I have been experiencing problems with Poser 8, so bad I cannot use it. For a start, the library takes a whole 10 minutes to index every time I fire up Poser. Secondly, the presence of Poser on my almost brand new machine is severely disrupting my Vista software and internet access.

SmithMicro inform me that no one else is experiencing problems like mine, even though I'm reading about it in these forums, and also hearing about problems through friends. SmithMicro are expecting me to alter my software and system just to make it possible to run Poser 8, and I don't think that is reasonable as I've had no problems, since SP4, with running Poser 7.

One particular item of bizarre behaviour is that when Poser 8 is installed on my computer it instantly generates tens of thousands of xml files, which totally bugger up my CCleaner, prevent me accessing the Vista start menus, and severely curtail my access to the internet, for both mail and browser. When I uninstall Poser 8 the xml files totally dissapear, but the service team at SmithMicro are most reluctant to associate these xml files with their software, which doesn't make any logical sense. No xml files ever appear when Poser 4,5, or 7 is running, let alone tens of thousands of them appearing in an instant, and have never ever appeared in conjunction with any other software. Just to be sure, I have several times uninstalled and reinstalled Poser 8, and surprise surprise, the many thousands of xml files appear and dissapear in the same manner. It just cannot be coincedence.

I simply do not believe SmithMicro's claim to me that no one else is experiencing these problems, but I suspect they are doggedly defending their new version program code of Poser regardless of the problems it is causing me. I am not prepared to put up with a Poser version that takes ages to load its library, or messes up my system, nor do I consider it reasonable to be expected to spend days on end, at SM's request, investigating and fiddling with the settings on my comptuer, and/or removing other software, just to please SmithMicro. So I have been obliged to remove Poser 8, and having done so my computer and internet is now working properly again and I'm back to running Poser 7. I am now seriously considering dumping Poser for the future and switching to an alternative competitor.

 I haven't seen anyone post a problem like yours, so you may well be the first one having that problem.

i think your machine is fubared anyways, i would suggest a reformat, or do a new windows installation on a seperate partition , just install graphics card driver, and chipset driver for your board, leave away stuff like CCleaner and try a clean poser 8 install there. it sounds like some  optimizer, or similar silly software peoples tend to run these days messed up your file associations, much worse can be the pile of crap building up in your windows system like a patchwork of several incompatible driver modules from previous diver versions which do not get removed, and of course a degenerated windows system, friggen microsoft is the one you should blame here :p  i havent heard of any problems like yours yet, but that does not mean poser 8 is error free, otherwise the service pack wouldnt be released. only problems ive heared so far are crashes on inventory refreshing, firefly render errors, firefly crashes (not new at all) , some even reported issues with newer nvidia drivers.  but a system f***up like yours has the cause somewhere else, you cant test software on the gajillion of possibilities of hardware components you can put a computer together, but you can cover the most common configuration of components and operating systems, and then there are still those with odd combinations of components which wont work together under given situations, i have built a machine like that once and was ending up getting a different motherboard because of quite unexpected incompatibilities with my graphics card manufacturer, different brand of the same card i borrowed from a friend worked, but i wasnt willing to shelve out 400$ more, so i bought a different motherboard, and the friggen thing worked flawlessly.  sometimes such issues do not show up until something happens like in your case.

so if it is not a messed up windows installation, not the driversm then you have the odd and rare case of "my systems components just do not want to work together with poser 8, just because" gremlins

yeah...and try to defragment your drives <_<   

I am having similar problems (not all) and I have mentioned it in several threads here..

I am using Apple OS 10.6 "Snow Leopard"

I have also contacted Smith Micro with NO RESPONSE>>

Poser 8 almost certainly isn't messing up your computer. You say that when it's installed it instantly generates tens of thousands of xml files: can you tell us where it puts these and give examples of filenames? Which OS are you using? What are your system specs? Have you updated Internet Explorer and Flash Player to their latest versions?

You say it's an almost new computer. If you're using Vista, UAC (User Account Control) can do strange things if you install and run programs as anything other than Administrator. Did you run the installer as an Administrator?

The generation of some xml files would be normal behaviour - it's how some of Poser's  preferences have been stored since version 7, if not before  - but tens of thousands sounds wrong. Even so, xml files on their own aren't any kind of hazard. By themselves they can't cause the symptoms you describe: they contain very simple text-based data and absolutely no executable code.

