Quote - Quote - "Sorry, but I don't get into debates like this as I have pointed out my credentials which speak for themself. They are based on known facts and have nothing to do with personal feelings."

You speak as if your knowledge is so great that you know the ultimate truth. You know for sure what countless experts have discussed before and have not agreed on. You are the ultimate expert. Ok.

Quote - "... as I said before, their OS has a better kernal than Windows"
 
Admitting this is true (whatever "better" means in this context...), how does that benefit the normal user? The user doesn't see it. The user sees the "graphical user interface", or GUI. And 96.8% of all personal computers in the world are Windows (95% in USA). So, why even start to get used to a new GUI that so few people in the world use? During the course of a normal life, it's much more probable to accidentaly run into a PC than a Mac (at a future job, at a friend's house, etc). I don't see how having a better kernel (assuming it's true) justifies any choice, when confronted with the power of numbers. Like it or not, Windows is a "de facto" standard, whereas Mac is a deviation, a niche. We all know the disadvantages of going for non-standards.
 
Does having a better kernel could translate into real benefits? For example, speed or security. Regarding speed, there are several benchmarks available that state otherwise. On the same hardware, Vista runs faster than OS X. Regarding security, with the proper care (regular update, antivirus and firewall) there's no advantage to OS X. I had PC's all my life and never had any security problem.
 
 
Quote - "In terms of Vue and 64bit on the Mac, I am hoping Vue 8 will address that."
 
Hope... Is that really a purchase criteria? :-)
 
 
Quote - "However, it's more of having the programming talent in place and the resources to do it because there is no reason it can't be done right now to a certain degree."
 
So, e-on doesn't have programming talent and/or resources?... :-) Somehow, I find that hard to believe. But even if it were true, who could blame them for not investing as much effort for 3.2% of the market as for 96.8%? It's just pure business logic.
Same logic is used by countless other software houses around the world. Take GeoControl, for example. A must-have companion for a serious Vue'er, that doesn't have a Mac version.
So, your sentence is in fact a strong argument against Macs...
 
 
Anyway, regardlessly of which OS or hardware is "better" in the general sense, the thread title mentions "perfect Vue computer". So, general sense is not relevant. Focus is Vue.
Let's see:

• Not taking hope as a criteria, can Vue run on 64 bits in OS X? No. Can it run on 64 bits in Windows? Yes. Is this important for Vue? Yes! Comfortable memory space is fundamental for Vue.
• Does Vista have problems? Yes. Does Vue work great on Vista? Yes, as many people will testify (me included). So, does it matter if Vista has problems? No.
• Is OS X "better" than Windows? I don't know. Does it matter? No, because user can't see it, particularly if he wants to run Vue in 64 bits.
• Does OS X have more authoring and media tools? Yes. Does it matter for Vue? No.
• Is a Mac more elegant than a PC? Maybe. Is that relevant for Vue? No!
• Is a Mac more expensive than an equivalent PC? Yes!! I just went to Apple store and saw the base price for an 8 core was $3299 (with only 6GB). That's just crazy. You could buy a small PC render farm for that price.
• Can a Mac run Windows? Yes. But if we run Windows+Vue on a Mac we actually ended up buying two operating systems: OS X (that we never use) and Windows. Does this sound like good business logic? No.
   

Sorry, but I won't debate this as obviously you have no intent on reading actual facts from other media sources than myself in the points I have made.

FACT: Mac users now take up 12% market share, NOT 3.2% as you quoted. Source, Mac World Magazine, Macbreak Weekly and others.

"So, e-on doesn't have programming talent and/or resources?... :-) Somehow, I find that hard to believe. But even if it were true, who could blame them for not investing as much effort for 3.2% of the market as for 96.8%? It's just pure business logic.
Same logic is used by countless other software houses around the world. Take GeoControl, for example. A must-have companion for a serious Vue'er, that doesn't have a Mac version.
So, your sentence is in fact a strong argument against Macs..."

