When I bought Poser 5, I thought I was making a good buy. Now after a few months it still isn't working the way I was promised. I reinstalled like CL told me to applied all the patches, Like I was told to and still yet it freezes up alot. I have a good PC 1.8gig P4, 1gig ram, 64mb video card, 80gig HD and they tell me it is my computer! WTF! IMHO I think CL sold me a lemon! I won't be posting for awhile till I get Poser working again. IF someone from CL is reading this I hope they get to work on the next SR to fix the on going problems people are having. I am Posting this here in the newsgroup and at Renderosity today.

whilst in all honesty there could well be someting about your computer that's causing so severe a problem (or the installation of windows, or the video drivers, or...and so on and so forth) there are still far too many "issues" with the product this long after release. It's certainly far easier to get an expected result from Poser 4 with even comparatively simple scenes/animations. Poser 5's enhancements are, on paper, very exciting. But there's too many letdowns... missing anticipated features like new animals, or render failures such as , even for those who have the program running without significant crashes, IMHO.

Well I know for a fact that when poser 5 stops rendering it is using a good chunk of the processor, usually in the 90+ range. I ungrade this machine to do heavy 3d graphics. I use several 3d rendering programs and none of them have the problems that Poser 5 does. It is the program itself not the machine.

I know a lot of issues were with windows ME.

In my experience, when a program crashes routinely, it is usually a result of drivers and/or problems in the windows registry. Invariably, by installing the latest drivers and cleaning up my registry, I get things to run properly without crashing. As to Poser 5, it has never crashed on my system.

Most people who have been posting complaints about P5 (especially about stability) have had many of those issues solved with the latest SR. Mine's not locked a single time, even with quite a bit of experimenting in the Cloth Room (and lots of crazy mistakes on my part there as I learn more about it).

You indicated that you have a 64MB video card, but not what kind. If it's an NVidia running under XP, there are known issues with the card not being compatible to many programs.

It is a NVidia and I have installed the latest drivers to get a different program running. I checked the registery and cleaned it after I unstalled Poser to make sure nothing was there with either CL's Name or Poser 5 in it.

I have and waited and nothing was done

I have half the machine. And no freezing problems with P5. So do several other users. Maybe you should talk nice to your machine for a while? I hear that works for plants that are dying.

Also check to see that you have the latest DirectX drivers from Microsoft loaded, as well as looking at turning the OpenGL on and off.

Hey Guys, Nyguy is just stated the facts. This is whats happening to him. Poser5 is so unstable that yes it runs on some computers, but look at all the crap a lot of people have had to do to their computers to get it to run. The whole thing is bullshit if it doesn't work. Myself, I'll program it back in when there is a fix for it all. I think it's scary, that it causes freezes, crashes and doesn't work right. I just think it's damaging your computers to use something thats 1/2 baked. I would just like to know if Ironbear has it running on his computer yet?

illusions - anyone who has paid out good money for P5 has certainly paid for the right to gripe about it not working. Doesn't matter how many others have done the same or how much better anyone else has worded their complaint. Consumers always have their right to voice their opinions on any purchase they have made. If you didn't want to read it you could have skipped a thread with this subject title.

Turtle From the posts he's made at 3-D Arena I'm pretty sure that IB has stated that he won't install it on his computer anytime soon - if ever lol

Poser 5 is a letdown, to much focus on hoopla and not enough focus on what the software is actually supposed to be for. If Curious Labs wants to stay in business, and keep loyal customers, they should offer refunds to those p5 doesn't work properly for

Ironbear said over on PoserPros that he has run some tests with P5 on both his machines, though he didn't say when he did so. I'd like to assume it was with the latest patch, because I still like to assume that Ironbear's opinions are formed out of relevant experience. I agree with you, LadySilverMage, that consumers who have paid good money for things are entitled to spread negative 'word of mouth' about their experience - it's part of how markets work. However, it must be said that there are few individuals running around who have taken this to a 'religious' extreme equivalent to the worst ranting salivations from such 'controversies' as the PC vs Mac debate, or Windows vs Linux, etc. These few are motivated by more than customer dissatisfaction, and unfortunately they seem to carry influence beyond any actual merit.

