The SR3 has been posted and is available for download at: http://www.curiouslabs.com/go/sr3 All of the details of this release are available within the Read-Me file. With kind regards, Curious Labs

Thanks.

The readme states: " If you modified any of the content that shipped with the retail version of Poser 5, the Service Release will not overwrite these modifications and your Poser 5 figures, etc. will not be upgraded. In this case, Curious Labs recommends backing up your modified content and reinstalling Poser 5 from your original CD." What if I removed the P4 stuff and rearranged my directories to make them more user friendly? What if I added other purchased items stuff to the Poser 5 directory? Please clarify what "modified any of the content that shipped...." means. Also please clarify what "....and your Poser 5 figures, etc. will not be upgraded". I'm especially interested in what the "etc." means.

This part has been troubling me too. As I don't 'alter' the base program or Geometries folder(s), I do rearrange the figure/prop/materials folders to keep things separated for ease of finding them as my minagerie grows: does this constitue "modified" or is the notice refering to 'app specific files'? (rearranging/reinstalling the libraries can take a lot of time and one never knows what was updated or changed when you go to put it all back again)

Let me get you an answer on this Sandoppe and Igohigh. Katherine

Poser5's version (with SR3 applied) whould now be 5.0.2.281 correct? Why is it not 5.0.3.XXX? Please let me know if my patched version number sounds right to you all... /gz

I'm having problems installing the patches, for the application and the figures. During the setup up screen after it has started, it will pop up saying 'CRC checking failed. blah blah is not copied correctly' then it asks me to abort, retry, or ignore. Aborting or retrying just cancels the setup. Ignoring won't do any good because I need the new files. Anyone else having problems?

Hi, Sandoppe, the immediate answer from our engineers here is that anything modified or edited within Poser and content related to Poser would be retained upon the SR3 update install. BUT, our German office made the last build of this installer therefore I would prefer you allow me to get the final answer from the lead engineer there. With the time difference, I'll be able to post in this thread tomorrow morning US Pacific time. Kind regards, Katherine

Hi Fretshredder, the 5.0.2.281 is correct. Confusing as it seems, there is logic to this within the sequence of the builds. Kind regards, Katherine

the 5.0.2.281 is correct. Confusing as it seems, there is logic to this within the sequence of the builds. Excellent! Thanks Katherine. So far it seems to be holding up ... yay! :-)

Hi Karma, I'm sure this will not be the best news to hear, but - it sounds like the files somehow became corrupted upon your download. I recommend you re-download SR3. Kind regards, Katherine

Looks like the big steps bug in walk designer is fixed. I'm not sure that transition from start path is working quite right though. Needs some closer investigation.

No hurry Katherine, as I'm on dialup I plan to wait till the 'mad frenzy' of broadband user's settles down (plus I'm in the middle of a scene now and would prefer to finish it first before making major changes)

After Many download tries, reboots, and cache cleanings, I was able to download a clean copy of the patches. Thank goodness for broadband! Otherwise it would have taken forever!

I have installed every service release to date including the figure updaters. But I am going for a fresh install. The reason being that I am not sure it is really humanly possible to track all the changes in the betas and SR's and make sure that every previous fix is overwritten.
In addition I have had so many really bad crashes and lock-ups in the earlier releases that I am not sure that there are not corrupt files lurking in my P5 folder that lie outside of the scope of SR3.

My strategy is as follows.

1. Make a copy of my Runtime Folder elsewhere on my system.
2. Completely uninstall P5 and wipe residue folders.
3. Defrag my Poser resident Drive fully.
4. Install P5.
5. Install SR3 and figure updaters.
6. Add the folders from my second saved runtime copy to my new P5 runtime (with the exception of the updated P5 files) and then wipe my saved second runtime folder.
7. Defrag again.
8. Cross fingers and run Poser SR3!

regards
STORM

From the readme: "If you have installed SR-1 full updater(which includes both the application and figures updates), you do not need to install the separate Poser 5 Figures updater." Just wanted to confirm that was correct, and curious as to why the different file name if it is?