WRONG: FACT - In order to understand this you must know the way development teams are implemented and work. Most companies, rather e-on or others rarely maintain a full time technical team of program coders. Typically, this means that when a company wants to put out another release and has looked at the market they hire additional programmers to augment at that time. The reason e-on and others would and are investing more now than ever in the Mac platform is because they and other developers know that more serious users are moving to a Mac. The figure you quoted about PC users are largely from the average Joe and NOT the high-end users like myself that make up those statistics.

"Is a Mac more expensive than an equivalent PC? Yes!! I just went to Apple store and saw the base price for an 8 core was $3299 (with only 6GB). That's just crazy. You could buy a small PC render farm for that price."

As mentioned before, you pay for what you get. The Mac can run nearly any OS, NOT a PC. Also, the service with Apple Care is much better and American based support. I don't know of any "render farm" that could be done on that scale. You would need to network at least 2 of those along with a good 16GB of RAM each to produce a farm with good speed. So about $10K should do the job. Note, Leo Leporte is running a 2009 Mac Pro that is going to just sit in his closet for a video server type of system. Price was just north of $5K. Also, that price you quoted on the PC was in fact cheaper as has always been the case with Apple products in comparison. It's like comparing a Ferrari to a Chevy.

It seems to me like I have hit a nerve that is not a-typical of forums on the net when someone tries to explain facts, that have even been reported by many technical news media outlets. As I said before, use what you want, makes no difference to any of us here. I am simply stating known scientific facts that were also backed up by others. All this talk has no regard to personal choice and use as now many times and was ignored, use what you like, it's YOUR MONEY.

Best of luck and happy rendering.

Quote - What is the preferred os (XP, Vista, 32 bit, 64 bit) for a Vue workstation....???

If you are going the Windows route, then the obvious choice is 64 bit Vista for the time being. You want to stay as much as possible in a 64 bit OS and use applications that will take advantage of it along with LOTS of memory. Certainly a Vue workstation would be applicable here. Make sure to upgrade to Windows 7 when it comes out.

Happy rendering.

Quote - For me, Vista Ultimate  64 bit (Ultimate comes with both 32 and 64 bit installers iirc) :)
Despite folk's moaning, Vista works brilliantly for most people.

I must disagree with you in some regard there.

As most tech guys know that have followed this disaster, known as Vista, from the start there were deep problems with this OS version. It has nothing to do with personal choice, but rather the computer code behind it. The Windows OS Kernal has been inferior for some time and Vista didn't help at all. It has been a huge nightmare for Microsoft and is something they wish never came out. Some of that due to mishandling of the product, but mostly due to sloppy code and how the various OS component APIs and such work.

Does Vista 64 bit work OK for most users now? That depends greatly on what you call fixed. I certainly would never say it works "brillantly" though. Yes, they have cleaned up the code some and finally thanks to their service packs it is at least a usable OS for the time being. But it's like trying to fix a car that was considered totaled, you can make it function but there are still issues lurking despite appearance.

This is why Windows 7 is what Microsoft is hanging their collective butts on because they know it can't be the failure Vista was if they want to save their OS from becoming a 3rd rate platform. If you notice one thing, which is what others like Maximum PC, Toms Hardware, TWIT podcast, Tekzilla, etc. have stated many times now and that is Windows 7 is stripped down. Many of the features and components that caused headaches under Vista are not yet implemented in Windows 7. Yes, it is still in beta right now, I'm using the most recent build, but industry insiders are saying it most likely will not ship with most or at least several of them that were deemed problems before. They want Windows 7 to be STABLE and to get that they are stripping it down and slowing adding things to it over long periods of time. This is a smart move for MS as that is the only way to start over and make a better foundation. However, as most have observed, just how stable and useful Windows 7 will be once those components and features start being added is anyones guess. It will have to be done over time even when Windows 7 ships to avoid the Vista issues of the past.

Hope that helps some.

