Applied Energistics is an amazingly awesome mod, which provides a truly enormous step forward in storage optimization and organization, as well as automation. However, I've seen some builds being shown off that... could use a bit of tweaking. It's not that they don't work, it's just that I see ways to clean things up a bit, make it a bit cheaper, run a bit faster, use a bit less power. So I thought I'd 'share with the class' some quick tips and tricks for getting the most out of your ME Network.
* It doesn't need to be big to be useful.
The first ME Network I generally build consists of: ME Controller, ME Drive, 4k disk, an ME Interface, and a Crafting Terminal. That's it. I hook it up to the power line that my machines are sitting on.
Generally, I hook up the ME Interface to the machne outputting the processed metals in ingot form. On a Thermal Expansion system, this gets really compact. You have your 'input' pulverizer, with the Induction Smelter to one side, and the Powered Furnace below it. Primary output goes over to the induction smelter to get turned into ingots, secondary 'bonus' ores go down into the powered furnace. Then I put the ME Interface right in that little corner so the Powered Furnace is outputting sideways into it, and the Induction Smelter is outputting down directly into it. Either way, ores go in to the pulverizer, and go directly into my ME Network.
Remember, you'll almost never need to actually access your Controller, so you can bury it back behind everything else, as long as it has power. You will only intermittently need to access your ME Drive (only when formatting, adding, removing, or upgrading disks), so it can also be behind an 'access hatch' or be otherwise inconveniently located, because you won't be accessing it in the normal course of your activities.
Also remember that as long as everything is physically touching, you don't need any ME Cable. This can really contribute to exceedingly compact builds which function elegantly.
* Automation doesn't need a MAC
Automation can start with an ME Interface attached to a machine to automate certain components. For example, the ubiquitous Basic and Advanced Processors which are needed to make most of your components... they need to be crafted, then smelted. Okay, so put an Interface on a furnace-type block, and tell it that one Basic Processor Assembly = one Basic Processor. Same thing with the Advanced. Oh, and while you are at it, tell it that one Nether Quartz Dust (or you can use Certus, but I just use Nether Quartz because it is so much more common) = one Silicon. Now you can just tell the system 'make me a dozen Silicon', then use the Shift + ? functionality from NEI to craft the assemblies, drop them back into the Terminal, then request the Processors themselves. See? You never even had to leave the terminal interface to get that whole task completed!
Users of IC2 will find a LOT of use in this system long before they can afford a MAC. Macerating coal dust, compressing carbon plates, and the whole new system that the Experimental fork is implementing can be automated with ease! One Interface can be used to make all your plates. Another to make all your wires (on the second machine, since it can't tell the machine to switch from making plates to making wires). And when you get to nuclear technology... all those things that can't stack in your inventory? Still stack in an ME Network!
The second advantage of this is that when you DO get your MAC set up, all of those sub-processes are already in play, so you can just set up a recipe for crafting Processor Assemblies, and you've got the automatic crafting of Processors done. It will send the quartz dust to the furnace to get turned into silicon, automatically craft the assembly, then send the assembly back to the furnace and spit out your freshly crafted Processors you requested!
*Before you use a Bus, ask yourself this: Can an ME Interface do this just as well or better?
This is related to the previous statement, but really deserves its own bullet point. The ME Interface you use to automate a process on a machine can also be used to receive the output. I've seen many builds which have an import bus to pull products out of a machine, but that's just not necessary. If you can't set up the machine to output back into the Interface directly, you can just pull it out and route it back via any item routing system, although I'd probably suggest Translocators for ease of use and compact design.
While I'm at it, I'd also like to point out that if something can pull from an adjacent inventory, like say a Railcraft Boiler, you can use an ME Interface to make the required items available through the ME Network without needing to use a bus.
And hey, while we're on a related topic to automation, I'd like to take this time to point out that an ME Interface can also accept input via Tesseract quite seamlessly. So you've got your automated mining setup that can chew through chunks like popcorn at a double-feature. You can route all that output via Item Tesseract hooked up to an adjacent ME Interface and get everything into your ME Network quickly and easily. It's much faster, and cheaper, than using input buses on an enderchest. Heck, the interface can even be the same one you've got receiving all of your ore refining results!
* You don't always need an ME Interface on every machine in a multi-task process
Scores of ore and seven interfaces ago, our forefathers put a separate interface on each machine in the ore refining process. Then we realized how silly that was and stopped.
