OTOY Forums

I do most of my work on a Macbook Pro with an eGPU. It's a wonderful system and I just added a PC render node so it's even better. I have one problem though. My Macbook Pro doesn't have ethernet. I have to use a Thunderbolt>Ethernet adapter and each time I plug in or unplug my Thunderbolt>Ethernet Adapter, Octane detects my computer as a different computer and locks me out for 1 hour.

After spending a day with my new render farm, I am heartbroken because I just purchased a new license yesterday and today I spent 3 hours (3 separate times) being locked out.

I have e-mailed some Octane staff and they were helpful in telling me the cause of the issue but provided no further assistance. I understand the need to have security on the licenses but if Octane is going to pride itself on being a fast render engine, this "1 Hour Lockout" feature has got to go. On a serious note, this is a huge letdown. Octane makes it possible to do fast preview rendering on a laptop but makes it impossible at the same time.

This screenshot is from my C4D plugin but the lockout effects Standalone too.

Not a guaranteed fix, but I had a similar problem when I was forced to use my tablet as a wifi connection. Assigning the interface, and the tablet a fixed IP solved it for me (I chose an arbitrarily high number in the IP scheme to prevent knocking off another device, as they usually take the first number available on auto-connect). Not sure if both were required, but I did both and it worked for me until I finally moved and could use a better router (was a crappy apartment situation with ISP designated units that were faulty). Once I reactivated after that, I didn't have an issue again for the four months until I moved, and it's easily reversible if needed, so no harm in trying.

Edit: on re-reading, I also left the tablet plugged in continuously. If Mac is like Windows, each time you dis-/reconnect a device, it technically registers as a hardware change. While Octane and most other programs seem to ignore things like Hard Drives and storage media (understandably), things like ethernet/internet connectivity register in the same category as changing your processor or GPU. I have no idea why, especially for laptops, but that would alter your configuration in a way that technically makes your computer think it's a different build than previously, even if you just used the same device again. It registers as a new one, thus you have a new core component (pretty sure it's something to do with hardware IDs assigned per device by the OS itself). I'm not sure if there's a way to fix that, as it's an OS function.