Ok, I have an NVidia card and XP Home, 2.4GProcessor, 2G memory. All the latest patches from CL--didn't install P5 at all until most of the bugs were supposedly fixed. I havent' done a thing about my Nvidia drivers. I've had two relatively minor crashes with P5-- reported them in beta, they're known, supposedly being worked on. They involve cancelling a render to a larger window. I don't do that anymore. Other than that-- I hate to say it, I have a more stable machine than Pro Pack which always crashed after about 2-3 hours of work for no reason at all. More stable If!!! I don't make my own hair, I haven't tried the clothify room yet, I don't do animations and never will, Haven't used the face room, I'm not impressed with most of what I've seen come out of there. I only use one figure-- will try two but I'm betting one of those will be low res. I have used V3 maxxed out with morphs-- I didn't like how slow it posed, I dropped the morph count in the body, left the head maxed, got back my speed. And this is with dynamic hair-- made by Rdna to render fast and it does. And most of the time I pose with full display. I wanted a better renderer that wouldn't drive me crazy and a chance to use the nested libraries. This is working so far. If only CL had only chosen to do that and the Material room I think we would all have been grateful. I don't want to say it but I will anyway-- my system may be bottom line for Poser 5. Over 2Gprocessor and 1G or more memory. Emily

from what i read, its six of one kind and half a dozen of another. meaning, half the folks who bought poser 5, it has crash, or did something bad to their system.. the other dozen who bouth it swear it works fine. ok, fair enough, even though this debate has been going on for about 3 months. sure there were patches that were made, and for some systems it did work, but other system didn't respond well to it, and continuing to give folk a headache. A lot of People has written to CL, to either complain or to express there concern over this issue. and for some reason CL most of the time doesn't respond. of course they will tell you to renistall, most programs do tell you that if the first one didn't install well, some software will even tell your system that you need to update your drivers. ( most new computers do now). yet for the issues some of the ppl are having, they are relying on other users for help in there poser problems. CL only will give you the same routine tech solutions to the problem. and most of the time it doesn't work. i argee that if you pay alot of money for software you may use to put food on your table. that the company who sells it should live up to there name and reputation. you have a righ to complain or express your views. but if you re read all the post the folks have been having. and seeing what kind of replys you got from Kupa ( CL) or any of the other staff there. then a small birdie ought to tell you that you can't rely on a company ( any company) that isn't honest with you about their product. ( meaning early release that caused all these fine folks problems). i really believe that CL OWES all of you folks who had problems with his software, i mean he should really make it up to you. you know, if he ( Kupa) lived in the biblical days, and sold something to the people that didn't work or got them sick. the fine folks back then would cut a tree down, carve it into a cross, and then go buy the nails to nail him to cross for hurting the people, and thats what CL has done,, hurt some of you guys.:(

And then there are those people running it just fine on half the machine. Sounds like it's hit or miss as to whether or not your machine and P5 decide whether or not they like eachother. Guess I'll be finding out soon enough. Fed-Ex is due here with it tomorrow. ::has fingers crossed::

If you moved to P5 from P4, the file references for texts likely tell each textured item from the library to link to files in the Poser4 directory. P5 has a problem finding texts that aren't exactly where the item says it's supposed to be. That's why CORRECTREFERENCE, a free utility, was designed to go seek out and fix all such references so that P5 can find the texts. I used CORRECTREFERENCE on my modestly huge Runtime directory (40 GigaBytes) and to my surprise P5 has been running like a rabbit ever since. While there are a lot of other problems with P5, text finding will screw up the whole thingie and you won't be able to sort up s#!t from shinola.

I for one am glad that people report their experiences with software and other products here (not just P5). I was seriously saving up to buy 5 as soon as it came out - but didn't make it in time. Now that I've seen what people have to say about it, I'm waiting until there's a really stable version out before I buy it. If I hadn't read about the problems here, I would probably be tearing my hair out with frustration by now, instead of having fun with my new Wacom tablet, which I bought instead. Just because people complained when P5 first came out doesn't make ongoing complaints redundant - it lets people like me know that there are still problems, and we can happily spend our cash elsewhere in the meantime. So, despite the discomfort CL must be experiencing, it really does the community as a whole a favour - at least I think so! Mind you, there's a difference between posting about problems, and beating a dead horse whilst jumping on a bandwagon ;). Not that nyguy did either, IMNSHO.

