Hey all,

I'm thinking about getting P5 in the next couple of weeks. ;O)

Anyhow, I was wondering about all the P4 content i have installed. Mostly freebies, but a few bought items as well. I was wondering about how I was going to have to get all that 'stuff' into Poser 5.
Will I have to 'move' all of it into the P5 directory structure or does P5 allow you to 'point' to existing libraries.
I've caught a few posts and such telling of a 'new' library structure with new names to a few directories. Am I going to have to 'reinstall' the commercial items I have?
I've also noticed posts stating that some P4 content is not working properly in P5. Is this mostly affecting the 'freebies' or are there commercial items affected by this also?
I'm going to get P5 anyway, but I would really like a heads-up on these issues. I appreciate your time in helping me figure this out.

proteus

Prtoteus, No need to reinstall anything. P5 allows you to acquire anything from your P4 runtime folder. In fact, I typically still install everything non-P5 specific in my P4 runtime and use the new folder system to retrieve it from there. (This allows me to still use them in P4 when I want to use it--typically to do speedy renders which don't need to be raytraced as P4 is less taxing on the system.) I hope this helps. --lb

Oh btw, Most stuff works in P5; however, some of the new features in P5 (such as the face room) only work on P5 figures. A few glitches still make a few items (like the DAZ Hydra most recently) act funny. But I don't think these glitches are either systemic or permanent. Good luck. --lb

This sounds good to me. So what you're saying is that Poser 5 automatically locates your P4 Runtime Libraries. This is just great man. Perhaps I'll speed up my P5 aquirement a week or two now that I don't have to dread moving/reinstalling all this stuff.
I was wondering if this issue would be addressed by CL.

Thanks for clearing up this issue for me lordbyron.

...Thy Godlike crime was to be kind,
To render with thy precepts less....

Prometheus-Lord Byron (1816)

I've had no trouble with Poser 4 content, but one caveat to the multiple Runtimes thing - the Geometries apparently need to exist in your P5 Geometries folder, so I just installed everything in the Poser 5 runtime. That's my only complaint is the additional Runtimes don't seem to be a "full" Runtime directory...

silver, I haven't needed to move any geometry folders. What were your circumstances? --lb

Attached Link: Linking Your P4 Runtime in P5

You just link your Poser 4 runtime to Poser 5, tutorial at the link above. You don't have to move any geometries or textures, but I'd strongly suggest that you run CorrectReference on your P4 libraries to get rid of pathnames that reference specific directories and hard drives. P5 is very literal when it comes to looking for textures and geometries and if the pathname says that the geo/tex is in D:mystuff, then it had better be there. CorrectReference is in freestuff.

I'll second Jelisa. don't start moving things around, just link to your p4 runtime(and don't move that folder either) her other suggestion is good too, CorrectRefrence will cure a lot of those texture not found popups.

lordbyron, when I created a new Runtime structure from within P5 (this is a fresh additional Runtime, not the P4 one) it gave only the Libraries folder and it subfolders - no textures or the other folders from the root of the Runtime dir. The P4 one however was fine, since it already had it's geometries folders, etc. Maybe I need to play around with it some more?

Silver, the first Item you install, will install the geometry and texture folders for that runtime (assuming they use those folders)as long as the item is set up already in a folder structure. just unzip it into the new folder(which holds your new runtime)just as you would into the P4 folder.