50 GMT

Hi Spencer,

Thanks for the update and the log file. Can you please keep me posted as to fix-it steps you hear back from the Deadline folks? I'd like to create our own troubleshooting article for this and add it to our Knowledge Base. (Also, I removed a broken link from one of our other articles on this, and fixed another.)

Please let me know, and I hope to hear from you soon!

Best regards,

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Tue, 10 Mar 2020 12:43:44 GMT

Hey Jon,

There have been 0 resolutions so far. Deadline believes the error is on the side of 3ds max and or vray.

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

spencer.fitch — Tue, 10 Mar 2020 14:40:33 GMT

I have encounted another error that may be stemming the whole situation with this scene in 3ds max on that render node - I have attached the 3dsmaxminidump.dmp file for you.

Re: 3ds Max Crashes when used as a deadline slave Windows 10

jon.bell — Thu, 12 Mar 2020 00:05:35 GMT

Hi Spencer,

Thanks for the updates. I didn't see your 3dsmaxminidump.dmp file attached here, but I did take a look at your render log and noticed a couple of items:

2020/03/06 07:31:05 INF: [14884] [08176] SYSTEM: Production renderer is changed to V-Ray Next, update 2.1. Previous messages are cleared.
2020/03/06 07:31:15 ERR: [14884] [11128] An unexpected exception has occurred in the network renderer and it is terminating.

Also:

2020-03-06 07:28:42: 0: WARNING: Slave's 3ds Max version is NOT the same as the 3ds Max version that was used to submit this job! Unexpected results may occur!2020-03-06 07:28:42:  0: WARNING: Slave's 3ds Max version is NOT the same as the 3ds Max version that was used to submit this job! Unexpected results may occur!

A crash seems to occur right as Deadline switches to V-Ray as the renderer. In addition, the 3ds Max version mis-match is curious, and would have to be investigated by the Deadline/Thinkbox folks, I think.

One odd thing I've noticed with some network render managers (including Backburner, although that's not a fair comparison since it's a legacy 32-bit app with very little error checking/correction): if you have mismatched versions of the 3ds MaxtoArnold plugin installed, some render nodes may fail, even if you're not actually using Arnold to render the scene. (I've seen this on Backburner when rendering with the Scanline renderer and otherwise version-identical copies of 3ds Max on both workstation and render node machines). Just something else to note here.

If you don't get a response on that Deadline forum re: solid instructions on how to make the registry changes they suggest, you might consider pinging them again, forwarding the information above, and also contacting the Chaos Group to see if they can offer additional insight into these issues as well. I know several VFX houses use 3ds Max, Deadline and V-Ray in combination, so nailing down a solution to this would benefit us all. 🙂

Thanks for your help, and I hope to hear from you soon!

Best regards,