Maximum PC limit for Win32SP2 based Server Farm?

[MegaPixel]

We've been running an 8 PC Backburner farm reliably for some time now. After adding 4 more machines recently, we've had alot of issues with random servers dropping their jobs and flagging an "Output Path xxx/xxx could not be found" error. This doesn't make much sense to us as we know the pathing for the jobs are correct because the same PC's that are dropping had just successfuly rendered and saved files on the same Job earlier.

 

I recently heard that WindowsXP Pro Service Pack 2 forced a maximum user connection limit of 10 per PC. Could this be the reason for our difficulty and if so can we overcome that limitation or do we need to be running a Server based OS on the Manager PC?

 

Here's how were setup currently:

 

Manager PC - WindowsXP Pro. Sp2 (Backburner Only)

Servers - WindowsXP 64 Sp2 (64bit Max 2009 Design)

Network - 100% Gigabit

 

Thank you in advance for any insight you could shed on our problem. - Pixel

[Jennifer]

If your machines are trying to write to an XP workstation, the connection limit will always be 10 PCs, and that did not change with any service pack.

 

For more connections you have to either have them connect to other computers (split up your render job to write to multiple workstations), or upgrade to Server 2003 or 2008.

 

Jenni