I was feeling out of sorts last night so I worked on an abstract. Thankfully, I saved it just before the last render pass. When it finished and I tried to save it told my I was out of memory. It wanted to run disc cleanup. I got rid of the temp files but for whatever reason it still isn't enough. :( I'm in the planning stages of having someone build me a PC. My current one only has 8gigs of hard drive with 9MB free. But I don't think I'll be getting the new PC until Thanksgiving weekend. I guess I'll run defrag today. Then maybe see what I can delete or move to disc storage. I so wanted to work on the abstract, sheesh. Ang

Oh Ang I feel for you!! I struggled half a year with a crashing Bryce and Poser and asked for my birthday a new harddisk (my PC was still good enough, only the 20 GB disk too small). Now I have an extra 120 gega disk for 3D programs and more than half is full already, but it is working terrific with so much space and worth the money (about 150 dollars here). No more frustrations and lost work. If you have Windows XP, you might wanna dump the system restore folder. It was huge at my PC and I never used it. I hope you can work on that image soon again!

ROLFMAO, I still have Win 98. 128 ram, 8 gig Hd and no idea how fast (slow really) the processor is Pent II. I'm going for much bigger, much better, much faster!!! It's going to be so cool. Heck anything nowadays puts my machine to shame. Its the waiting thats gonna do me in and money. Most of the parts are going to go on the credit card. :( I've been trying to save up for it for 3 yrs, never get anywhere, something else always comes up and needs the money I set aside.

I feel for you too. I used to have to work with a 900MB harddisk! :) Now I have 120Gig and I've already used well over 90Gig of it :) I couldn't move back to anything smaller then 30GB :) As Creations said, the system restore folder might be huge. Mine is almost a gig now. Deleting that could give you some more 'breathing space'. I don't know how to delete it, because my windows says I don't have acces to delete those files. But I know it can be done, my dad did it once on his onw comp running win 98. For as little $500 you could build an AthlonXP 2000+ system with 512MB ram with a budget radeon vidcard and a nice 40Gig disk. That should get you up and rendering again. That price is excluding a monitor, but I think you already have one of those :)

That is so not fun! I don't have much of advice for you, though. My boot drive died a while back. And the only solution was to get a new one. (in fact, I got 2. one of them for backups only! :)

with windows XP I sometimes remove all but the last restore point with disc clean up. this clears some space but leaves a good startup installation incase its needed. system restore as saved me a few times when thing have gone wrong!

I went back and forth with my latest yesterday. Got sunlight off and couldn't get it back on. Finally got it back and the colors were screwey. I tried to save it as a different file and got the message "unexpected error. Out of Memory". The hard drive still has 37GB free and the last save was only 321MB. Fortunately all the new objects are saved seperately as bryce files. I also have three versions of the file I'm working on. I'm sorry that you lost your work. It's good that you got a save in though. When you get a new machine add lots of disk space and save sequential files every day.

I think you can probably find a 20-30GB hd for about $20.

Well I tried defrag, told me I had to scan disk. I tried scan disk told me I had to free up some space. I freed up space and scan disk gets hung up about 3/4ths the way thru. Haven't tried bryce yet, but I'm thinking that if I freed up 1.5 gigs of space I should be able to work on some more stuff. keeping my fingers crossed Thanks for the advice about things. I have a crappy monitor so its going with this pc downstairs for internet access for my mom. I've already decided to go with 120 gig hd, just because I'm too lazy to clean out the hard drive till I absolutely have to. For ram, I'm looking at 2 512Mb stiks. I don't know what my husband and his girlfriend bought but I know it cost them $1700. I'm thinking I can do better for less having a friend build me one. And its going to be an Athlon probably 3000.I just get so nervous that my hard drive will crash and that scares me real bad. Take care, I'm off to see if I can get bryce to work. Ang

Rayraz, Win98 doesn't have a system restore folder. :-) It was introduced in Windows Me and you could have done the same thing in Win98 only with third-party programs. BTW, you should be logged in as Administrator to delete some things. Ang, if it's any consolation, my previous computer was P I, 133 MHz, with 32 MB RAM and 900 MB hard disk. True, I didn't do any Bryce on it, but I was working in Photoshop (version 4) and it finally refused doing some filters when I had 16MB free left on disk. That thing with Scandisk hanging up is perfectly normal when it doesn't have enough breathing space. What you can do is to go to Control Panel -> System -> Performance -> Virtual Memory and see whether "Let Windows manage virtual memory (recommended)" is checked. If it is, check the bottom option, for you to decide how much VM there should be. For the minimum value leave zero, but for the max value put 192. Now see whether there's more free space on the disk. You see, if there's not enough RAM, Windows put the data on the disk, in a swap file. If left unchecked, they would occupy all of free space on disk. OTOH, it might not create more space. OTTH, if you can borrow a CD burner, you might burn things like old scenes, models and textures onto CDs. I know I keep mine on hard disk :-), and I also need to offload them, because my disk got only 8GB left. From 40. My Bryce folder (scenes, tests, models and textures) is more than 9GB.

the 'out of memory' message could also refer to physical memory. Check to see what else gets loaded on when you boot up..anything like Gator, or Bonzi buddy, or Ulead Calendar Creator, whatever..they take up memory, even though you don't see them (AOL is also a big hog, especially after you've tried to delete it..almost as bad as gum in high-tread sneakers)..
don't feel bad, my first hard drive was a 30-megabyte, and I thought I'd never fill it up..;)

"Win98 doesn't have a system restore folder. :-)" I noticed :) he had winME back then it seems :) He switched back for some odd reason.