There's no point in blowing this problem up into some sort of conspiracy on SM's part. It's possible that you haven't described the problem properly to them, and they haven't asked you the right questions in return.

If you can provide more precise, meaningful information, someone here may just have the answer to your troubles.

as the OP uses CCleaner, probably regularly, and they have a fairly new machine. the problems are unlikely to be caused by extraneous files and a bloated registry. nor should it need defragging just yet.
i have no idea how to explain all the xml files, but the problems with net access could well be laid at Poser8's door, for the simple reason that parts of MS Internet Explorer have been incorporated into the app, and it may well be messing with the OP's access ports.

3anson, parts of Internet Explorer have not been incorporated into Poser 8. The new Poser 8 library system was created with Adobe AIR. It uses IE components and the FlashPlayer for some functions, probably for displaying the thumbnails and associated data (I don't know for sure, I didn't write it, but that's my guess based on how AIR works). This has nothing to do with web access.

We can't really tell what's going on until the OP supplies some hard data. My guess is that this has more to do with how their new system has been configured than anything else.

lol, not to mention it likes to copie a full complete runtime in your admin shared documents that it can't seem to access without you reconfiguring a few things around.

waist of drive drive space if you ask me for it to do that.

I'm sure Bagginsbill can explain it best as he wrote the new Library system but as far as I can tell the xml files are created in the IE cache folder by Poser8 so it can keep track of what's in your library, at least that's where it's putting them on my machine.

Are you absolutely sure it's not Vista playing silly beggars?

Just to be sure (for myself) I fired up Poser8, then started browsing with IE to see if Poser would affect my web access, no reaction from IE whatsoever to having Poser8 fiddling with it's cache.

I hardly ever use IE as I'm a Firefox fan anyway but this proves in my case that Poser is not a problem.

ps I'm using the Beta version of Windows 7 right now as my Vista committed suicide a while back.

" parts of Internet Explorer have not been incorporated into Poser 8. The new Poser 8 library system was created with Adobe AIR. It uses IE components and the FlashPlayer for some functions"

sorry, you have contradicted yourself in that statement.
parts and components are the same thing.

and as the new library is a part of Poser 8, it is incorporated into the app.

and as the OP stated, Poser 7 works fine on his/her  rig, ergo  :-  the app is the problem, not the OPs rig.

I have also noticed that Crap Cleaner now spends considerable time clearing IE5* and XML files, if -and only if- I have had P8 open;  I wonder if this is another manifestation of the memory leak I have noticed.  Open Task Manager.  Open P8.  Don't do anything with Poser 8, just watch Task Manager and note the ever-climbing memory allocation P8 is using.  It would be a serious issue for trying to render out 1200 frames of animation.

*Even my older machines have IE8, and I don't use it;  I browse with FireFox.  I have both XP and Vista machines;  both show this behavior.  Like the OP, I also have dual Poser installations on each machine - Poser 7 & Poser 8 on the 32bit machines, Poser Pro & Poser 8 on the 64bit machines.

 Hm. 933 files are tens of thousands.. Ockham, I thought you were better at math ;)

Anyway.. I'd say it's NOT Poser. And NOT necessarily Vista either playing games.

I have Poser running right now, in Vista.. and I have 55 api.xml files on the computer, so neither tens of thousands nor 900-something files. And when I looked where IE wanted to put Temporary Internet Files, (C:UsersLisbethAppDataLocalMicrosoftWindows) the folder "Temporary Internet Files" wasn't even there. Probably because I hadn't used IE yet.

I never use IE, but I do have the latest version installed (version 8) - I l ike to keep things up to date, also the programs I never plan to use. My normal browser of choice is GoogleChrome.

Sooooo... Not everything that happens on your computer is replicatable by anyone else. In short, it's not necessarily the people at Smith Micro who are idiots. They may simply not have the problem.

Well I'm glad Ockham has noticed these strange files.

I expect it is possible that I could supply enough information for someone to come up with an answer, but it has taken several weeks now of SM trying to help and it has got nowhere. I do not have weeks, or even months of free time to spare, or the knowledge, to try out fixes. All my driver and system files were updated before installing P8, I run only Firefox, and never have Vista UAC activated. SM got me to strip my computer payload right down to bare bones in diagnostic mode and Poser still didn't work at the speed of Poser 7, nor did my system recover.