Let's take ore refining as a perfect example. In the experimental version of IC2, there's like four machines now involved in the ore refining process. Now, you could set them all up in a row, with an interface on each machine, all set to automatically process your ores. However, this eats up four interfaces, and it also will prevent you from storing things like dusts in your ME Network because they will automatically get pulled into your furnace to get turned back into ingots, which is counter-productive. Or, you can have one ME Interface at the beginning of the chain, then use something like Translocators or pipes or something to make the line continue, and have the input on the final machine, possibly even wrapping back around to output into the same Interface!
This is really easy to do in Mekanism, thanks to the Configurator. Set up your ME Interface to have all ores route to it. Then you have a Translocator pull them into your Purification Chamber, then you've got the machines in a circle around a central Universal Cable and Translocators moving stuff from the Purification chamber to the Crusher to the Enrichment Chamber to the Energized Smelter, then have the output from that going back into the ME Interface, easy peasy.
Not everything needs to be automated with Applied Energistics, and it can waste a lot of energy and resources to try.
* You don't always need your entire ME Network online all the time.
I think this is a holdover from Railcraft-style thinking of 'create a stupid amount of energy, always on, so that it doesn't matter how much energy I am wasting, because I've got a surplus created'. You know, just set up a few 36 HP boilers with all the Commercial Steam Engines hooked up and just not worry about power anymore.
However, the ME Dark Cable makes it ridiculously easy to shut down large portions of your ME Network when not in use, dramatically reducing the amount of negative power flow on your energy grid. Heck, you can use MFR's Rednet to send redstone signals to the ME Dark Cables, with a series of levers at your Interface. So, for example, you decide you want to make a bunch of Advanced Machine Blocks. Fine, flip the lever that turns on the ME Dark Cable attached to the ME Interface which is connected to your compressors and pulverizers. Create your run of components. Flip the switch back off and walk out when it is done. If those machines aren't going to be running when you aren't there, then there is zero need for the ME Network to have all the power draw for all that cabling and ME Interfaces.
You can segregate entire sections of your ME Network to power down when not in use, which can dramatically reduce the power draw of your ME Network when not in active use.
* Bulk Items do better outside your ME Network
We've all had situations where we got a few thousand cobble, and wondering what to do with it. The last thing you want to do, however, is actually put it in your ME Network, because it will chew through disk space. MFR's Deep Storage Units + Storage Bus does a *MUCH* better job.
In closing, I hope this has been informative for you. Please feel free to share your tips and tricks for optimizing your ME Networks, and as always, constructive criticism and critique are welcome.
* It doesn't need to be big to be useful.
The first ME Network I generally build consists of: ME Controller, ME Drive, 4k disk, an ME Interface, and a Crafting Terminal. That's it. I hook it up to the power line that my machines are sitting on.
Generally, I hook up the ME Interface to the machne outputting the processed metals in ingot form. On a Thermal Expansion system, this gets really compact. You have your 'input' pulverizer, with the Induction Smelter to one side, and the Powered Furnace below it. Primary output goes over to the induction smelter to get turned into ingots, secondary 'bonus' ores go down into the powered furnace. Then I put the ME Interface right in that little corner so the Powered Furnace is outputting sideways into it, and the Induction Smelter is outputting down directly into it. Either way, ores go in to the pulverizer, and go directly into my ME Network.
Remember, you'll almost never need to actually access your Controller, so you can bury it back behind everything else, as long as it has power. You will only intermittently need to access your ME Drive (only when formatting, adding, removing, or upgrading disks), so it can also be behind an 'access hatch' or be otherwise inconveniently located, because you won't be accessing it in the normal course of your activities.
Also remember that as long as everything is physically touching, you don't need any ME Cable. This can really contribute to exceedingly compact builds which function elegantly.
* Automation doesn't need a MAC
Automation can start with an ME Interface attached to a machine to automate certain components. For example, the ubiquitous Basic and Advanced Processors which are needed to make most of your components... they need to be crafted, then smelted. Okay, so put an Interface on a furnace-type block, and tell it that one Basic Processor Assembly = one Basic Processor. Same thing with the Advanced. Oh, and while you are at it, tell it that one Nether Quartz Dust (or you can use Certus, but I just use Nether Quartz because it is so much more common) = one Silicon. Now you can just tell the system 'make me a dozen Silicon', then use the Shift + ? functionality from NEI to craft the assemblies, drop them back into the Terminal, then request the Processors themselves. See? You never even had to leave the terminal interface to get that whole task completed!