Where can I find "CORRECTREFERENCE"?

The real problem is that people are running different mashines and different OSs with different settings. CL is not a Company like MSoft, Adobe or another big Software company, they have not the possibilities like them to test their software on evey possible Mashine with each possible configuration (All these companieshave really buggie Software too). Look, most of the new features of P5 are working OK now with newest patch on most of our mashines. So give them a little bit time to correct their app. All in all Poser 5 is a good working 3D app now with cool new features. If you want that all from another company like Dicreet or Newtech or Wavefront I'm sure most of you all dont have the money for them. And to be sure ... all these expencive apps are very buggie too :) Just my 2 cents Chris

Interesting reading. Yes of course people with bad experiences have a right to complain - freedom of speech etc. etc. (which also allows people who've had good experiences to gleefully report that, too). Though I think a lot of "these threads" go slightly awry. Here's a VASTLY over-simplified version of how I've read a lot of them: 1. Darn software! Darn company! Argh! And support? There is none! 2. Works great for me - can we do comparisons and maybe between us, the users, we can find some other factor which is a part of the problem? 3. I just so wish you people would let the #1's complain about poor service without badgering them! ...at which point any cohesion the thread may have aimed at goes to pot. Oh - Wacom graphics tablet? Have a care - apparently the driver can cause problems with mouse cursor. See the Poser 5 beta forum, where IIRC SimonWM found that out and reported the issue.

I'm using a Wacom Tablet without a problem in Poser 5 Chris P.S. see post above: different mashines with different OSs and settings :)

Poser 5 works fine enough with me, but that may be because I don't ask it to do much more than what poser 4 did. Like Queri, I have forgotten about using the cloth room, the animation room, the face room (wich works no better than Vickie 2 morphs if you know them well). I also stopped trying using advanced options in renderings : atmosphere nodes, gel lights, procedural textures, all this froze my computer. It only works when I'm using a single character with hardly a prop or dress (good excuse for undressing Vickie). IMHO, Curious labs should have concentrated on improving one or 2 fetures of Poser 4 (for instance library management and material room) and forget about the other ideas. The net result is that everything is half done. I feel like this is a sort of grand ecart. Poser 4 was a good application, affordable by amateurs but usable by pros. These 2 populations seem to have different wishes about the future of Poser and what he can do. Some wish it to stay low cost, fast, fun and with tons of free items, others wish it to become a pro tool capable of the best renderings, even if this means being more expensive and requiring exponential ressources. I feel like CL has not made the choices between the 2 and has taken the risk of disapointing both.

"Oh - Wacom graphics tablet? Have a care - apparently the driver can cause problems with mouse cursor. See the Poser 5 beta forum, where IIRC SimonWM found that out and reported the issue" He already said It's not his computer Who3d. He called the manufacture's tech support and they told him: "Dude..you got a Dell." So it's obviously CL's fault...... The bastards. It's all very technical don't ya know.

my little dell runs it fine...:)

LOL! Scott you absolute... oh, there's no "profanity button". But you are one. You're just lucky I wasn't drinking at the time, or you'd be getting my cleaning bill I note above some people are using Wacom tablets and P5 without problem... it's often bizzarre what combination of items "cause" an issue, but I hate dancing on such a razor-thin fence in case I slip and cut off soemthings I'd rather keep. I doubt CL are entirely to blame for all the issues experienced - by a long chalk. Yet at the same time it's blatantly obvious that they have been guilty of some of the most heinous crimes against poserosity :( ...and of course, there are the times when I jump up and down on their grave too quickly and then find that the problem I was having came from somewhere else...oops. Quick - delete those posts!