Has anyone considered that although xml files are 'harmless', if they are being used as a part of the library indexing they might be imposing a huge strain on RAM and the system. I don't know, all I know is that they certainly weren't there in previous versions of Poser or they would have shown up in CCleaner. Oh, and something else I forgot to mention, CCleaner also showed that when P8 is running it generates a hell of a lot of thumbnail cache files too, also none of which show up when using Poser 7. My computer spec is safely within the 'preffered' sales description, but I don't think it can cope with all these extra files.

Thank you all for your offers of help, but in my position would you be happy to give up everything and all your time for several weeks, and put up with a malfunctioning OS, just to sort out 'one' program? I'd like to meet the overworked graphic designer who would happily say "Yes"!

Made a mistake there, it wasn't Thumbnail cache files, it was Internet log files, but they still weren't there before firing up P8, and I hadn't even accessed the internet at that point other than as and inclusive part of P8.

Trekkie, he might have only had that many xml files, but CCleaner clearly showed I had variable counts of 10,000 or 20,000+ xml files. Just how did they get on my computer if I hadn't accessed the internet, and was only running P8?

     Well, even when "idle", your computer is quietly running about two dozen processes.  Still, it does appear that P8 is the one generating the gobs of IE5 and XML files.
      I've also noticed yesterday that on at least one of my machines (TinkerBell) I can't save a new material (mt5 or mc6);  the + button isn't there!  It was there on Pixie the other day.  I'll have to see if it comes/goes on the same machine, or if it seems to be XP vs Vista, or what.

     In any case, I'm not inclined to uninstall Poser 8;  I simply am making note of perceived issues, and I'll hope that SM gets them fixed.  The advances offered in P8 are worth the effort, to me.  I'm a hot rodder, so I have a high tolerance for dealing with teething troubles on new/adapted equipment.

Quote - " parts of Internet Explorer have not been incorporated into Poser 8. The new Poser 8 library system was created with Adobe AIR. It uses IE components and the FlashPlayer for some functions"

sorry, you have contradicted yourself in that statement.
parts and components are the same thing.

and as the new library is a part of Poser 8, it is incorporated into the app.

and as the OP stated, Poser 7 works fine on his/her  rig, ergo  :-  the app is the problem, not the OPs rig.

There is no contradiction.

Parts and components are the same thing, but that isn't the point. Poser 8 does not contain any parts or components of IE, but it does make calls on them to achieve certain things. If IE wasn't there, the library system wouldn't work. Poser also makes calls on the OpenGL toolkit (part of Windows), but OpenGL is not incorporated into Poser. You can print stuff from Poser, and when you do, it calls on Windows' printer drivers, but those printer drivers are not incorporated into Poser. Does that make sense?

And yes, the library is part of Poser 8, it does not contain any IE components, but it needs those components to be present or your system so that it can access them.

The fact that Poser 7 runs well on his setup and that Poser 8 doesn't, does not mean that the problem lies with Poser 8; it doesn't mean that it doesn't lie there either. We don't have enough information to make that judgement.

But let's get back to the subject of the original post:

"Poser 8 not working" - OK. People have had problems.
"ruining my computer" - no.

As ockham points out, the xml files are temporary files. They shouldn't accumulate over time. If they are, that needs to be sorted out in IE's preferences: there's an option to have it delete all temporary files when it quits. On it's first run, when the library is building its index, it may well generate loads of temporary files which may well be in the thousands for large multiple runtimes. They won't break your system - how could they? - but they might slow it down. Maybe CCleaner chokes on vast numbers of files - that's CCleaner's problem, not Poser's. If all else fails, delete them manually.

I just checked my Temporary Internet Files folder with Poser 8 running and it contains a handful of Poser-related  xml files and a pile of other crap that has nothing to do with Poser.

Quote - Just how did they get on my computer if I hadn't accessed the internet, and was only running P8?

The new library palette uses Flash player embedded in a HTML page which is displayed by an HTML rendering control, this uses the IE temporary files area in the same way IE does when it communicates with the server embedded in P8.

If you look at the "Internet Address" column when looking at the temporary files, you see the its "http://127.0.0.1:11530" which is the special IP address for the local machine and the port Poser uses.

So nothing unusual going on, and the temporary files cache will only take up as much space as set in the "Internet Options" in IE.

Thank you for your input. You keep mentioning IE, but I only use Firefox, though I can understand that Poser looks to IE, and not Firefox. I do however always have Firefox set to delete everything on exit, every time, I use CCleaner because it seems to clear lots of other garbage too, plus some cookies that Firefox doesn't delete..

