Well, installed it yesterday and was a big mistake. After restarting Windows, my XP was dead. Repair of Windows failed. Very cool. That was my last experiment with Poser 5 back to Poser 4 and waiting till the final of DAZ Studio. Thomas

I don't understand what happened, I have XP also and had absolutely no problems, of course when I install anything nothing else is running, not antivirus software or screen savers or even backgrounds..... Sharen

So how did you recover?

I have windows XP, Poser5 and SP4, no problems here. But a total failure of an entire operating system? Could you give more details? I thought that the restore in XP got you back to how the computer was before but you say that failed also? I'm amazed to hear of such a vast variation in results. I would have thought that if it had crashed your's it must have crashed others.

sounds like a virus to me...

Possibly the new version of MyDoom, which deletes Microsoft files? Scarab

I have XPPro, all patches, and never ever close Panda Antivirus and Firewall whilst installing. Never ever had a problem. If XP completely crashed and there is no recovery available, then something else happened. Did you install a recovery point? Could you access Safe Mode?

Mine used to hang at the .arp plug-in... I traced it down to a corrupted Library folder. funny, that folder was fine until I patched P5??? Now it won't even open. But, once you get it all working, SR4 kicks ass. I haven't had a light hang yet, and that's with the fancy ones and shaders for the lights AND displacement maps!

I installed it on XPHome too, so far no problems (I only installed it this morning). I don't see how a program like this can crash Windows completely, it does indeed sound like something else is wrong and that it's just a coincidense that it happened when you installed the patch. Also since the Restore didn't work it sounds like some virus to mee :o(

I also have XP Pro, I've installed SR4 and have had no problems.

It is probably just a coincidence but I got a similar experience - installing poser 5 (or an update to poser 5) resulted for me, each time, with a failing hard drive. I installed the latest release and then again, one of my hard drives is giving me suddenly S.M.A.R.T issues. It is just weird that these hardware problems happen only when I install a poser update so far.

That sounds really bad :-(. I installed it without problems, like all the other updates before. WinXP Pro

So should I install that SR3 figures updater as well? So far I've installed all updates as they were released, and I did install the original Figures Updater that came with SR1. If this one is not included in the SR3 update, why isn't it labeled SR4 figures updater then? I thought that since I had installed SR3, I was up to date, until the arrival of SR4. Now I'm not sure, but I'm not interested in wasting time and bandwidth in downloading an update I don't need...

If you already have the SR3 Figure updater installed, no need to install it again.

There is almost no way for Poser to cause hard drive errors (like physical problems) - so if it happened to you I would say somehting else was wrong. Whiel there is a slight chance of a software install causing an OS to die (overwrite of a crucial file etc) I can say that I haven't seen it happen with XP as it auto-heals most of that stuff.

However Poser - any version - is big. The files it opens and uses are large, and it pulls an unbeliveable number of them into memory, compared to other applications. Not saying that Poser can cause HDD failures per se, but if you have any weakness in your HDD sub-system then Poser will likely be the app that pushes it over the edge. Happened to me twice during the public "beta" of P5, until I realized that my Power Supply was marginal with all the extra HDD and stuff I'd installed. Finally P5 as it was first shipped included Interlok "copy protection". That does write to your HDD disk header "sector 0" area - an area that only Fdisk would/should normally write too. This could conceivably have some side-effects if the HDD sub-system wasn't in good shape. I'm not sure if later versions of P5 CD's still had Interlok code present. (Note SR2 removed the monitoring code, it did not remove the actual Interlok code.)

XP stopped while starting. Tried repair installation. Roleback was not working. I had only the option of a total reinstall. Never seen anything like that before. And be sure I know how to repair Windows. I'm a longtime betatester for different companies (since 1991) and I have seen many problems. This one was extreme. Installed the new SP. Restarted XP...and that was it. Never reached even the password screen. Repair install..stopped before reaching the final. Even replacing the registry files was not helpfull. (I have more computers. This one here is normally only for graphics) Thomas

Thomas, as a note. layingback pointed out that interlock does write the boot sector -- which does not function ideally the way interlock expected it to on the updated NTFS system -- and can cause a corruption of the coding there, which can -- and does -- cause your system to fail to boot. You can use fixboot through the XP recovery console to repair the sector about half the time -- seems to depend on how many changes have been made to it and the degree of corruption.