Thanks Katherine. I'd prefer you talk to whoever made the thing :) As Igohigh says, it would be a real hassle to try and figure out what was in the original library setup. If this only affects the geometries folder and/or the program files, then it's not a problem. It's easy enough to back up the geometries folder to protect new things that have been added. But backing up "everything" and then having to "reinstall" from the original disk is a real hassle. I did the figure updater before doing the last patch btw, so as I read it, I should only have to do the SR3 update and not the SR3 figures. This may make a difference as well.

Installed it, loaded simple scene, rendered it 4 times with different light setups, and got complete lockup on the 4th render. I give up and am going back to Pro Pack until the next service release comes out. ::grumble:: On the plus side, things did seem to load faster. Until the lockup of course. :(

seamyst... at least you could install it. I downloaded it 3 times and each time I got a CRC error. I know these have been difficult times for Curious Labs but I don't remember getting this frustrated about a software ever.

I just reinstalled poser 5 from scratch, downloaded SP3 with and without antivirus in background just in case, and still the same CRC errors. I guess I just have to go back to Pro Pack and wait for the dust to settle.

Well, I installed both downloads (it does say to install both). I've put Judy and Don in out of the picture, moved a chair in, put lights in, rendered, deleted lights and replaced them with other lights, rendered, added a plant, did a Firefly render...and so far, so good. I'm not seeing any problems so far. I was on the Internet and checking messages while doing the Firefly render and it rendered along without pausing, which is an improvement for me. This is a very rough trial and probably proves nothing, but so far so good for me.

hee.. if it aint' broken, don't fix it. I'll wait a while b4 updating =) What does it update? Just improve stability of program? The stuffs I would like improvement for poser is faster and better render speed and quality. The firefly seems faster but I see cracks in textures, and transparency problems with hair. And also the ability to import the poser 5 files into vue. currently it's not working well, the poses don't work. >>Software piracy is a huge concern for Curious Labs and we remain committed to protecting our products A thought on this, wouldn't it be better if the software are sold at more affordable prices. I got Poser 5 once I saw it for $150 at amazon. :) Otherwise I will have to wait for some warehouse sales =p Also a suggestion, if customers are able to save more by direct download to lower the cost of producing the boxes and cds. Okay this is just what I'm hoping, but I'll be rushing to get future versions of poser if these great deals keep coming :D Thanks :)

What accommodations does Curious Labs have for those of us who have a dialup modem?! I shudder to think of the time it will take to download this stuff.

well, its working, but I still can't inject the head morphs to V3. P5 still locks up. I sure do wish CL and DAZ would stop pointing fingers and actually fix that some day.

Does it anywhere mention that they fixed the freeze on loading when material can't be found? I read it three times and couldn't see that-- that's my main problem and much as I would like things to work faster and load faster-- I'm a 5 to ten minutes to load P5 right now.-- Ican eat that as long as I don't freeze because p5 can't find a hair texture that is already loaded. Emily

Exceuse me that should be the freeze on "rendering" when material can't be found. Emily

This is not an incremental patch right? If i did a fresh reinstall of P5, i wouldn't need the old 2.1 updater?

Ah nvm...readme clarified that..

I downloaded it last night and it installed with no problems. Had time to check the AVI texture problem which a number of my scenes suffer from and I can confirm it fixes the problem although you have to 'refresh' the link and save the file to fix it. After that it loads and remembers the link as it should. Now I can really start to play with AVI textures....

Attached Link: http://kassad.ifrance.com/kassad/

...and still the hair collision is unusable, freezes Poser most time and don't react on any cancel-click! And I'm using a high-end pc: a new (only for Poser) p4-3Ghz, 2 Gig Ram and 240 gig harddisks with XP Professional. WHAT PCs DID YOU USE TO TEST THIS?? It's hard to find a faster pc than this one! For now i'm very disappointed of this new patch, other bugs also seems to be untouched by any improvements. The dyn.-clothes still run into same 'back to the beginning'-state where it freezes, as it did without this patch; texture-jpgs suddenly cannot be found, nevertheless they ARE still at the same place; lights often 'forget' the angle-end setting when opening a poser-doc and so on... all the real bad bugs, that makes working with P5 to a pain are still in place. Or are these thought as 'features' to avoid bored users? Well, maybe i should be happy, that things aren't worse than before this patch! I would suggest that you at CL THROW AWAY ALL THE OLD MEMORY MANAGEMENT AND REWRITE IT FROM THE SCRATCH FINALLY. If you are not able to do so, ask here in the community; there are a lot of developers who are able to do this! Sorry, when i got somewhat rude, but P5 could be such a beautiful software, if it would have been programmed with more care... call it disappointed love... HP

