Glad you got it working now.

I'm also using Firefox (1.0.4) and have no trouble with thumbnails in freestuff.

IIRC, the thumbnails are not hosted at Renderosity (I know there were plans to allow it, I don't know if it ever happened). If you are using a firewall of some sort, perhaps it is not letting the files through since they are coming from a different website than the one you are looking at (Renderosity).

There is also a setting in the Firefox options (Web Features) for loading images. There is a sub-choice for the originating web-site only. If that is set, it may be blocking the thumbnails.

TC

The 4 computers are/were:

P4 1.8 Ghz XP
AMD 2400+ XP
AMD 2500+ 2000
AMD 1700+ Laptop XP

I think it may have also happened to a P3 933 Mhz running ME. That machine is long gone.

Video boards are various Nvidia and ATI models. The laptop has some no-name integrated video card (maybe ATI chips).

Memory amounts have been 256 up to 784 Mb

It doesn't matter what (if any) other programs are running on the machines. Watching the processor usage shows 97-100% usage by Poser.exe when Poser 4 is the active program, even if nothing is happening. If I click on a menu it drops down to very low usage. If I do a render it drops down to 60-70%. Some dialog boxes seem to drop it down to 0% while others keep it at 100%

The only thing common other than Poser is a Windows NT based OS (but I'm pretty sure the ME machine also did that same thing).

A few years ago, I noticed that Poser 4 runs my processor at 100% just sitting there (the CPU fan sounds like a jet engine after awhile). That could be what you are experiencing. Interestingly, processor usage actually goes down when Poser is rendering. After uninstalling and reinstalling a few times and being ignored by CL Support in e-mail, I posted here about it. I was told that's just the way Poser works. I don't know if versions 5 and up do the same thing or not. I've using Studio for the most part these days. I don't like burning up processors. BTW, This has happened on every computer I've used Poser on (about 4 to date) - all different makes, models, specifications, Windows versions, etc.

--It seems to me that those forums generated more traffic than the majority of the forums here.

-I suspect that the Poser forum has always gotten the lion's share of the forum traffic on this site.

Which is why I used the term majority. Obviously, the Poser and possibly Bryce forums generate most of the messages. Many of the other forums tend to be relatively unpopulated.
Please note the above use of 'many' as opposed to 'all'.

--It is a business, period. It is a business that likes to foster the image of a community, but it is in the end, a business. The forums, galleries, etc. only exist to bring people to the site in the hopes that they will go to the store and spend money. The forums and galleries are marketing tools.

-That might be true -- and personally I don't have a problem with it if this is true.

I didn't say I had a problem with it, either. It does seem that a lot of people using the various forums seem to think this is a community of some sort. That's what causes a lot of the anguish. People have unrealistic expectations because they believe the marketing hype that the 'community' is what counts and the store is a sideline.

--The reason for moving OT posts to a super-secret forum is so they can keep tabs on you. Remember, you do have permanent records here.

-Yes.....I've noticed a black van with a stylized flat-blue "RR" logo painted on its side parked near my house lately.

And a couple of guys dressed in black were connecting cables to the telephone pole at the end of the block.....I asked them who they were. They refused to say. But I could tell by their accents that they were from Nashville.

But I'm just a little too smart for them, you see.......I know what's going on here.

It's got something to do with the Illuminati -- and with the pyramid on the back of the dollar bill.

;)

Now that would just be silly.

Just some observations from a long time member, mostly just lurking.

The name and description of the forum is clear as to the purpose of the forum. Sometimes the moderation is very loose and sometimes it is very tight. It does seem to go in cycles.

You should get over the notion that Renderosity is a community. It is a business, period. It is a business that likes to foster the image of a community, but it is in the end, a business. The forums, galleries, etc. only exist to bring people to the site in the hopes that they will go to the store and spend money. The forums and galleries are marketing tools.

By the way, I think that this is pretty much the same with all the different Poser/Bryce-based sites that contain a store. They are selling products. Some are more mercenary about it than others.

As for the various OT forums being 'unsuccessful', you may need to define the terms for success. It seems to me that those forums generated more traffic than the majority of the forums here. If by unsuccessful, you mean that they could generate controversy, not to mention that they weren't talking about the latest and greatest Vickie texture then I guess they would be unsuccessful.

The reason for moving OT posts to a super-secret forum is so they can keep tabs on you. Remember, you do have permanent records here.