Crashing the operating system is a major flaw to me. If you guys are having trouble, what chance do I have? When you talk about replacing registry files, corruption of coding in the boot sector, ....all that stuff is over my head. All I wanted was a program thet works. Crashing the OS, corrupting file, etc, is really scary to me, and no more fixes till POser 6? CL is going to leave a flaw like that in the fix?????

First of all let me assure you that the Service Release 4 installer doesn't write anywhere else than the directory specified to update. Also, SR 4 does not add or modify any items in the registry (with one exception: the file extensions .pz3 and .pzz are registered with the new poser.exe executable). Yes, the initial version of Poser 5 was protected by InterLok, and yes, InterLok does low-lewel work to protect itself. But, since Service Release 2, InterLok is not used or accessed any more. If you install Poser 5 from the CD and apply SR4 (or SR3 or SR2) rightaway before launching for the first time, InterLok will not even be started and does nothing on your system. To reiterate, when launching after installing SR4, no low-level access takes place at all, the launch process is completely read-only (again with one exception: at the very first launch, a file caching the serial number entered is written to the Poser directory). That said, it is extremely unlikely that Poser 5 with Service Release 4 installed could do any damage to the operating system, and I can't even remotely imagine how such damage should be caused by Poser.

But installing an original Poser 5 CD will right Interlok code to the sector 0 of your primary drive again. That's the potentially dicey bit. The SR's (2 and above) do not write to sector 0, agreed. Reason is they do not remove the Interlok code. They simply remove Poser from being "watched" by Interlok. Interlok is still running (it has to be in case it was already "wathcing" another installed app). There was install code to permit the removal of the Interlok drivers on PACE's site if you no longer need it, but I understand they are no longer available. But even that wouldn't remove the entry from Sector 0.

Wombat, I know you are experienced enough not to lightly point the finger at SR4 - but as a programmer, I am skeptical that the SR4 updater caused the problems you encountered, especially after uli's description of what SR4 Installer does. I would suspect that your registry had already gotten corrupted somehow, and that this installation was the last straw that pushed Windows over the edge. But XP unable to recover? If it were my cheap PC clone, I'd start suspecting hard drive, power supply, or motherboard were no longer 100% reliable. For anyone who wants to take no chances, install or upgrade Poser 5 (or any other complex multimedia application) FIRST THING after booting Windows. Ideally without virus checker, Windows Messenger, or any of those other background processes: Start Menu / "Run..." button. Type "msconfig". Click OK. Click "Startup" tab. Check "Disable All". (You DON'T want to disable stuff under any other tab, unless you REALLY know what you are doing.) Reboot. Install Poser 5. Run "msconfig" again. Check "Normal Startup". Reboot. Personal Note: I myself never bother to do this, when running Windows XP or Windows 2000. Older OS versions were MUCH less reliable. But then, I also format my boot drives, and install everything from scratch, so that I know exactly what is running on each PC...

On the other hand, anyone who is NOT running Win XP or 2000, I would personally discourage from installing Poser 5, until they upgrade. I have one PC running Windows ME that runs everything I throw at it - including video editing, MIDI editing, and 3D games. It even runs Poser 4 like a champ. However, I could NOT get 5 to run on it. Even after patient technical support help from Curious Labs. Even after SR2 removed the Interlok support. As far as I am concerned (and I say this as an experienced PC multimedia programmer myself, with a series of Poser-compatible utilities under development - so I AM committed to Poser's success), Poser 5 is too fragile to run on any Windows OS prior to 2000.

(I don't mean to overstate my commitment to Poser - I also plan to support DAZ Studio, as soon as it is a stable platform.)

But if you install SR2 (or 3 or 4) BEFORE starting Poser, my understanding is that it will NOT do the Interlok thing at all, it won't write to that sector, will it?

(Sorry for the many posts...) Another installation note: Other useful steps to take to insure a solid system prior to installation: * C drive / Properties / Tools / Error Checking - Check Now. * run a Registry Checker, such as that included in Norton Utilities. * if you have TWO disk drives, consider installing Poser on the SECOND drive, instead of the boot drive. ("D:/whatever/Poser5") (Just in case Interlok still does SOMETHING to the boot sector, it is much safer if that isn't the boot sector of your boot drive.)

