I've looked at upgrading from P10 as some of my scenes are getting big and a couple of times I've had P10 fall over without of memory issues. This has happened when rendering at times too. I've got round it by saving my scene, deleting some items, rendering it then reloading the original and deleting other bits and rendering again then assembling the lot in Photoshop. This is a chore. I've looked at the comparison chart on the Smith Micro site and it says P11 is 64 bit but the info P11 Pro says 64 bit native whereas the P11 info doesn't. So which is it? I'd prefer to go for the cheaper option as funds are tight.

As I read the system requirements, both Poser 11 and Poser Pro 11 are 64 bit. A 64 bit operating system and CPU are required to run it.

Poser 11 is 64 bit, and it ended problems I had just like yours with Poser 10

you can use decimate to shrink scene size also. if you get a version that has it.

what is "decimate" and what reason would there be to "decimate"? Iunderstand it is to reduce file size...but how does it work with Poser?

P11 (Pro?) "Reduce polygons" - reducing the number of polygons in a figure helps with the Poser preview screen refresh rate making it easier to add more figures to a scene before the UI grinds to a halt. There is also a "Combine Figures" which can also reduce the poly count by deleting hidden polys (eg figure + clothing). Useful for background figures.

Example with SF Kitty - 100% (80K), 50% and 25% poly count.

Reduce polygons = "Smart Polygon reduction". Yes, a Pro feature, but only Poser Pro is now available. "Decimate" is a term I know well, but would never have associated it with "Smart Polygon reduction". I thought the latter was some content-creator feature. Now I know! Poser can do 'decimation' of meshes. Thanks.