I perhaps should have also mentioned that when I first installed P8 (and I told this to SM support) the library was so unstable it repeatedly crashed the program, which required restarting, every time I tried to click on anything in the library, even the non button areas. Also, each time it crashed, the attached error message was thrown up on my screen. And then for some unknown reason the crashing stopped, all on its own.

My library content is in the old P7 runtime, and accessed as an extra library, though that old runtime is pretty big, and as I said to SM support, after the program stopped crashing the indexing slowed or speeded up depending directly on how many files were in each folder. For example, it would go fast through small folders, but seem to get stuck for much longer indexing the larger folders. Another point I observed is that the indexing would never automatically progress from one section to the next, but would stop dead at the bottom of the last section until I clicked on the title heading of the next library section, when the indexing would restart. Another thing that annoyed me was that it wasn't possible to index in any way other than from left to right in order of heading, I mean I couldn't get say the camera section to index before the poses. All in all it was a real annoyance to have to manually coax the library to index, section by section, for a whole ten minutes until it was complete.

ok lets get some details here

Vista Version and Service pack?
Firewall?
where is your Poser 8 installed to?

zippy

I'm never sure whether I'm helping or hindering on these forums so I'm glad I've been of some assistance.

I too use FireFox for web browsing, exclusively. Never IE. That has nothing to do with Poser. If you think of IE as part of Windows, like OpenGL and printer drivers and all the other crap that you may or may not use, it makes a bit more sense. It only accesses the bits of IE it needs, when it needs them.

Another example: there's an add-on for FireFox called "IE Tab". It uses the Internet Explorer engine to render web pages rather than it's own. This happens within FireFox: IE doesn't get launched; FireFox makes a call on some IE components. When I do that, temp files are created in IE's temp folder rather than FireFox's.

Anyway, there are library problems, they're known about and, we're told, addressed in the now overdue SR1.

Quote - ok lets get some details here

Vista Version and Service pack?
Firewall?
where is your Poser 8 installed to?

Vista version Home Premium, with all updates.

I have Service pack 1. For some unknown reason I find it impossible to install service pack 2, it always gets stuck half way. I have no idea how to fix that.

Firewall is standard Vista

P8 is installed using default Vista option 1, as confirmed to me by the SM service team.

Computer is quad 2.7 processors, with 4GB RAM.
256mb Invidia GL graphics card with most recent drivers.

Quote - I wonder if this is another manifestation of the memory leak I have noticed.  Open Task Manager.  Open P8.  Don't do anything with Poser 8, just watch Task Manager and note the ever-climbing memory allocation P8 is using.  It would be a serious issue for trying to render out 1200 frames of animation.

*Even my older machines have IE8, and I don't use it;  I browse with FireFox.  I have both XP and Vista machines;  both show this behavior.  Like the OP, I also have dual Poser installations on each machine - Poser 7 & Poser 8 on the 32bit machines, Poser Pro & Poser 8 on the 64bit machines.

Try selecting the ground plane and see if the memeory useage drops.
if so, only select cameras and lights when needed until it's patched.
SmithMicro were informed.

 OK now we have your system specs listed. And something else must be the culprit, because I'm running my Poser 8 under fairly similar conditions (except I only have a dual- and not a quad core)

Also Vista Home Basic, SP1. Also using Vista's built-in firewall.

I use GoogleChrome and not Firefox, but that shouldn't matter. Neither of them is IE.

The thing is: I do NOT have all those problems, and I do not get a load of xml files when Poser is running.

I'm running Poser off an external harddisk, like I've done with all previous versions. It's the only major difference I can see.

Mind you, my install is apparently odd, I still haven't managed to find my Poser.ini for Poser 8 either, and logic tells me it should be there - but it isn't where it should be, nor does a computer-wide search for "Poser.ini" bring it forth.

So perhaps I DO have a lot of .xml files somewhere. Perhaps it's GoogleDesktop, the search thingie, that is broken. I don't think so though, it can find anything else.. but who knows?

Bottom line is, apart from the well-known bugs that are all, as far as I can see, being fixed in SR1, I do not have ANY problems with my Poser 8.

Well except for one that SM ca't replicate either: I can't import an obj with the "Weld identical Vertices" checked. That will crash Poser everytime. It doesn't matter which OBJ it is. The included Poser 8 people's objs will crash it too.

But I can import it to Poser 7 with no problems. 

