Multi-machine rendering on non-identical hardware produces flicker

Hi folks,
     I'm using a renderfarm manager to break up a large AE render into pieces and render different frameranges on different machines. My render nodes are of two different hardware types -- a bunch of oldern (Dell 1850) dual-proc nodes, and a couple of newer 8-core Xeon machines.
     I'm finding that the two different types of hardware produce slightly lighter/darker output. My current test is loading a Quicktime movie w/ standard Photo-JPEG codec, applying no effects, just placing it into its own comp and rendering out as an image sequence. The 8-cores produce slightly darker output than the others.
     The OSes, AE versions, QT versions are the same, I've confirmed that "Render using OpenGL" is unchecked in the render settings for the comp.
     Anyone know what else could be responsible for this difference? It's slight, but significant enough to produce a slight flickering effect in the final output.
     Thanks in advance for any ideas!
--Rob

Hi Mylenium,
The source movie is flat - one video track only. I've switched QT Prefs on both nodes (testing now with one of each hardware type) to "Safe (GDI Only)" and both have "High Quality" enabled in QT Prefs.
The newer nodes DO have a GPU graphics adapter, while he older ones do not (on-board graphics), but I would assume that turning off the DirectX in QT Prefs and not choosing "Render using OpenGL" in the comp makes that irrelevant, right?
When I re-encode the source as something different (tried Uncompressed 8-bit and Sorenson 3 so far) the two nodes render the same. When I encode back to Photo-JPEG, the discrepancy returns. So it does seem to be specific to this codec (or at least not to all of them). Exporting directly from QT Player as an image sequence produces matching output, too, so it does seem to be happening in AE CS3.
Does the color profiles possibility still apply, given this new info? If so, how can I check / compare them?
--Rob
Rob LaRose Systems Administrator Imaginary Forces 646.486.6868 office 646.486.4700 fax www.imaginaryforces.com<http://www.imaginaryforces.com/

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The source movie is flat - one video track only. I've switched QT Prefs on both nodes (testing now with one of each hardware type) to "Safe (GDI Only)" and both have "High Quality" enabled in QT Prefs.
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Rob LaRose Systems Administrator Imaginary Forces 646.486.6868 office 646.486.4700 fax www.imaginaryforces.com<http://www.imaginaryforces.com/

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<Sushil More> wrote in message news:[email protected]..
how do i configure the Master and other machines in a Multimachineconfiguration.
>
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