Thanks for the advice, I'll check out that virtual memory thing. I have a cd burner and thats how I freed up space. Its just a pain in the butt. Not that I'll ever go back to look at the stuff again, but I like to have an organization to it and I don't have the time to organize. Ok I'm really scared right now, its warned me that I may not be able to restart my computer if I've put in a virtual memory amount thats I'm guessing too low? If nobody hears from me again for weeks (well I can write from my work PC) it'll be for this reason. Wish me luck.

"BTW, you should be logged in as Administrator to delete some things." I use Win ME, so I don't have an admin user...

I don't think it's necessarily your system, though you are really pushing things. I have a P4 2.4 1gig of ram and lots of disk running in XP pro and I am the Admin. Bryce is not fully up to date to run on windows. You can quit while it's still saving and windows won't stop you like it will with office programs. It's unfortunate, but it happens even with big systems. Call it cosmic rays, Hitting a key while saving, whatever. Just remember Save, save, save. I Agree with your idea about Burning CDs. I put my work and even copies of my models in the same working folder. When I'm done I burn the whole folder with the multiple saves to a CD. (I wait till a stack is on sale and buy 100 at a time. It usually only costs 30 cents to back everything up.) I make two seperate copys then delete the folder after I open both files from the CDs to see if they still work.

Ang, I, like you are panning to do, also have an Athlon, an Athlon XP1900+ and in case you are not aware, these processors run a bit hotter than Intel's do; similar to the heat you would get from 'overclocking'. Not to worry, tho, just make sure you have plenty of cooling for the case and you should be fine. I have had no problems with mine for over a year, now. The CPU fan should be Athlon approved tho.
I know the angst you are going thru...I was without my 'escape' for a year, it ain't pleasant!
Good luck.

Rstar

Oh Angela, poor thing. You must get a new computer as soon as possible, but in the meantime you could get a new harddrive and maybe 512mb ram. At least that would have you up and running Bryce without getting a totally new system. I got a 120gig h/d at the beginning of the year and so far I'm just under half way full which is a heck of a lot of data. I don't know how I survived with my first computer which only had a 4gig h/d. Onward and upward Ang dear and I hope you get things sorted out soon. 8) Catlin

I just remembered that when I got my new ram and h/d I once got a message saying that I was out of memory and that was because my virtual memory was set to 512mb ram instead of the new 1gig. Now I can't remember where I put it straight but I did and I haven't had any of those messages since. If I remember what I did I'll let you know Ang. Catlin

Hey Catlin, I'm just gonna weather the storm till I get the new PC. I'm gonna burn the abstract and then pull it up when I get a new pc. Its not that big of a deal. I did change my virtual memory, maybe thats something to keep in mind when I get the new computer. So many things to know. Since this is my thread, I'm gonna go OT: Saw my husband today, his birthday is coming up in Oct and he told me his girlfriend is giving him a party at a restaurant and is inviting his friends. He said that she might invite me. But alas, the party will be on a night that I work. I bowed out gracefully. Now, the delema, do I send him a card? I'm ROFLMAO at the thought of sending him one of those sexy girl cards. But I don't think I'll waste my money, seeing as how he forgot my birthday this year and made it up by buying me a box at an auction a few days later. Anyhow, my life is fairly stable at the moment, trying to savor these moments. Angela

How old is he? Maybe you could get him one of those Black over the hill cards or a fake Viagra perscription and suggest he better fill it if he expects to keep No.2 happy. If you can't get a card that will make "you" happy then I wouldn't bother.

ROFLMAO, I wish I could send that type of card. Unfortunately he never was in need of viagra, I think he had it natural running thru his bloodstream and he's only 42 so no black cards. Guess I won't be getting him one this year. I think the only thing sweet will be if I hear that his girlfriend doesn't like sex as often as he does. That will be sweet. Ang

There are cards here I saw the other day which are about 2 feet tall that look like tomb stones. I think if he was my ex I might send him something like that to remember me by. lol 8) Catlin But your probably better just ignoring it, that should hit him harder than actually getting him one.

PS let me know how things turn out cuz my problem sounds similar to yours, In the meantime im using an extra unit from my office the slowest computer on the face of the earth...64MB RAM Im flipping roch222

Ang..I feel for you 2 WEEKS AGO my HD took a BIG GIANT ....WESTERN DIGITAL...40 GIGABYTE SH...T!,

Ang, I'm so sorry to hear about your data loss! I bought my first home computer 5 years ago and it was because I had located a close-out retail copy of Bryce2 for only $12 U.S. I realised I would need a system to run it on so I bought a used Cyrix 166mhz system with a 1gig HD and 32megs of ram! I was pretty naive about computers then obviously! The system lasted only 4 months before it died. This inspired me to buy a magazine on building your own computer and I bought all the parts on the checklist. I couldn't believe how easy it is to build your own system! Since then I have built over 20 systems for myself and others.It is fun to build your own system, and there is a wealth of info on the web about doing so. One of the great things about it is getting the exact equipment and software config. that you want.