So.. something is wrong. But as long as I'm the only one having this particular problem, I'm forced to believe that it is something on my end...

 zippy--

Did you reinstall your OS after the SP2 update failed? If not, then you are most likely running on a busted OS to begin with. It's =possible= that the update bombed out and at just the exact point where nothing was damaged, but this is Windows we are talking about. The odds are extremely in favor of the busted update having done things that only an ubergeek, or a reformat and reinstall can cure.

Quote - Try selecting the ground plane and see if the memeory useage drops.
if so, only select cameras and lights when needed until it's patched.
SmithMicro were informed.

Will do, adzan - thank you for the tip.

Quote -
I have Service pack 1. For some unknown reason I find it impossible to install service pack 2, it always gets stuck half way. I have no idea how to fix that.

That would be a problem with Vista and could be the cause of your problems with Poser.

Can someone tell Me why these issues are occuring at all?

 Which issues? That zippy's computer can't install Windows Vista SP2 or what?

Other than that, his problems are exactly NOT common, even if Ockham has a touch of it with his 933 xml files.

Just a thought, but does the Poser sales pitch say that Vista SP2 is 'essential' to run Poser 8?

Or did SM beta test a computer without SP2?

If they don't think it essential, then how can it be the problem? I don't remember having to have a particular Windows SP to run Poser 7.

By the way, I never said there was a conspiracy at SmithMicro. I just meant that any sensible company with a huge investment of time and money wouldn't knee jerk change their software on the basis of only a few problems. That's what I meant by 'reluctant'. Eric and Trekkie are therefore right if I'm the only customer out of the total world sales count who has this slow problem with the P8 library. Kind of makes my computer totally unique!

 Question ... did you attempt to try to install Service Pack 2 BEFORE or AFTER you installed Poser 8?

Also ... you mentioned that your content is installed in the Poser 7 runtime folder. You didn't happen to install Poser 8 content to the same library, did you? That might explain some of the bad behavior.

Quote -  Question ... did you attempt to try to install Service Pack 2 BEFORE or AFTER you installed Poser 8?

Also ... you mentioned that your content is installed in the Poser 7 runtime folder. You didn't happen to install Poser 8 content to the same library, did you? That might explain some of the bad behavior.

I tried installing Vista SP2 as soon as MS notified me to update, which was ages ago, and way before I acquired Poser 8. The service pack always failed at the same point after three attempts, so I gave up weeks ago. I can't manually reinstall the entire system as I don't have the discs, but my system is ghosted so I can wind back to factory install if absolutely neccessary. I have just notified SM of the issue with SP2, and I'm waiting for a response. I must admit it would be interesting to reinstall the system and software bit by bit, seeing which program or utility upsets P8. All my work documents and downloaded software are on separate hard drives.

I always install new software to default locations, so P7 runtime is in default e frontier location, and P8 is in default Smith Micro location. I then simply imported the P7 runtime to P8 library, following the instructions in the manual. It was no different from importing my (uninstalled) P5 runtime into my P7 library. I checked that the P7 and P8 libraries were in the correct locations immediately I first encountered problems with the P8 library.

This is getting interesting:)

 Ah, that's what I suspected.  If the Vista SP2 installation failed, it seems to me that there are other issues with your system that are beyond those of Poser 8.

How old is your hard drive? Is there a possibility that it has some bad sectors somewhere? Something else seems to be amiss. I don't think it's Poser that is causing your computer to act weird, I think it's more likely the other way around.

Vista 32 Home Premium with SP2. (and there's nothing wrong with my system)
I just got through deleting over 50,000 xml files out of this deal.

Users/admin/local settings/ temporary internet files/content.IE5
The xml files are in the cryptically titled directories, and are hidden (as is the content.IE5 directory).
By simply opening and closing P8, 146 xml files were created which showed up upon application close.

I'm wondering now if I caused problems with the P7 runtime by copying and pasting it from a backup drive when I got this new computer. I say this because I then encountered several problems with the P7 library using Poser 7 for the first time, and several files had lost their links. So I then ran the utility Runtime Repair to try and fix those problems, which it did. But when I acquired Poser 8 I found that the P8 library couldn't identify the old rsr pictures files, so I ran Runtime Repair again to convert all the rsr's to png's, and that was fine. But that also seemed to be when I first noticed that the P8 library was starting to crash. Does that help this issue?

Quote - How old is your hard drive?

My system hard drive, also containing the runtimes, is 8 months old.