The easiest thing to do to find out is to type some of those in a search engine like google. If you look around, you will find a webpage that will list the common processes and what they do and whether you should turn them off or not. Most of what is listed there are various Windows services that are launched on boot up. Whether they are required or not will depend on your setup (networking, internet, etc.) TC

""Poser versions of all the content" Which most likely means there will be obp's in the bundle...;o)" I would suspect it is most likely in .daz format for Studio to export to Bryce. All in all, I think that it is a good price. It's certainly in line with what I paid for my last upgrade. So is the 50% render speed balanced out by 200% render speed of yellow glass? (just kidding!!) TC

"Still, If I had spent $60 for DAZ's Bryce 5, and then had to spend say $100-$150 for Bryce 5.5, that would feel about right. especially if it was only $100, lol. ;o)"

and

"60 bux for a 250 full version program is a steal. It has been since DAZ bought it."

I think that it is a matter of perspective. You guys have invested a lot more time and money in Bryce then people just starting with it. I paid about $200 for B4 quite a while ago and $100 for the upgrade to B5 back when it was released. So after 4(?) years it wouldn't be a big deal to buy 5.5 at a reasonable price.

I've been using Truespace and have paid for little point upgrades several times so I'm kind of used to it.

However, If I had never used a 3D program or was a Poser user who had just bought Bryce from DAZ, I would be a little ticked if 3-6 months later I had to buy the same program at a higher price to get a faster renderer.

I would bet that the majority of people who purchased Bryce from DAZ thought that they would be getting some kind of deal when upgrades came out.

As for OpenGL, it's pretty, but as Brycetech points out, it will be useless for boolean modeling. It's clearly aimed at the Poser users.

TC

I don't mind them making money off of Bryce. I've had the Corel version of B5 for several years and don't mind paying for 5.5 (depending on the final price of course: if it goes for $300+ like B5 originally came out then I'll likely pass). I expect that it will probably be in the $100 range. That doesn't mean I wouldn't prefer an upgrade path, I just understand why there isn't one. I also hope (and expect) that there will be an upgrade path for B6. I do think that the content bundles are only a good deal for someone just starting. I don't see much advantage in those for longtime DAZ customers or for people who are Bryce only. I also think that if I had just recently bought Bryce from DAZ that I would not be happy at all with the prospect of paying full price for 5.5 sometime in the next 3 months. I suspect that there will be some kind of consideration for those people when the uproar really gets going. TC

Moongoat, no. You get the $30 off if you buy one of the bundles being currently offered. If you don't, then when 5.5 comes out you will pay whatever they are charging. That may change in the future but that's what the DAZ folk are saying at this time. TC

DAZ has stated that there will be no upgrade price to 5.5 for anyone. If you buy one of these bundles they have available now, you can get 30 dollars off whatever the price of 5.5 is when it is released, but that's it. Their reasoning is that they haven't made enough money off of Bryce to justify an upgrade price. I don't necessarily fault them for this but it is disappointing. I begin to suspect that PJF is correct about the future of Bryce. So for those that recently purchased Bryce from DAZ, they will have to buy it again (most likely at a higher price). This isn't sitting too well with a few people posting at the DAZ site. In the past, DAZ has sometimes backed down on things like this if enough people get pissed about it. However, if you have Bryce 5 from Corel, expect that you will be paying the full price (or 30 bucks off) for 5.5. Of course that 30 dollars off will cost you 60 dollars (42 if you are a Platinum Club member) TC

Open up Bryce on one of the machines and open Lightning on the other(s) To start the render, you go to File - Render Animation. Change the output module format to BMP sequence. Set (or Note) where you want the render saved. Click on the little dot next to Render on Network. Then click on Configure. Check the machine(s) running Lightning for the IP address (it's in the box near the top). Add those numbers to the the Client List (or Search) Make sure there is an arrow next to the addresses in the client list and click update. You should get a green dot if the computers are communicating. Make sure there is a check next to Use Host to Render (especially if you are only using two computers) and Tile Optimization. Click the check mark at the bottom and it should start rendering. It will render 100x100 squares on each computer and when done will stitch it all together.

There is a thread at DAZ in the Brycetalk section which addresses this error. You may want to check it out.

The thread is called "Intermittant Loading errors in Bryce"

Apparently sometimes an obj is saved with a text string NaN or #IND instead of a number value in the normals area and that can cause the error you are getting when you import.

http://forum.daz3d.com/viewtopic.php?t=6509 TC

There is one caveat.

You can only put up to 14 .mat files into any one folder.

Any above fourteen are ignored (based on alphabetical arrangement).

Not sure if there is a limit in the number of materials in a .mat file though.

TC