Ang, Windows will tell you a lot of things, not all of them necessarily true. :-) The thing is, Microsoft receommended for virtual memory 1.5 times amount of RAM in Windows 98. (What a sorry excuse for a sentence.) If there are problems, you can always start computer in Safe mode and then change the things back. Just press F8 while it's booting and you'll get a boot menu. And yes, building your own computer is not exactly the hardest thing on the Earth. You just have to be careful to read a bit on it. BTW, send him a box a couple of days afterwards. :-)

Thanks guys, Well I haven't lost any data that I know of. And after removing some of my Bryce stuff and saving it to a disk I can run bryce again. But it won't finish opening the abstract. I can only hope that its still fine and that it will work on the new pc. It doesn't give any error messages and sometimes it opens to a point where I see the stuff, so I think its just too much for this pc. Erlik, I changed the virtual memory. It was set for unlimited. When I checked the option to set it myself, the default was 1334 or something close to that. I got chicken and set it to 300, I suppose that it should be some weird number for a reason, because you said to set it to 192. Aha, just got it 1.5 x 128 = 192. Does it matter that I've got a weird #? If so I'd better go in and change it again. Take care

I normally set virtual mem to 2xRAM rather then 1.5. If you do this change when you first install windows you should get a contiguous slot at the start of the drive (it'll be nice and fast). Sorry to hear about the PC woes, I'm sure the new one will make some big smiles. BTW did you do all the HD reclamation stuff like removing all off-line content from your browser etc?

What you should do is to open Bryce and open a big file. Than go to the root of your drive (c://) and check how big win386.swp is. If you have practically no free space left, no luck, you can as well leave to Windows to manage virtual memory. BTW, you should have "Hide system files (recommended)" checked, uncheck it. Also, do not check "hide file extensions for known file types". Open a folder, then go to Tools -> Folder Options -> View and then scroll down. And if you created that abstract in Bryce, it should be able to open it, unless: b) you created it when you had more space, b) file is corrupt.

Virtual memory is something usually set higher, almost noone sets it lower..;) The trick is to set it not too far from your available Ram..if you set it too high, it uses your Hard drive as memory (not the end of the world, but your hard drive is much slower than Ram). At the prices they are nowadays..it might be an idea to add more Ram to your system.

...I've already decided to go with 120 gig hd, just because I'm too lazy to clean out the hard drive till I absolutely have to. That could be a big mistake. Today's huge hard drives are nice because never before could we store so much. The bad news is that never before could we lose so much in a matter of seconds. Don't be too lazy about cleaning things out or you'll discover you are just an accident waiting to happen.

Ang do you clean out cookies and temporary internet files when you come offline? I've found that if I leave it for a couple of days without deleting all the rubbish you pick up while surfing it mounts up to a fair amount of mb. I always delete them now as soon as I get offline. Catlin

Good point Catlin, where are they hiding on my drive? Its funny, I know where to look on my pc at work but here at home I don't think I've run across the guys. Actually, this pc may not accept cookies, I got denied once because it said I had to change my pc to accept them but then I couldn't figure out how to do that. Wasn't important, all the things I need work. I forgot to run scan disk last night, so guess I'll try it tonight. If my brain doesn't turn to mush again. Ang

Go to : start>my computer>documents and settings>the folder with the account you go online with>local settings>and there you should find cookies, temporary internet files and your temp folder where Murkysoft puts all it's temp files. This is the path I take but I'm using XP so if there are any errors then perhaps someone with a better knowledge of Win98 could amend it. Hope this helps Ang. 8) Catlin

Another thing you could do is go to My computer>local disc>right click on it and in general properties it will say disc cleanup. Click on that and it will show you all the temp files etc that you can safely delete. Catlin

Eeek, I deleted my internet temp files and cookies and had to remember my password to get back in here! Hope I can remember all the others. LOL

You might want to look at your C:WindowsTEMP file. I have found that some graphics programs stash 'temp' files in there, and then don't clean them up when they are done. At one point, I had 16,000 files in there! It would not accept any more, and slowed everything down, nearly to a halt. After checking with lots of people, I deleted everything from the folder. Amazingly, everything got much better immediately!! I run Windows ME. Hope that helps a bit. Tres

Well 512RAM with windows 98 and less than a pent 4 is not a good idea. Win98 is'nt able to handle it.If you have Xp setting it to classic windows is a good thing to get more speed.Yes disc back up is what I do too.I burn a new disc weekly of all my files then delete them from this.... But more my solution was to have 2 pc's.I have a pent 3 -550 running xp with 512 ram for all the crap I download and for trials.If I like it I send it over to my Pentium 4 This way it is always nice and clean and fast.Hmmmm so why do I want a mac now also.