Quote - > Quote -

As I said, you can check my profile and see I am a professional and don't care what someone decides to use because it's their money. But speaking from a purely Computer Science education background, the Mac Pro is truly the way to go.

You keep saying that, and yet you still sound like little more than an apple fanboy.

Sorry, but I don't get into debates like this as I have pointed out my credentials which speak for themself. They are based on known facts and have nothing to do with personal feelings.

Organizing files is a very simple process in Poser. Regardless of Mac or Windows, you simply follow the directory structures you want for your "Libraries" folder.  NOTE, in order for files to load textures properly and geometries, those structures should be left as-is inside the Runtime for that package you downloaded and installed. You can play around with the directory structure of your "Libraries" folder though, so long as you do so inside the sub-folders like "Runtime > Libraries > Pose" There you can make folders such as "V4", "M4" or whatever and organize however you want it.

In general terms I have hundreds of files I work with and also custom made character, textures, etc. So, I make a figure specific folder inside each category like "Pose > V4" then drill down with directories like "Clothing", "Hair", etc. that way I know at a glance to find the figure I am working with (like V4) then what items I want (like hair, pose, etc.)

Hope that helps some.

Quote -  An interesting line of recommendations......

For my part, I have no wish to fan the flames of a Mac vs PC debate............

But what has been, & is, important for me is that the hardware I purchase works as effortlessly as possible: I do not have the knowledge, skills, or inclination to build a machine from component parts with the headache of compatibility, inter-operability, drivers, etc., not to mention issues of warranty et al. Thus, currently, Macs offer the best solution for me - with the added reassurance that the OS & hardware are engineered to work together optimally. PCs of a similar specification to their corresponding Macs are no longer ( to my understanding) significantly, if at all, cheaper (excluding self-build for the reasons cited above).

As we know & lament, e-on do not yet provide a 64bit version of Vue for the Mac: Thus, if you wish to benefit from significant amounts of RAM the options would appear to be...

1. Choose a PC running a 64bit Microsoft OS
2. Choose a Mac & run Vue on an MS OS via Bootcamp (with the hassle of saving to an external drive for file exchange between OSs)
   3) Choose a Mac & run Vue on an MS OS via Fusion or Parallels allowing both OSs to run side by side with seamless transfer of files (my undertanding from the promotional literature).
3. Choose a Mac & see if the soon to be released 'Snow Leopard' version of Mac OSX provides the promised framework for easy programming in multi-threaded 64bit (& e-on take advantage of it) !

Spoilt for choice really!   ☺

As I said, you can check my profile and see I am a professional and don't care what someone decides to use because it's their money. But speaking from a purely Computer Science education background, the Mac Pro is truly the way to go. Apple has a great reputation for their "Apple Care" service and as I said before, their OS has a better kernal than Windows. Also, you can do just like you stated and use Boot Camp to install Windows, Linux or whatever if you want.

In terms of Vue and 64bit on the Mac, I am hoping Vue 8 will address that. However, it's more of having the programming talent in place and the resources to do it because there is no reason it can't be done right now to a certain degree. After all, Modo and C4D both take advantage of the hardware better. It just amounts to getting a team in place to code it, but you are right in that it MAY be somewhat better to do once 10.6 Snow Leopard is out and do it all then.

One word of advice though, do NOT even attempt to do anything major inside an emulator like VMWare Fusion under Windows. The performance hit is VERY large and anything like 3D applications really must be run native using Boot Camp.

Happy shopping and rendering.

Quote -  jeff i haven't noticed any relative path issues with poser imports since the latest vue 7 on my mac
love esther

I have been having much success there too as long as I setup my pose scene inside Poser Pro and save as a ".pz3" then import into Vue 7. However, I have been in talks with them over at e-on and they say the issues are caused by relative paths and Poser but are still working on fixing this with Smith Micro. It seems like some of those issues have been resolved, at least part of them. I'm sure a bug fix will appear in their patch area when they are convinced it is worked out.

Happy rendering.

