sorry about the troubles ctbram
dunno if I'm doing this right, I have opened the scene, then did a "save as" and saved as .ma this time
should I do an "export all" instead?

if the save as is correct, here is a link to the .ma file:
https://cozmos.net/filez/comp_desk10-1.zip
and the swatches if needed:
https://cozmos.net/filez/mayaSwatches.zip

If you've done 6 mill. in 30 minutes, this is a helluva lot smaller, so reinforces my opinion I have settings incorrectly applied.
Will be interesting to see what you find

again, many thanks for all your time & efforts

J.B.