Is there an answer for jchimim's question yet. "Curious" minds (like mine) want to know before downloading and installing. :)

In reply to questions #16, #34:

There are some content files which can be found both in the SR1 Figures Updater (respectively in the SR1 Full Updater) and in the SR3 Application Updater (they're needed for the Walk Designer fixes). Therefore, applying the SR1 Figures Updater after SR3 could result in unexpected behavior. This was the reason to provide a new Figures Updater as well, which allows to install the SR3s in arbitrary order. So you can either do that, or, if the download is too large for you, just use the SR1 Full or Figures updater before applying SR3.

Has Curious Labs considered redoing or creating an add-on to Poser 4 to include the file directory management part of Poser 5, which are really badly needed in Poser 4? I would pay for that update/add on to Poser 4, as my directories are so large as to be unmanagable, but most of the rest of Poser 5 is just too much trouble. I did buy the original upgrade, but literally threw it away a few months ago. There is a stage where you have to step back from a plan and ask if it just isn't too flawed, and Poser 5 seems to be in that category, while Poser 4 is maintaining it's price - why not build on what is working?

The sad thing is once you see what Firefly could be capable of you realize that Poser 4 renderer is just a toy. Its really sad that you have all these options but once you start putting it thru its paces, it starts to cough and dies. I have been forced to join the crowd anxiously waiting for DAZ Studio, after having this flop since September last year.

hmmmm, think I will wait. Sharen

Will Curious Labs offer to send a CD to those of us who have dialup modems? One of the files (20MB?!) would take 2 hours to download, and that's only if it came out ok the first time. Unfortunately I can't tie up my family's phone line that long.

possibly design a firefly render mod. to work with p4, then offer p4 and the render module to p5 users for free. i have to agree with the comment above, p5 could be a beautiful peice of software. i don't know how it works... why is that? i have had p5 for a few weeks now. i tried to register it with cl via e-mail and they haven't gotten back to me. i'm on a government computer and can't register from the computer i'm posing on, and i likewise can't just call up and do it by phone, because i'm deployed in the middle east right now. seems like cl has gotten my money for the product and that makes me "low priority". "low priority" people have nothing else to give, so "low priority" people can wait their friggin turn, ie, wait until nobody else is buying poser. come on daz. where's studio? i think people have just about eaten their fair share of trash around here. and for those that have a working p5: i hope you can use it to no end. if everyone had a tool like p5 that worked, it would be a happy place indeed. could have been such beautiful software.

{Has Curious Labs considered redoing or creating an add-on to Poser 4 to include the file directory management part of Poser 5, which are really badly needed in Poser 4?} This is a nice dream to have, but I seriously doubt CL will do this. Once a company has released the next version of the program, they do not release patches to a fix a previous version. Their standard answer is, "You're having problems with the old version? We don't support that anymore. Upgrade to the next version and that should fix your issues."

"25. Re: Poser 5 Service Release 3 is now available by queri on 5/8/03 22:46 Does it anywhere mention that they fixed the freeze on loading when material can't be found? I read it three times and couldn't see that-- that's my main problem" Have you tried "CorrectReference" (IIRC) from the freebies? This program apparently fixes most of not all "incorrect texture referances" in your runtime library. Whilst these are not the fault of Poser (4 or 5) having the references correct in the first place should obviously speed up any version of Poser. "40. Re: Poser 5 Service Release 3 is now available by richnovak on 5/9/03 08:06 [snip] i have had p5 for a few weeks now. i tried to register it with cl via e-mail and they haven't gotten back to me. i'm on a government computer and can't register from the computer i'm posing on, and i likewise can't just call up and do it by phone, because i'm deployed in the middle east right now. Have you tried installing SR2.1 or SR3? Either of these removes the NEED to register in order to use the program, because they "disconnect" Poser5 from the hateful "Anti-Piracy" software. That would allow you to use Poser5 to your hearts content. "30. Re: Poser 5 Service Release 3 is now available by kassad on 5/9/03 04:41 I don't see any Cinema 4D, 3D Studio plugins in the readme. Same thing for the Vue d'Esprit compatibility. [snip] I thing that we, users and buyers, are beta-testers of an unfinished product... ;-)" IIRC CL have been saying, for quite a while now, that commercially available plugins are under development - not part of a SR that adds functionality (and they've been blasted for adding functionality in an earlier SR too!). Software development quality has been on a downslide for decades. Windows 2000, released somewhat before Poser 5, is still getting bug fixes. As long as we continue to pay for goods which aren't "good enough" companies will continue to make them that way. Not all companies, but reality (and competition) can set in quite quickly in a products development cycle :(

