I have poser 7 and Poser Pro 7, but never use them.  I switched to Carrara about a year ago and now I find poser frustrating.  It takes some time to get used to posing in Carrara, but once you do it is very intuitive.  The latest version (7.1.1) is very good at allowing free movement of a joint.  One does have to adjust shaders, but that can be done on the fly with Carrara.  Also, constraints can be a bit tight on joints - but you can turn them off.  I also animate, and Carrara is much easier (IMHO) due to the simple and complete control of all objects throughout the time line.

If your hardware can handle it, you can see what you're doing as you create a scene.  Then you can render lightning fast (unlike poser which offers a pukey view and snail like rendering).  The lights are so much better with realistic drop off.

Also, of course, Carrara offers terrain and sky which is simply unavailable in Poser.  The water is excellent.  There are primitives for ocean, fire and emitters for water, snow, etc.

Carrara also allows for manipulation of meshes, UV painting, creation of 3d objects.  While some mesh manipulation is possible in poser, it is hopelessly primitive in comparison.

A simple render is very quick, and is not far off the final product.

Once you explore Carrara, I think you will find poser a one-trick pony in comparison.

The only thing I use poser for now is to open and manipulate objects which do not import natively so I can save versions for import.

Klebnor

Lotus 123 ~ S-Render ~ OS/2 WARP ~ IBM 8088 / 4.77 Mhz ~ Hercules Ultima graphics, Hitachi 10 MB HDD, 64K RAM, 12 in diagonal CRT Monitor (16 colors / 60 Hz refresh rate), 240 Watt PS, Dual 1.44 MB Floppies, 2 button mouse input device.  Beige horizontal case.  I don't display my unit.