Users of IC2 will find a LOT of use in this system long before they can afford a MAC. Macerating coal dust, compressing carbon plates, and the whole new system that the Experimental fork is implementing can be automated with ease! One Interface can be used to make all your plates. Another to make all your wires (on the second machine, since it can't tell the machine to switch from making plates to making wires). And when you get to nuclear technology... all those things that can't stack in your inventory? Still stack in an ME Network!
The second advantage of this is that when you DO get your MAC set up, all of those sub-processes are already in play, so you can just set up a recipe for crafting Processor Assemblies, and you've got the automatic crafting of Processors done. It will send the quartz dust to the furnace to get turned into silicon, automatically craft the assembly, then send the assembly back to the furnace and spit out your freshly crafted Processors you requested!
*Before you use a Bus, ask yourself this: Can an ME Interface do this just as well or better?
This is related to the previous statement, but really deserves its own bullet point. The ME Interface you use to automate a process on a machine can also be used to receive the output. I've seen many builds which have an import bus to pull products out of a machine, but that's just not necessary. If you can't set up the machine to output back into the Interface directly, you can just pull it out and route it back via any item routing system, although I'd probably suggest Translocators for ease of use and compact design.
While I'm at it, I'd also like to point out that if something can pull from an adjacent inventory, like say a Railcraft Boiler, you can use an ME Interface to make the required items available through the ME Network without needing to use a bus.
And hey, while we're on a related topic to automation, I'd like to take this time to point out that an ME Interface can also accept input via Tesseract quite seamlessly. So you've got your automated mining setup that can chew through chunks like popcorn at a double-feature. You can route all that output via Item Tesseract hooked up to an adjacent ME Interface and get everything into your ME Network quickly and easily. It's much faster, and cheaper, than using input buses on an enderchest. Heck, the interface can even be the same one you've got receiving all of your ore refining results!
* You don't always need an ME Interface on every machine in a multi-task process
Scores of ore and seven interfaces ago, our forefathers put a separate interface on each machine in the ore refining process. Then we realized how silly that was and stopped.
Let's take ore refining as a perfect example. In the experimental version of IC2, there's like four machines now involved in the ore refining process. Now, you could set them all up in a row, with an interface on each machine, all set to automatically process your ores. However, this eats up four interfaces, and it also will prevent you from storing things like dusts in your ME Network because they will automatically get pulled into your furnace to get turned back into ingots, which is counter-productive. Or, you can have one ME Interface at the beginning of the chain, then use something like Translocators or pipes or something to make the line continue, and have the input on the final machine, possibly even wrapping back around to output into the same Interface!
This is really easy to do in Mekanism, thanks to the Configurator. Set up your ME Interface to have all ores route to it. Then you have a Translocator pull them into your Purification Chamber, then you've got the machines in a circle around a central Universal Cable and Translocators moving stuff from the Purification chamber to the Crusher to the Enrichment Chamber to the Energized Smelter, then have the output from that going back into the ME Interface, easy peasy.
Not everything needs to be automated with Applied Energistics, and it can waste a lot of energy and resources to try.
* You don't always need your entire ME Network online all the time.
I think this is a holdover from Railcraft-style thinking of 'create a stupid amount of energy, always on, so that it doesn't matter how much energy I am wasting, because I've got a surplus created'. You know, just set up a few 36 HP boilers with all the Commercial Steam Engines hooked up and just not worry about power anymore.
However, the ME Dark Cable makes it ridiculously easy to shut down large portions of your ME Network when not in use, dramatically reducing the amount of negative power flow on your energy grid. Heck, you can use MFR's Rednet to send redstone signals to the ME Dark Cables, with a series of levers at your Interface. So, for example, you decide you want to make a bunch of Advanced Machine Blocks. Fine, flip the lever that turns on the ME Dark Cable attached to the ME Interface which is connected to your compressors and pulverizers. Create your run of components. Flip the switch back off and walk out when it is done. If those machines aren't going to be running when you aren't there, then there is zero need for the ME Network to have all the power draw for all that cabling and ME Interfaces.
You can segregate entire sections of your ME Network to power down when not in use, which can dramatically reduce the power draw of your ME Network when not in active use.
* Bulk Items do better outside your ME Network
We've all had situations where we got a few thousand cobble, and wondering what to do with it. The last thing you want to do, however, is actually put it in your ME Network, because it will chew through disk space. MFR's Deep Storage Units + Storage Bus does a *MUCH* better job.
In closing, I hope this has been informative for you. Please feel free to share your tips and tricks for optimizing your ME Networks, and as always, constructive criticism and critique are welcome.