Reading this thread, I feel I'm going thru deja vu. Word of caution: be careful using CorrectReference. It's nice but it can make mistakes and lose things that weren't lost to begin with.

again though, i'm on a government computer and i can't download 20-30 megs to run the program correctly. when i get home, that's going to change. while i'm here, i have to rely on cl to give me the answer to the challange code. which they haven't done now, after about a week. backburner much?

I also tried the hair room dynamics with collisions turned on: in first exeriment (long hair) made the finger-in-electric-socket, in the second experiment (with shorter hair) the effect was less visible... could be a hair lenght matter?

Actually, it's likely a "number of segments" matter... the shorter the individual segments, the less likely the hair would react like that. I.E., short hair with 20 segments looks better than long hair with 20 segments. But long hair with 40-50 segments looks about the same as short hair with 20.

"43. Re: Poser 5 Service Release 3 is now available by Jackson on 5/9/03 10:04 Word of caution: be careful using CorrectReference. It's nice but it can make mistakes and lose things that weren't lost to begin with." I must admit I haven't tried the program. There is of course one ideal way of ensuring that your poser-files structure doesn't need correcting, or cause long delays searching for files that aren't where specified:- don't corrupt the structure. This doesn't mean not moving files, but means instead that if one moves files one should update anything that points to those files rather than just leaving it to the software to sift through your runtime trying to find out what you've done with the textures etc. There is some work in sharing our efforts "correctly" - making sure that ones work contains the correct relative references and avoiding absolute references to files, but from reading posts it SEEMS as if the majority of reference problems come form people moving stuff around and then complaining that Poser (or Poser updates) has problems finding the files. Sorry guys - I've been biting my lips on this one for too long, it would seem. Cliff Bowman

HA! i finally got it registered. i think those people must be reading this forum (the registration people i guess...) we'll see what sorts of things i come across with with the original p5... cross my fingers...

Looks like I don't install this yet. Still no answer from the German programmers on the question Igohigh and I raised. The problems id'd by SimonWm (inability to cancel and the memory issues)are precisely the type of thing that happens to me with large renders. I never had P4, but I do have Vue and a 100 mb render would not be a problem in Vue at all. At first I thought it was a computer/OS issue.....that's why I started the other thread (to see if there was a pattern). But hpdrag is running a stallion of a computer for Poser only!! I didn't expect the Vue capability, because it was clear from earlier threads that it would not be available this time. I don't use any of the rooms but the material room. Until the memory issues and rendering lockups on large renders are resolved, it's a waste of time. I've given up on trying to render large images with depth mapping checked in the lights or cast shadows checked in render options. Most of the time it will lock up on the first production render if I do. No point in getting a larger computer.....that's not the solution either. Not sure what is.

sandoppe, are you talking about post #3? None of the updaters carries Poser 4 content (except for two bumpmaps and the Poser 4 Nude Man genitalia OBJ). Therefore, they won't affect your removed P4 stuff (except for the three files above). Also, the updaters do not know anything about 3rd party content, so they won't touch 3rd party content. What they do update are the Walk Designer poses (both updaters) and the Poser 5 figures in Runtime/libraries/character/Poser 5 (Figures Updater) The updater is not supposed to touch any files that have been changed by the user. If you want them updated, you need to restore the original state first. As far as I can tell, 'etc.' means content other than figures, e.g. poses, props or faces (pretty much everything in Runtime/libraries).