Compiler hit it right on and his statement is worded perfectly, CL tried to please everybody ,the pros and the hobbyist, and the result came out so so. P5 seems to be working good for me (with a wacom tablet) but boy is it ever slow on a top of the line machine. I do think if you want to do a complex scene, you better stick with P4, but i'm not a pro by any means

If nyguy REALLY wanted a solution or help getting Poser 5, or some aspect of it, to work, his post would have been politely phrased, with the specific problem and the relevant specs laid out: "Help, it freezes when I do ..." or "Why can't I use my ... while in the ..." coupled with basics such as naming the operating system: "I'm running under [OS] and ...". Simply saying that he hates the product doesn't help him in the least. Most of the people in this forum are ready to help solve problems. They will provide links to drivers and utilities and tech reports and python scripts. Hell, there are 2-3 ways around the cross-talk problem alone because people here are helpful. But there is no help for someone who only wants to gripe. So now we know that he has an Nvidia card of some sort, but no hint as to operating system, whether he is working across partitions or accessing another drive, or when he last defragged. He is obviously comfortable cleaning his registry, but uninstalling programs always leaves little bits scattered around (one of my main beefs against Windows is its sloppiness). It appears that his only point in posting was to rant. Carolly

Add a light... freeze. Add P5 hair and hope for the best. Cancel the render and have the reboot button ready to go Gel lights? Forget it. Atmosphere... sometimes, but I can go to bed while it renders. I run P5 with an NVidia, too, and I am starting to think that's the problem judging by all the posts. In that case, I can hardly fault CL, can I? Anyway, this was not a rant... P5 still offers me sooo much more than P4PP ever did and I am almost happy with it... Haven't gone back since except to beta products.

I'd like to give nyguy more benefit of the doubt - we've (mostly) loved Poser 4, and perhaps PoserPP. We WANT, desperately, to love Poser 5, Vicky 3, DAXZ T Rex, Renderosity clothing, 3D environment sets and ohhh, the vast panopoly of stuff we can get, free and paid for, just as much. When one of those things (or more) seems to be at the focal point of problems rather than delight, there's a certain human-nature element to a. blame that item or supplier without 100% concrete proof (impossible anyway) and b. vent a bit. We're emotional. nyguy may have got seriously disenchanted with trying the more reasoned approach, resulting in this very very mild outburst. I've done similar in the past myself (we're all human). I hope nyguy's issues are resolved - with community help or CL help - as well as the community has helped me with some of my issues :) Cheers, Cliff Bowman

Well I have a nvidia, but running on 98. Have had no trouble with Poser 5 at all. Installed all the latest patches. No crashes, no timeouts, reasonable render rates. Perhaps the inherently unstable win2k is part of the problem? says innocently I understand CL is workeing hard to fix all the known problems. They're kind of understaffed at the moment, due to issues with their parent company and the rocky economy. Lyrra

Win2K working pretty well here, on a Celeron850 even (1.5GB of RAM doesn't hurt tho). P5 isn't problem-free, and I'm using a Geoforce 2 video card... but I'm probably what you'd call "problem-lite". Most if not all of my problems are pretty well repeatable, across systems.

I have Win XP and an Nvidia card, but have had no problems with other programs other than Poser5...what are the known programs that don't work with XP and Nvidia ???? ....and quite frankly, I think the problems I see have no relation even a little bit, to the graphics card..at least on my system. However, quite a few Poser 4 light sets cause instant freeze when that render button is pressed...not sure why, but its pretty consistant. As far as drivers, it is possible to install new drivers without uninstalling the old ones...which can cause some mighty strange problems...so, if you are going to reinstall drivers, make real sure you have deleted all evidence of the old drivers prior to reinstalling. Another driver issue...everyone offering advice on drivers makes the statement "make sure you have the LATEST drivers"...but is that actually the best policy? Especially when a program was written prior to the last 3 or 4 versions of drivers even being released??? Did you ever think it may be more beneficial to go to the Nvidia driver archive and try an OLDER driver package??? You may be surprised at the result.

USE CORRECTREFERENCE (free utility here)! and don't bitch about performance until you have! It works!

Just so, Dave-So. Some of the older Detonator drivers are much better behaved with things that are not games, like Poser and Vue, than the newer ones are.

