If your not in a hurry CS4 should be out around Oct 1st  will be 64bit and will enjoy a speedboost if your running a gen 8 or 9 nvidia card.  It'll be taking advantage of the gpu's from that point on.

Depends on how you promote your storefront.  If you just leave it up to people finding your items through a broad search query well good luck on that.  You can start out with the free one and give it a try to see if you should bump up to a paid store if you can generate sales .    Just grab the templates they have and match your works to them and give a few items a shot.  Think most are 200dpi then the various sizes per item.  Doesn't hurt to give it a shot anyways with the free one.

A Small Orange has decent packages www.asmallorange.com  either shared or full vps and you'd/ your friend would use full cpanel administration to setup and run the site/sites.  Relatively small so easier to get in touch with tech support etc.  Been with them since late 04 or 05.

The head is about 10-15% too large from when I messed around with 4, so goes without saying the eyes would be too large also.  Pretty much they slapped a babies/preteen head on a somewhat womans body as a base.

Looks like Crysis to me from what I played of the demo.  Basically in a suit that has selectable abilities whichit was really metalmuscled out on the outside of it. 

Yep that'll happen if your refresh rate is too low.   Or since you said you ran a trinitron you might have been annoyed by the wires holding the grill up on the screen and never knew it. 

Problem is some people have it in their heads that they have to get every new version of a program whenever it's released even when the old version works perfectly well. 

Quote - FEAR!!! I read this frantic speculation and i see alot of FEAR
(On the part of some not all)

How Many Here have a runtime that exceeds 10 GiGS??
not including all the unopened zips of "poser content"
hoarded over the years
If there was no future versions of poser what would it mean to you
as a practical matter?? in your real life...Honestly
No more renders??
will all your existing content just "expire and stop functioning??

IMHO The basic functionality is Poser for still rendering has not really changed
since the poser5 yes there have been some slight enhancements to the materiel room but thats about it
the character animation tools have  have been stagnant since poser4
Any other Feature that you might be waiting for in poser  8-9-10
already exists in other programs.

I have stopped at poser-6 as I see no reason for another version of it
I dont have this  "concern"  I see expressed here about there not being future versions of ANY software package
Adobe is at Photoshop CS3 Im still using Photoshop CS1 no problems No **FEAR
**
Macromedia is defunct Adobe Now owns Flash.

 Im still using Macromedia Flash MX No problems No FEAR
Apple is on Final cut Pro6 im making money with Final cut Pro4 no problems
 No FEAR
Maxon is on Cinema4D 10.5

Im incorporating 3D Media  into my Video  work from Cinema4D 9.5  No problems
No FEAR.

Heck Sanctumart Killed off the RDL7 Sci fi sets and offer ZERO support for existing users
yet I still create renders with it no problems No FEAR
I could go on and on listing applications I use that are not the latest version that still are quite viable.
My freelance clients dont care what version im using to produce the result they are paying for

Relax  be creative and use what you have already aquired creatively .
use your imagination Dont be to bothered about the Future of software programs that you cant Control anyway.

Cheers

Quote -

You know, I wonder why Daz wasn't the preferred buyer of Poser if Poser was going to be sold at all? That would have made sense all the way around. It's purely speculative but I wonder if Daz was offered Poser but they refused?!

• Rick

Daz used up their plat club voucher and didn't want to pay the full price this month.

Has a Jamie Lee Curtis look to her.

No matter how much makeup you slap on her V4 is a pig.  I stated the same when it was released and still think it the few times I try to get enthused about loading it up to look again every couple of weeks.  Even went and fell for the sham of Alice as the last resort of trying to get enthused about it but still looks horrible when loaded.  I came to the conclusion one night and started calling her the Lois Griffin character since she's got a out of proportioned head to body.  I'll take a good V3 facial/body morph over any of the V4 ones anytime.  Lastly  take it for what it's worth but the other night I figured I'd go through and hit the for sale/clearance area of the MP and notice a bunch of V4 items already in the clearance bin. 

Quote - > Quote - Memory speed shouldn't matter as much as in the raw processing of the chip.  While I love my X2 if I was buying a new box right now I'd look at a core 2 duo or the quad core, well its' 2 c2d cores glued together but thats another debate for another time, one depending on your budget.  

That's exactly what I've heard about the new quad core CPU, it's a 2x2 cores and not a true quad core, may be a while before Intel introduce a true quad core CPU.

So if the raw processing speed of the CPU matters, what about the Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz and above?
Does overclocking of CPU helps?

What about the performance of video cards, do they matter in regards to the rendering speed?

No the core 2 duo's are a much better generation of processors over the old P4 cores.  Far more efficient than the old ones were.  They are to the point where i'd consider buying another intel system again and i've used amd's for the past 4-5 years with a X2 as my current build.

Memory speed shouldn't matter as much as in the raw processing of the chip.  While I love my X2 if I was buying a new box right now I'd look at a core 2 duo or the quad core, well its' 2 c2d cores glued together but thats another debate for another time, one depending on your budget.  

Here's a breakdown on DDR2 speeds to cost and what would be best in particular builds
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=28&threadid=1966035&enterthread=y

I looked at the plat club previews and looks like I'll be saving alot of money.  Wasn't impressed with it at all from the base model or any of the vendor previews.  Looks like a bad aiko head, well aiko is bad anyways but i digress, on a smaller v/sp frame.

Gamut/color depth is the reason to stick with a CRT.  If your just doing web work well maybe the LCD's are better for you.

Fast response times on panels usually indicates 6bit panels which are far cheaper to produce along with only testing grey to grey speeds. Look for a decent 8bit panel or higher and you'll shoot the price up.  Think I saw a eizo 20 or 21 rated at 14 bit for around 1600.

Why the decline of crt's to lcd's?  Price to profit.  The panel manufactures can keep releasing revised versions and push them into the market at the same price point of a panel from 6 months ago. Plus longevity of a crt to a panel.  A good CRT will last you 10 years can you say the same about a panel one?

Card readers/hubs/speakers on lcd's, you buying a monitor or a hub?  Last I checked most modern motherboards come with 6-12 usb 2 ports and 1-2 firewire ports not including add-in cards or external cheap hubs you can daisychain.

Quote - How do you feel about the fact that Poser 6 paid users have to pay the same price to upgrade to Poser 7 as those that got Poser 4 or 5 free or paid for an earlier version of Poser but didn't fork out any money to upgrade until Poser 7?  I feel it is shameful of a company to treat its paying customers this way and it would be shameful of me to not say anything.

Depends how you view it.  Should a p6 user be pissed off that another user found p4 and p5 enough to satisfy their needs?   I went from 2 to 4 to 6 now should I be ashamed that I never bought 3 and 5? or pro pack?  Should I feel bad that I never used 2 and 4 execept maybe for 2-3 days total in the time they were out for varying reasons since I found them lacking?  Should I be pissed off at Daz after buying Bryce 5.5, which remains unopened still, back in january that they offered it for free or for around $10 recently?  Shoud I be thankful I only bought that pos hexagon 2 for the 1.99 intro cost instead of full price?   That answer is a resounding yes. 

Last I checked both companies were in business to generate a profit to stay in business via software sales.  Software upgrades are the greatest scams ever created since somehow people get it in their heads that once a new version is released their old one needs to be replaced no matter how well it works for them.  I suppose I  miss something in a eula along the way stating everyone from a point on now that you bought a version of software from said company must continue to buy every update and new version.

The only disrespect they could show their user base is to not have a upgrade option at a reduced price while jacking up the new versions price.  Noone is holding a gun to your head to buy it I guess is what I'm saying.