Quote - OK, I tested out my theory and it works.

Morph Manager will get rid of them. Sorry, I don't know the link of where MM is. A search here will tell you.

Save your figure in your New figures folder ion your runtime.
Open MM and click on Load File.
Now first thing is to load a pose file.
So, change Files of type to Pose Files. Then load any V4 pose. eg ( V4 Fashion 01 )
Now click on the button that says V4 Fashion 01.pz2 and load in your saved figure Cr2.
Now you will have a + sign beside your BODY group.
Open the BODY group and delet the V4 skin realizim kit Chanels one at a time. select, right click, delete.

Save back into your New figure runtime folder or what ever folder you want. Be sure to re-name it so you don't overwrite the original until your sure you want to delete it.

There you go easier than it sounds.

I couldn't find MM here, it is a fairly old program. Also, I work on a Mac platform, but I can use it under Windows so that won't be an issue if a Mac version is not available.

If I can't find it or use it, what about editing the "cr2" as you say in a text editor by hand? That should get rid of them too if you save it back out don't you think? So right now, that may be my only way until this gets reported to "face-off" if they are still around.

Thanks for all the help.

Quote - 3DNeo are you trying to distribute a morph?  Because there are easier ways to distribute a morph where none of this business of material dials is any issue.

No, not at this time. The unfortunate thing is I did not save the "pose character" (i.e. morphs) for the figure first and only have a copy of it that was saved as a full "character". This is why I am trying so hard to get rid of the darn V4 Skin Realism or else I could save it out as morph injection/remove.

Surprising, I found this out and have not see anyone else mention this before. It is a MAJOR hassle dealing with it like this as outlined in the fix above if you did not have a clean copy or morph pose saved before. I wish I knew that as I have 3 figures that way and need to get it back so I can save it as you state.

Maybe "face-off" will look into this and reply, but the artist seems very hard to get a hold of.

Quote - Ah, the V4skin realism kit are material settings by Face-off. If you want to get rid of them just use the no map pose in your V4 folder. Or, go into the material room and select each material group and right click > select all > delete.

Don't know if there is a python script that will do it for you.

Thanks, but those options don't work. I sent an email to "face-off" but have not heard back.

Once that script is applied, it stays there regardless of changing the body mats, even to "mapless" default as you mention above. If you look under the V4 - Parameters - Other menu you will see the V4 Skin Realism dials are all still there no matter what and you don't have the option to delete them as they are grayed out.

All I want is to remove this from my character so it does not load everytime I want to use that character. Any thoughts still?

Quote - I am running Vue 6 Infinite on a 8 Core 3.0ghz Mac Pro. I am thinking of upgrading to Vue 7 Infinite. I was curious if I would get any increase in performance by getting the 64 bit PC version of Vue and running it on Vista through Boot Camp?

Yes, you will, but I don't use Boot Camp because I find it a hassle to have to boot back and forth between the OS and save the files to my external hard drive for access. I found that for me personally, I saved time in rendering, but lost time having to work with the files and switching which was a wash in the end.

I too would LOVE for a 64bit version of Vue for the Mac and hope others will write in requesting it in their next major version of Vue 8.

Also, if you REALLY want to speed things up, you may want to look into doing a dedicated RenderCow, RenderNode, or whatever the 3D company calls it for their software. It basically takes a machine, say a Mac Pro and turns it into a full time render machine off loading the work so you can continue designing. It's only limited by the money you have as you can do several dedicated "farms" if you wanted to and speed was that important for your work flow.

If you would like an informed opinion, my background is in Computer Science and I would be happy to help. Check out my signature and you will see what I am using to design on, it's a Mac Pro all the way. I do NOT debate Windows/Mac as simply I come at it from a science background and use the platform that is the best out there and right now that is the Mac Pro for a number of reasons.