Computers are funny critters, really, they are. For instance, my win98 doesn't like my sound card. Or at least the mouse drivers don't like the "legacy device" that gets turned on automatically when I install the sound card drivers. Sooo... I found out the hard way that I had to install the drivers, and THEN reboot into safe mode to turn off the "legacy device" and THEN reboot into regular mode to keep my system from freezing up completely as soon as win98 booted up. But, at least I wrote that part down for future reference (never know when yer gonna have to re-install something that gets corrupted somehow... and can someone please tell me why 5 minutes after I shut down a program and then go to open it again windows will tell me "I never heard of it, what the heck are you talking about? You don't have that program installed" and never even bothers to say "oops, my mistake" when I point it to the applicable exe file? Huh? Can someone tell me why it does that? Am I not feeding it enough old dos applications or something? Is that the problem? g). Kate (who is currently re-installing her entire Poser setup due to some massive file corruption sigh)

I have nVidia and XP. Both ProPack and Poser 5 have various refresh issues which are livable. Poser 4 doesn't have them though. Same machine, OS, and drivers. Something broke in the ProPack and CL seems to have carried it through to Poser 5. Haven't gotten too down and dirty yet with cloth and hair, but had a lockup when I accidentally clicked on the Content room. Up came my dialup and I cancelled 'cause I didn't want to go to Content Paradise. Poser 5 told me CP wasn't available (well, doh) and then wouldn't let me out of the room. Had to kill it. Hope that's the worst that happens as I dig deeper. Heh. What does bother me greatly is the lights in P5 though. I depend on DAZ's complex globals so still do most of my rendering in the ProPack. Sigh.

Dave-So seems to have made more points I'd like to address than anyone else since als tI was here so.... "what are the known programs that don't work with XP and Nvidia ????" I'm always deeply suspicious of anything that has a lot of updates - it seems to me that, by definition, those items were released in a poor state. While CL with P5 seems that way at present, I've had years to experience watching video card manufacturers churn out driver after driver - often having a beta and an older "WHQL" driver available for download, back before they even started archiving old drivers... and just look at the number of "updates" to ANY version of Windows since 95 - it's horrendous! But I was on the subject of graphics drivers - these I've seen updated time and time again often (as with many types of software fix) introducing more problems (or re-creating old ones). It always amazed me that video card vendors bothered paying Micro$oft for it's WHQL certification since this didn't seem to mean the drivers actually worked... but limiting oneself to known OS/video card/application issues is potentially unhelpful. the video card vendor usually knows of at least some issues - that's why they keep coming out with fixes! In THEORY CL may have believed that by sticking to old video card techniques - "doing 3D the hard way" (but using existing code) that they were avoiding problems with new cards and techniques which, due to not being fossilised, were not as reliable. They may even be right, except that it's probably getting more and more irritating for video card vendors to include backward-compatability to such an old method... "Another driver issue...everyone offering advice on drivers makes the statement "make sure you have the LATEST drivers"...but is that actually the best policy? ... Did you ever think it may be more beneficial to go to the Nvidia driver archive and try an OLDER driver package???" This hasn't passed me by, but... that the majority of people who actually benefit from the idea of driver or OS updates are generally quite intent that CL are "to blame" (it amazed me when some chap found that doing a Windows updated fixed P5 considerably - I'd not thought of trying to run a Windows OS without huge gobs of bug fixes in years, so found the idea of an untouched installation...bizzarre!). Given such a fixation on CL, to suggest the vast slew of things that MIGHT help stability is a step somewhat braver than I've been inclined to take. At least, in one go. Especially as some of the "correct" steps to take to diagnose the culprit, in cases, are beyond your average punter - who may not have spare hard drives, alternate videoc ards etc. etc. and have the TIME to take their system back to basics and build it up, over time, watching carefully until somehting they add appears to suddenly decrease stability. Spit "What does bother me greatly is the lights in P5 though. I depend on DAZ's complex globals so still do most of my rendering in the ProPack. Sigh." I've heard P4 lights cause issues in P5 too... I wonder if saving light sets as P5 ones (perhaps having changed them to raytrace and back or somesuch - "touching" them enough to make them P5 lights) might be a potential aide?