I can't see me doing any CG for a while, I'm blown away by this game. I played Fallout New Vegas for over 1000 hours and am already 125 hours into Skyrim, I just can't put it down :biggrin:

Looks like I'll have some nice new features to play with when they put it on sale in a year's time :laugh:

The ones you can change between Vue versions are installer (.exe) files while the ones you can't change are zip files that you install manually. Changing version is merely so that the installer knows where to put the files, it doesn't mean it will just work with that version. You are licenced to use the files for any version of Vue you own but due to the changes between versions it is unlikely that a file will work on a version of vue earlier than the one it was created on.

I think the main difference is hyperthreading, so the i7 will show as having 8 cores and the i5 as having 4. If you have a version of Vue that supports 8 cores then you would see slightly better performance and if you don't then it's not worth getting the i7. You could also save on your graphics card unless you are a big gamer as it is way overpowered for Vue.

I hate to think how many hours I have spent playing Bethesda games,  considering I have already put more than 600 hours into Fallout: New Vegas the total must be more than a couple of thousand. For me the magic comes from the "user mods", some of which are incredible. New Vegas started off unstable for me too but after adding the 3GB+ mod, sorting my load order out and using FNVEdit to create a merged patch I very rarely have a crash.

I'm really looking forward to Skyrim but I do have worries about the new engine being less "modable". 

 I think that may well be your best bet, its not quite as quick as the full GTX 460 but the differences will not show up in Vue and it uses less power. The areas in which it is cut down (memory bus width and amount of memory) will only tend to show up in FPS gaming and heavy video tasks so it should suit you perfectly. I personally would prefer the full GTX 460 but that's because I enjoy gaming as well as 3D graphics.

The performance of the GTX 465 falls between the cut down GTX 460 and the full GTX 460. Its based on the older and larger GF100 GPU, which is the same as the GTX 470 and GTX 480. While this might sound like good news it does mean it uses a fair bit more power than the GTX 460. Also, the GTX 465, 470 and 480 are based on yields and the 465 gets what is left after the two more powerful cards in the series have taken all the best GPUs. The lower rated GPU is then hobbled so that it can only use 11 of the 16 SMs (streaming microprocessors) while it's bigger brothers use 14 and 15 respectively. The biggest problem with this GPU is the sheer size of it, those 3 billion transistors burn an awful lot of power and put it out as heat.

If you can pick up a GTX 465 at an appreciably cheaper price than a GTX 460 then go for it but I would personally still prefer the GTX 460 as it is a better card.

I've seen the cut down version of the GTX 460 (192 bit bus) for as little as $145 with a rebate and GTS 450 will run you between $130 and $150 (newegg prices) - The 192 bit bus width GTX 460 will easily beat the GTS 450 in any test so why buy it?

If you are only going to use it in Vue then you may not see any differences as they both use the same base technology (460 uses 7/8 of a GF104 GPU and 450 uses a GF106 GPU, which is basically half a GF104) and support the same versions of DirectX and OpenGL. On the other hand, they will both use the same drivers so any problems seen with the 460 will also be apparent in the 450.

I just don't see the 450 as being a good buy, not with the prices for the cut back version of the 460 being so attractive. Also, just because the current versions of Vue don't push the limits of these cards, it doesn't mean to say that future versions will do the same. If a future version of Vue were to utilise the GPU power for processing then there is a gulf between these cards, with the 460 waltzing ahead by some 50%. With that in mind I know which one I would go for.

 Sorry to hear about your woes, it sounds to me like it was just bad timing. I took the plunge last Friday and upgraded from Vue 7 Complete to version 8 and the only problem I had was my card being declined by my bank. Turns out it was just my bank being overly paranoid and a quick(ish) confirmation phone call to the fraud department smoothed that out. You'd think they would be used to international payments in this day and age. After that I just re-submitted my payment and the download was nice and quick with no errors.

E-on should be used to this scenario, it happens every time they have a major new release. The obvious answer is to provide some temporary extra servers at the datacentre just to get them over the initial downloading frenzy. That way normal business could continue as, well, normal. :-D

Roughly an nVidia 8800GT = 9800GT = 250GT
The 9800GT was a renamed version of the 8800GT and even some 250GT's were renamed 9800GT's.

Neither the 9600GT nor the GT 240 can really be considered as upgrades as they are both slower than the 8800GT.

Good upgrades would be...

GTX 260 which has a big increase in pixel fill rate, bandwidth and processing power but is limited to OpenGL 3.3 and DirectX 10.0

GTX 460 (1024MB)  which is not only insanely fast but also supports OpenGL 4.1 and DirectX 11. The cheaper 768MB version is not as powerful as it has a narrower memory bus which affects the pixel rate and bandwidth, though you can make big savings if you shop around.

I am still using a 9800GT but if I could afford one I would get the GTX 460.

 Ummm, his gallery is still there

Another Welsh ex-electronics engineer here but in my 900 case (literally) I do use a vacuum nozzle (lol). I've been out of the industry a long time now, so maybe that's why I do such daft things - though the only hardware losses I've ever had have been due to Texan thunderstorms (vicious) and the amazing self destructing IBM Deskstar (should have been Deathstar) hard drives.

Down here in the south we had the LG plant, biggest factory in Europe at the time, so it was a shame LG pulled out before they even moved in, leaving the tax payer with a colossal factory and an even bigger bill. Thanks to the Welsh development agency grants we had all of the big far eastern electronics companies here, plus Bosch and a few other big names but once the grants dried up they started disappearing - not much left now.

 SilverBlade: For the same reasons as you (severe pain in most of my joints) and the UK weather since October, I've done very little in the way of Art but like you I lost myself in PC gaming. I played ME and ME2 back to back, which was a real blast and have done the same with the STALKER series (1-3). I also bought Bioshock (gotta love Steam) but have so far avoided it's sequel as I don't like what they've done with it. Unless the weather improves dramatically I'll probably dig out Fallout 3 and the addons as I haven't played that in over a year. 

 I had that same message when I had an ATI 3850 video card, it just means that the card isn't on their supported list but it works fine.

 I took the one way step of sidegrading from 6 Infinite to Complete when it was first released and I can't say I have regretted doing so. The upgrade costs for the Infinite line became prohibitive and as I don't see my finances improving in the foreseeable future I went for the cheaper option. I don't find Complete to be a hindrance to my workflow and have found the differences to be either trivial or those that I don't use anyway.  Its sad that I had to give up my rights to ever upgrading back to the Infinite line but unless I were to win the lottery there is no way I could afford to do so anyway - Trouble is, I don't do the lottery (lol).