Autodesk 3DS MAX! Wow! You have got some thick wallet to through
that kind of money around. 3DS MAX cost around 2600 dollars here in the states.
I paid 360 for student one. I think it is one of the best
modelers out there.

____________
Two wrongs don't make a right.
But six left turns will get you around the block
and back in the driveway again.

Sure Groucho is having a lot of fun !!  

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State of Play Update #1

Okay - Real Life intrusions over with, back to my normally scheduled broadcast.

I've installed the nVidia Quadro FX1700 into Willow... and wow!  Not quite as fast as the 9600GT I was using, but it is incredibly stable.  I can now switch all the OpenGL features in Poser 7 & Poser Pro without it crashing and have smooth, detailed previews while working on it.

(Not that I've actually done any work yet - I've not done anything useful with Poser since early December!  That's about to change big-time, though...)

I also bought Adobe's Production Premium CS4 suite - and that works very well with the Quadro card as well.  I'm looking forward to experimenting with photoshop's new 3D features - the possiblilty of being able to paint on an object in 3D sounds intriuging.

Oh... almost forgot the most important update I did to Willow - Went to 64-bit Vista Ultimate.  Mainly so I can now upgrade to a polygon-loving 8Gb of RAM and be able to use it.

Finally, I bought and set up my NAS - a NetGear ReadyNAS NV+ and I've only just finished moving files to it.  It's currently in RAID-X format, so I've got 1.3 Tb of mirrored storage networked to my little render-farm.

The only issue I have right now is getting a copy of 3DSMAX - the only authorised distributor in New Zealand is proving to be somewhat useless at their job.  I figure I'll try again after Easter.

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

Number 11

CORDELIA

This one is my sister's old laptop.  I say old, but she's not too shabby for her age.  All I've done with her for now is re-install her from the disc that Toshiba provided with the system, and patched her up to current standards. The issues that Lil Sis had with the screen and CD-drive have cleared up completely with the clean install - which is a bonus.

 I have no idea what I'm going to do with her yet...


Tabitha

Toshiba Satellite M50 notebook
Intel Celeron M 1.6Ghz
1.5Gb RAM
ATI Raedon Xpress 200M
14" 1280 x 768 LCD Monitor
60 Gb HDD
XP Home

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

State Of Play Update #2

Things are now rapidly advancing, and I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I've just ordered 8 Gb (4 X 2Gb PC2 6400 DDR2-800 sticks) of RAM for Willow - which works out really well, because I can take the 3 original 1 Gb sticks that were in her and give one each to Fatith, Harmony & Tara - bringing them up to 4 Gb each.

I've installed the Windows 7 Beta (32-bit) onto Anya and it is working incredibly well.  Having used Anya with the original release of Vista - before SP1 - I still shudder when I recall how slow and horrid an experience that was.  Windows 7 is everything that Vista should have been in the first place.  Anya is now being used as my primary net machine - on 24/7.

Also ordered and on the way are some UPS's - for the NAS, Anya and Willow; some spare Samsung monitors, a couple more 800 watt PSU's and a Wacom Intuos3 graphics tablet.

Oh... and a poo-load of books on CGI, 3DMAX, and Poser.

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

COOL ...

  I'M ready to  be blown away
when he gets  -all this stuff
pumping...  

State Of Play Update #3

The last major hurdle has been overcome - I've finally been able to source a copy of Autodesk 3ds Max 2009 - which should be here early next week.  Cost a pretty penny, but well worth it.

(I could have gone to 3ds Max 2010 - which was released last month - but that version has an entirely new plug-in format which is incompatible with Poser Pro's 3ds plug-in. Plus the 2009 software is known to be stable and reliable.)

The next three weeks I'm on a total learning blitz, devouring all the information I can find on Poser Pro, Adobe Creative Suite and 3ds Max 2009.   I'm pretty sure my brain will be hurting by the end of it.  But come hell or high water, on the 1st of June I intend posting my first images and freebies.

Already I've (figuratively) dusted off the Lab Of Tomorrow... Can't wait to get that one done.

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

Number 12

JESSICA a.k.a. BIG RED

Of all my toys - all of them - Jessica is my pride and joy, and my one true love.  She is a Toshiba Qosmio X300 kick-ass gamimg laptop that puts all my other computers - with the possible exception of Willow - to shame.

I'm gonna let this review speak for itself...

http://apcmag.com/toshiba_qosmio_x300.htm

Jessica

Toshiba Qosmio X300 Laptop*
Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo T9400 2.53Ghz
4 Gb DDR3 RAM
1 Gb DDR3 nVidia 9800GTM GPU
17" 1680 x 1050 LCD Screen
200Gb 7200rpm HDD + 320Gb 5400rpm HDD
Windows Vista Ultimate

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

That's a wonderful toy Groucho  

I'm fixing a friend of mine's old PC ...