To state what was said above, the Mac Pro will also allow you to run NATIVE Windows OS (i.e. Vista, Windows 7) or even Linux on it since they have moved to an Intel platform some time back. Also, as the saying goes, you get what you pay for and that is certainly the case with Apple. The fit and finish of the Mac Pro are second to none. You do pay more for the hardware, but you can cut back if you know how when ordering. If you go that route, get the stock hard drive and memory and upgrade when you get it. I do recommend HIGHLY though Crucial memory, OWC is OK if you want even cheaper but I stay with Crucial.

Another reason you see somewhat limited hardware specs compared to building a Windows machine is because the Mac OS is designed to run like a fine tuned Ferrari with their hardware. It is certainly one of the most stable and reliable platforms I have used. Also, just look at all the professionals using Macs now and everyone I know that has any computer background has made the switch for many reasons. As I point out, you can run just about any OS you want as well so there really is no reason. Superior support with Apple Care is a plus too and highly recommended as well.

You want to load up on RAM, I would say at least 8-16GB. Yes, Vue does not YET take advantage of 64bit OS and all the extra RAM, however it may in Vue 8 when released. Also, a lot of other 3D software will such as C4D and Modo.

Best of luck and happy shopping.

Quote - Just loaded my upgraded Vue 7 Pro Studio. Wanted to do a quick test render. Loogs good on the screen, but all the images come out black when I render to disk? Never happened to me with Vue 6.
What have I done wrong. I tried .png and .TIFF renders. Nothing but a black image. By the way, this is on an imac g5.

This was a known issue with some of the early versions of Vue 7. I know some of them have not been upgraded yet and believe only the two top versions are current, though I may be wrong. However, I do know the "PLE" edition does not and may not have all the patches applied.

I don't know if this is the case, but be sure to read the Vue support area about the patches as this sounds like the same issue they had early on. It is listed on their bug fixes report.

Hi,

Check out my sig and you will see that I too am working on a Mac Pro platform. I use Poser Pro, Vue 7 Infinite and Photoshop CS4 "Extended" in my work flow. All of the current versions run just fine and very well on my Mac Pro. There are a few known issues with Vue 7 that have been worked out mostly that were Mac related, so be sure to download the latest service update for Vue 7 when you buy it. Also, there is still an import issue related to relative paths and Poser Pro along with a couple of issues involving dynamic hair and dynamic cloths for import. Otherwise, it works just fine and they seem to try and update issues on a decent basis.

You said "And will I get better performance if I run Bootcamp/Vista business with a windows version of vue infinite?"

Not that I know of, but some programs have a slightly better speed on the Windows platform. For example, Cinema 4D is a little better on Windows compared to the Mac version. However, it's not like it is night and day and the very slight increase is not worth the hassle to me to have to save my files to an external drive and re-boot back and forth to and from OS X and Windows. It's not like one is junk or else they would never hear the end of it. It's up to you, but I don't duel-boot for the hassle reasons.

Keep in mind, a LOT of memory is needed. Even though Vue is still a 32bit app, I find it helps a LOT in other areas and of course Photoshop CS4 does have a 64bit version. When doing the type of work we do for 3D art, I would start at 8GB and prefer 10-16GB range. It makes a noticable difference in my work having the memory. Buy a bigger hard drive and get the cheapest one on the Mac Pro, I did and installing a new drive is a piece of cake. Get "SuperDuper" to make a clone of the boot drive and copy from the small drive to the large one in drive bay #2, then swap them and format the small one to use for storage if you want.

BTW, I also HIGHLY recommend a Drobo for your data too, it's great to have the piece of mind.

Hope that helps.

I would agree with the comments, you can do no better than both "asilefx" and "geekatplay.com" as they both have GREAT tutorials. Also, I think it is geeekatplay that has a Vue 7 book coming out as well. Like I said, both are very nice companies.

On thing I would like to see are more from them about Vue and other topics like importing Poser figures and such. Also topics like beginning C4D, Maya and Modo for making models and such would be a big help if they did them.

Have fun, take your time to view them and you will learn a lot from both of those sites.