Lack of RAM. :( I have a pretty cool image going and both of my computers are chugging like an old locomotive going up the side of a mountain. I had to drop the idea of finishing it in Bryce because I caught a conversation between my two computers that they were figuring out a way to rub me out. So now I'm going to try some serious postwork in Photoshop and see if I can salvage this image. We shall see. More details soon. MD

yeah the computer itself can sometimes be the only thing holding you back. oh well----hope you can finish it beacuse i know how much that stinks!

Rack of lam, uh, lack of ram, nevermind. Sometimes you can render seperate pieces of the scene without changing the light settings or position and layer them together in PS. Good Luck.

dang, ram's dirt cheap right now. Only limitations I'd see is if you have an older system board. I got 512 meg for about $140, and I paid too much for it back in November. Just find out what you've got in the machine, and try your local hardware store. If your machine is chugging too hard, you might want to check the Virtual Memory, and see if it needs adjusting. If it's too high, you're using the Hard drive as memory, and that does slow things down. Good luck.

pakeld howd ya do that? checking the virtual memory? im using win xp... teach me please oh knowledgeble one! waiting for reply... eyecon

control panel/system/advanced/performace options/ this is for win2k s/b simular for xp..

What is a good size for a page file (virtual memory)...mine's at 384 by default. MD

I think my old computer takes only pc100 sdram. I've got about 256 mb in now. I've got a P3 processor, out of curiosity would it be better Bryce-wise to get 256mbs more ram or upgrade to a P4? (don't even think I can do this but just wondering)

nevermind, just saw MadDog's first post

page file I was told to try and not go over 500 but ive got mine set at 768 and it seems to do ok..some one in here has it set at 2gig just read it and cant remember lol Hep upgrading to a p4 more than likly means for you a new system :( .you would need a new power supply, cpu/fan, motherboard and ram everthingelse you could keep,unless you have built on video,, would get a bit $$$

Mine is 768 by default. Does anyone know if increasing it will enhance performance?

My swapfile usually has a size of 300MB. I set windows to manage the Swapspace. I only set wich disk to use. Sometimes it gets more then 1.5GB in size. tjohn; If your swapfile is often at it's max size increasing the size may speed things up. If it's not then it won't make too much difference. wildman2; New powersupply??

off hand i'd say it wouldn't cause you would be going the speed of your hard drive then, once the ram is completely used.. But i could be wrong..

wildman2; New powersupply?? p4 power connectors for mb are differant are they not..?

Didn't think of that. I don't use Pentiums...

athalons huh

Athlons are cheaper and fast.

< Athlon 1.7(1.43)266bus 1Gig-ram ATI/Radeon 120 gigsHD. Windows XP. Athlons are much cheaper for the time you keep'm. ;) Moves right along, Almost time for a new Motherboard, make this one the farm.

To set the page file in WinXP: right-click on My Comptuer, go to Properties, go to Advanced, then go to the Advanced Tab in Performance Options - you will be able to set your page file size there. The size of the page file should be at least 1.5 times the amount of ram you have, both min and max. I've got mine set to 768 on both ends on my laptop and I have never had a problem with performance in regards to virtual memory. (If you can do this, one way to boost performance of your machine is to get a small hard drive, say, 2-4 gig, and install that in your machine. Format it, then make that drive your swap file AND NOTHING ELSE.)

Yeah if you can it's good to give the swapfile a HD all to itself. Then you don't have to worry about it fragmenting your drive. Mine has 5 gigs to work with but I'll probably split that into another drive so I can use some of those gigs for storage.

Some good information you folks have put out. Windows is a tedious experience sometimes... I've noticed a LOT of difference between DDR RAM and the old stuff. It's not really changed Windows stability, though... Does anyone know if Windows XP is really more stable for Bryce than '98? Off Topic, I know... (bows)

well, I was going to answer Eyecon here, but y'all took care of it first. Only thing I'd mention is that if you set the virtual memory too far past the amount of RAM you have, it'll start using the Hard drive, which will slow things down quite a bit, but even that's been touched on. Glad we could help.

I'll be honest, it probably is. Something else I noticed yesterday, and this may result only from the fact that I have less running on the other machine (named SMOLTZ), but my main computer I use (named MADDUX) runs XP well, I have it set to where it runs with pretty good efficiency. Maddux has a 1.4 Athlon/256 DDR/32MB vid all on an Asus board (really reliable.) On Smoltz, I'm running a dual boot, but I ran Windows 2003 on it yesterday and was maneuvering (sp) stuff on those files with ease for a while, til my picture just got too big. On Smoltz, I run a 1.0 P3/256 SDR133/32MB vid. I think 2K3 was more stable because it had less running, so it's probably a wash. Although, for some reason renders seem to finish faster on Smoltz, so that is my rendering machine. And now that I look at this post, I'm not sure if anybody can grab useful info on it, but I'm gonna post it anyways for typing this much. :) MD

http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm http://www.tweakxp.com/tweakxp/default.asp hello all, sorry for the late post, but i came across this message and thought i could be some help. especially after all the help i have gotten here. the top link is an explaination of all the services running in the background of win xp (xp only, sorry). by disabling some of these you can get a performance boost, a noticeable one at that. don't worry it tells you which ones you need and which ones you are safe in disabling. the second link deals with the regedit feature. i have used a lot of them my self (from both sites) and let me tell you, my pc runs very well. i am really anal about getting the most from my pc and i can say with some certainty that you will get some performance from your machine from using these sites. one of the ones that helps is the "always uload dll's from memory" tweak. this one works really well! i have to text files filled with performance tweaks, if anybody would like to have them just let me know and i will post it in this thread. hope i was of some assistance! eb

Heck yeah, post 'em up, thanks for the great tips. I've used the Black Viper stuff before to very good use so I may have to do that again. I have a project coming up that's going to require every little bit of energy this computer can muster so I'll have to look into it. MD