____________

State Of Play Update #4

Finally have all the software I want installed, tested and configured correctly.  3Ds MAX 2009 has way more powerl than I actually need at the moment, but it's nice to have something to grow into.  A whole lot of tech manuals and books on Poser & MAX 2009 have also arrived, and I've allotted the next two weeks to reading and learning.

My first task with all my toys will be to finally finish and release the Lab Of Yesterday...

(Would've been the Lab Of Tomorrow... but I took my time about it!)

It's already been loaded into MAX 2009 and taken for a fly-past render.  Working fine, looking great - now to finish it.

____________
Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

yeah, we're waiting for that lab , but don't worry, we're almost all lazy here, I'm in first place obviously ...

Someone else could add some new tocuhes to our Futura ...

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State of play Update #5

Thought I'd bring y'all up to date on what I've been doing with all my little techno-toys.  Kinda explains why - after spending a butt-load of cash - I still haven't done much. Doesn't help that I had to spend an ungodly amount of money upgrading my Wintel machines to Windows 7…. Grrrrr.

1 LEELA

Upgraded Leela to Snow Leopard, and added another 2Gb of RAM.  I've set up the Wacom tablet on her, because the tablet's dimensions are the same shape as Leela's screen.  (All my other PC's have widescreen monitors, and it can be a little problematic using the tablet with 'em).  I'm using Leela for all my major image editing and storage.  Also set up a firewire external HDD for use with Time Capsule…

2 DAWN

Until recently I've been running a freeware DVD Movie catalog program on Dawn to keep track of my movie library.  Unfortunately, the developer is no longer supporting it, and I needed more features.  So I bought Bento 3 for my new Mac (See AMY below) and set up my own database…  Which leaves Dawn without anything to do.  I'll probably give her away.

5 TABITHA

Gave her away to a friend after I bought AMY (See below).  After using a touchscreen system for quite a while, I can see the advantages, but the technology still isn't quite there yet.  It was a very nice PC, though.

6 ANYA

After my initial gripe with her, Anya performed sterling service as my net machine.  No issues whatsoever.  After my flatmate came back from Oz, I gave him Anya back…  Though he can buy his own monitor!

7 TARA, 8 HARMONY, 10 WILLOW

Untouched… although Tara and Harmony are due to be upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium when I can be bothered getting around to it.

Willow will NOT be upgraded to Windows 7 just yet, because quite frankly she is already working perfectly as it it, and as she is… er, will be...  my primary CGI workstation I'm not about to fix something that ain't broke.

9 FAITH

Upgraded her PSU to 800 watts so I could put my GeForce 9600GT into her.  Faith is now set up as a dedicated simulator PC to run MS Flight Sim X, and a few military sims.  Got a good set of flight controls and everything.

11 CORDELIA

Sold her for $400, which considering how old she was was quite amazing.

12 JESSICA a.k.a. BIG RED

The best laptop I 'd ever owned… and I gave her to my little sister…

13 KENDRA

…because I upgraded to this little beastie.  Toshiba's new Qosmio X500 laptop.

When You Need Something Heavy Enough To Kill A Whale...

And I'm not entirely happy with it.  Not because of the hardware (runs nice and fast), but because this machine was released with Windows 7 64-bit as the only supported OS (on the same day as Windows 7 was), and until some of the nagging little flaws in Windows 7 are patched, I'm a little ticked with it.  (Anybody had the wonderful "Let's not refresh Explorer when we delete things" bug yet?  When you're trying to prune a ton of old directories?  Hitting F5 constantly gets mighty tiring real quick…)

Plays games fast, though...

Kendra

Toshiba Qosmio X500 Laptop
Intel Mobile Core i7 Q720 1.6Ghz
4 Gb DDR3 RAM
1 Gb DDR3 nVidia 250 GTS GPU
18" 1920 x 1080 LCD Screen
500Gb 7200rpm HDD + 500Gb 5400rpm HDD
Panasonic Blu-Ray Burner
Windows 7 Home Premium

14 AMY

I really like my iMac, Leela.  A lot.  So when I decided to get rid of… er, I mean give away or sell… Cordelia, Tabitha, Anya and Dawn, I thought I might as well go MacBook Pro.  So I bought a little 13" MBP in December, and have been swearing at it since January.  It's the perfect size, great screen, light and tough, long lasting on the battery side, runs all my bought Mac software… and has to be constantly [EXPLETIVE DELETED] re-installed because the [EXPLETIVE DELETED] file system keeps [EXPLETIVE DELETED]… um, corrupting itself.  Grrrrrrrrrr….