Steve, that thing about installing to a different drive... It only works if it's 2 PHYSICAL drives, right? Not if C: and D: is two partitions on the same harddisk, am I right?

Attached Link: http://www.runtimedna.com/messages.ez?forum_id=28&Form.ShowMessage=72272

Elle, thanks for linking to that useful thread! ernyoka, while it is true that Poser itself makes no use of Interlok, if you install SR2 before starting Poser, I simply don't know whether the boot sector writing was already done during the initial install of the original Poser CD (if you have a CD prior to SR2). NOTE: even if it was, it is almost certainly harmless, as long as the Interlok software never gets fired up. What I mean is, lets give Curious Labs a break here. Everything is probably A-OK now that they've stopping using Interlok. The "two drives" thing is more of a "passing thought", based on my experiences prior to SR2. Forget I said it. But yes, since talking about "boot sector", that means two PHYSICAL drives. And to reiterate: I don't know whether the boot sector writing occurs during initial CD installation, or the first time a Poser 5 (if PRIOR to SR2) is fired up - in which case you're certainly safe.

ernyoka, Unfortunately the Interlok Sector 0 header is written, certainly by the Poser 5 CD initially shipped. It is highly probable that a later pressing of the CD, with SR2 already applied would not do this (to avoid the royalty payments to PACE for a feature CL wasn't using, if for no other reason). But whether there exists such a later pressing of Poser 5 I do not know. I'd like too, because if it does, I'd like to ask CL for one so that I can consider a full re-install of P5 (to see if it works any better with respect to the dumb floating separate focus parameter window). All the info about the Poser 5 SR2 and Interlok was here on R'osity posted by CL in the Poser 5 Beta forum, but all of that was deleted by R'osity ASAIK. CL was very clear at the time that SR2 does NOT remove any Interlok code at all ,in fact leaves it present, correct and running - for the reason I mentioned above. (They just dropped the links to it out of Poser 5 SR2 - and above.)

OK, sounds like layingback has more knowledge than I on this matter. NOTE: lest this lengthy discussion confuse anyone, if you ARE running ANY version of Poser 5, then you've ALREADY successfully cleared the "Interlok" hurdle: As uli describes, installing SR4 wouldn't cause any additional Interlok activity, nor any further touching of your boot sector. Wombat's disastrous experience baffles me - I see no way in which SR4 could cause that.

As I understand it the Interlok sectore isn't written until a P5 with less than SR2 is >RUN< (as stated above). So if you Install P5, then Install SR4 before you fire Poser up at all you will NEVER execute any Interlok code at all.

1 - Just did a free test. If you install Poser, then install SR2 or later, without starting up poser, it does not (repeat DOES NOT) write to the boot sector. Did it three times, comparing the sector reports each time. If you start Poser 5 Before installing the SR, it DOES write. Moral -- don't start up poser 5 until it's fully patched on a clean install (something I noted in my instructions) 2 - Layingback -- while I can't speak for everyone, it appears the majority of folks are finding that sure enough, that intolerable delay on the parameters has indeed been fixed. Won't solve all your issues, but, well, hey, the world ain't perfect...

ynsaen, "that intolerable delay on the parameters has indeed been fixed" Wow. On mine it's even worse on SR4 than SR3 - much like it was before I removed CP. So looks as if I too will have to re-install from CD to remove SR2 "effects"... And thanks for the tests on Sector 0 - that was indded why I wasn't going to try the re-install.

np hon -- I hadn't thought of it myself before, so I just had to know -- I've had the NTFS db go belly up on me before becuase of interlock. I didn't want to go through it again! lol

ynsaen - thanks for doing that test, but did you test re boot sector writing ON A SYSTEM ON WHICH POSER 5 / INTERLOK HAD NEVER BEEN INSTALLED? If the Interlok DLL is already present in Windows folder, that may change the install behaviour. (I think what you report is accurate - but I want to make SURE).

Steve, I did exactly that. I'm getting a pair of clean systems ready to do some tests with SR3 and SR4 and wanted to make sure they were clean (going to look into some reflection things about the two patches) so, like I tend to by habit, I low leveled the old drives and started from scratch.

ynsaen, thanks for being so thorough!! sigh of relief