Quote - I'm wondering now if I caused problems with the P7 runtime by copying and pasting it from a backup drive

I don't think that's the problem.  I use an external HD (or a 64Gb flash drive for the laptops, or more recently, an express card SSD) on a regular basis to copy my library to all of my computers so as to keep their repertoires uniform.  I also used this method to establish a downloads/runtime library for P8 (in the shared docs) on each computer.  I have P7, Pro, and P8 all using the same library without any problem.

Im not a computer expert but if Vista cannot run an update created by the company that both the os and the sp were created by, then the problem may be somewhere in this area.
and i would assume that P8 is also running into the same wall the sp is running into. but P8 is handling it differently. some reason i don't think that it is a small issue that vista wont run it's own update. i would think it would be wise to first find the issue with why the update fail then if P8 continue to behave abnormal sort out that issue.

I think stallion is right. I can't have a computer that can't update Windows. So I'm going to reinstall my whole system and then get the service pack 2 working. After that I shall start with installing Poser 7 and 8 and see if that works ok before installing everything else a bit at a time and see if Poser 8 might start having trouble again. At least then I might have more of a clue of what is going wrong on this computer.

Meanwhile, thank you everyone for your help and patience.

I feel your pain zippy, i had to do a reinstall then reinstall all the other apps ( a real PITA) but it may be the best way to prevent future issues with other apps you may install later on, I hope the sp situation works without fuss and the rest of your ducks line up..
keep us posted
best of luck

I can say with 100% certainty that Poser8 will run on a machine with Windows XP SP3 because I did it myself.

If you still have the product key (usually on a sticker on your machine) you can probably get Vista install disks from MicroSoft. In the past they sold replacement disks for around $10 (including shipping).

Okay, I have my computer back up again and here's what happened:

1. Reset computer to factory settings

2. Downloaded and installed all system updates, including a very recent upgrade for the graphics card. It appears the Vista service packs all installed, too.

3. Installed anti virus and Firefox - No other software

4. Installed Poser 7 + Poser SP3, and copied saved runtime to runtime folder. Poser 7 tested and ok.

5. Installed Poser 8 and hotfix. Internet and computer acces at this point okay.

6) Fired up P8, ok, added P7 runtime. ok.

1. P8 library appears as IE window and indexes FAST.

2. Index ends. Up comes an error message on screen. "There are compatibility problems which will be fixed." Library IE window then dissapears on its own and reapears as a docked pallet, but NO LONGER indexed. Indexing now starts again, only this time extremely slow.

3. I close P8. Computer and internet now takes ages to access, I am met with consistent blank white windows, which stay white for at least 30 seconds until files and internet reapear.

4. I reopen P8, library still running extremely slow. 

5. I exit Poser. Still can't easily access computer and interent.

6. I uninstall P8, computer and internet acces now fully working again.

So you see from item 8 above where the problem starts, and it is the P8 library that triggers it. Apart from what is stated above, there is no other software, or utilities, installed at this point. I cannot use my computer while Poser 8 is installed.

 This is really weird. Did you send those steps to Smith Micro as well?  

Yes, I sent this message off before posting here.

I did as SM suggested and tried telling the antivirus to ignore both P7 and P8 entire folders, but that was no help. SM insist there's no problem with Firefox, so can't be that either. I think that error message was about a Poser compatibility issue with Vista, but I can't remember all the text. I'm pretty sure it didn't mention Poser. As for the library vanishing...it was nothing to do with me!

you did allow P8 through the firewall right?

I had UAC fully working this time. I clicked yes to every message that came up asking permission to continue, or allow.

no, not UAC, the Vista Firewall - they are different things

I've just checked, the firewall is accepting both P7 and P8 executable files.

Hold on a second. Everything was working great, then you got a dialog box "There are compatibility problems which will be fixed." ?!? That's not a Poser dialog. Whatever that was, it made a mistake, and trashed your system. Based on your description of the sequence, everything was perfect until this mysterious piece of software "helped" you by "fixing" something that didn't need fixing.

It would be nice to see a screen shot of that message. Did it, by any chance, say anything about Norton or McAfee?

The last comment by bagginsbill sounds and feels like an attempt to put the blame anywhere else except Poser 8 ..

I am experiencing several similar issues,  i.e. slow internet, Poser crashes when accessing libraries.

AND I AM NOT USING WINDOWS...

Apple  OS 10.6.1  and I am experiecing these exact same issues...

Please WAKE UP...  There are SERIOUS PROBLEMS  with Poser 8..