A couple of weeks experimentation has confirmed that the 160Gb HDD inside it is flaky.  I've installed the OS onto an external USB HDD and have been booting from that, and so far I've absolutely no problems with file corruption on that drive.  As soon as I do an erase and install on the internal drive, everything works for about a day or so.  But inevitably it will start taking an age to boot, or not boot at all.  And at least once, it's corrupted itself within a couple of hours of use.  The HDD reports it's okay, and Disk Utility finds no initial problems with it after each install.  I've even done a Secure Erase on the entire partition once to see if that would help.  But no… so I'm gonna have to get it fixed.  Under warranty, but still aggravating considering it's only a couple of months old.

I wouldn't be so ticked, but that I've set the DVD region on Amy to Region 1 so I can watch TV shows I've bought from Amazon in my bedroom at night instead of having to use the home theatre system.  (Halfway through the Phil Silvers show 50th anniversary set…)

Amy

13" MacBook Pro  
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.26 GHz
2 Gb RAM
nVidia geForce 9400M
1280 x 800 LCD Display
160 Gb SATA HDD (when it works)
OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

Oooooo... 3DS MAX can be fun... tho a pain.  Been years since I've looked into it and the max I own is about 12 years old.  I have another version too, but that one is a less than kosher copy given by a friend, so I haven't touched it.

Maybe I should dust off my old MAX and see what I can churn out.  

Sounds like you've had alot of fun tho with all these pc's.. and a render farm... I envy you.    Best I can try for at the moment is the pc I currently use and my older HP, tho I'm shy about it.  The pc before that one was the one I ran MAX on and it died a slow death.  Managed to restore it enough for my grandparents to use it for email purposes  

I started off with 3D Studio 2.0 for DOS way back in the day... and until I picked up Max 2009 I was quite happy to putter along with 3DS Max 3.5.  Would still be using it if it were Vista/Win 7 friendly.  Then again, it had issues with XP! (Corrupted memory if you tried keyframe animation with it.  Animation worked fine in Win98SE, though.)

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Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!

State of Play Update #6

Three and a half years... really?  That long to spend all my money?  That long to build up my DVD library?  That long since I've done anything... ANYTHING... substantial with Poser or 3D MAX?

Sheesh....

Time flies when you're spending up large.  Thankfully, I'm done now.

I spent early 2009 to late 2010 concentrating on building up my DVD library to something really impressive.  2736 movies, 282 TV series spread out over 780+ seasons, 120 documentaries.  It will take decades to watch all this... kinda why I bought it.

I spent 2010 to now dealing with mundane stuff, family crises' of various intensities, accumulating a herd of cats (seven... I just lost one a few weeks ago when it disappeared), and getting to grips with a new toy that really got all my attention - a Fujifilm Finepix Real3D W2 stereoscopic camera which is so much fun to play with...

Really early this year I started concentrating on getting back into the swing of things with Poser by first of all updating and testing all CGI software, and second of all, getting up to date with all the freebies out there... took a while, but it's done.

So now what?  Oh yes, that's right... how about producing some art... what a good idea.

I'll update my PC list first - here goes.

1 LEELA

She's been sitting alone and forlorn in my office - barely booted up at all in the last two years.  Now I've installed things like Encyclopedia Britannica, The Complete National Geographic collection, Playboy - the 50's and my favorite... 53 Years of Mad Magazine. Now being used as my primary image manipulation computer.

2 DAWN

Little Dawnie - ignored as well - until recently.  Now used as a DVD ripping machine to back up my DVD library to external drives for safe-keeping.

3 TARA, 4 FAITH, 5 HARMONY, 6 WILLOW

Sold Harmony to my mother once it became clear that the NEC Powermate PCs are incredibly reliable and I don't really need four of them.

Tara is running XP still, and is now my primary PC internet machine.  Willow sits there patiently waiting to do CGI... and Faith really, really hates my PS3, because it gets all my gaming attention at the moment.

7 JESSICA a.k.a. BIG RED

The best laptop I 'd ever owned… and I gave her to my little sister… who BROKE IT!

She nuked the GPU by overheating the machine.  It can be fixed, but I'm still a little miffed - so I took it off her.  Currently sitting in a cupboard, boxed up and ready to send off for repair.

8 KENDRA

Currently being used as the base for all my stereoscopic experiments.  Also recently found out that the EULA for 3D Max 2009 explicitly states I am allowed to install a second copy onto a 'home' machine as well as on my primary workstation.  Wish I'd known that earlier... so now Kendra has a copy of Max on her as well.

9 AMY

Currently my go-to machine when using the internet around the house.  Also has my massive DVD library database on it running on Bento.

Two weeks ago I started plowing through some of the books I bought on Poser.  A lot to digest... but I am getting there.  Stay tuned...

____________
Am I the only one who thinks they named it Windows because it is a major pane? BA-DUM BOOM!!