hi there, i have noticed with my latest image that when i zoom in it is very pixel dotted - as if when it has been rendering little dots appear as if the image has little dots of "ink" missing from the final image. has anyone else ever had this and how do you combat it? thanks.

Can you post a screen capture of what you mean?  Also can you post a screen capture of your render settings?

"It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good
heart whatever they might have to say." - Ghandi

sure here they are - thanks for your help.

and heres the settings-

I don't know why you want to zoom in on whatever it is that you are rendering, but perhaps try these render settings.

The bucket size is variable and can be adjusted by values of 8 if you need to lower or increase the value.

"It is good to see ourselves as others see us. Try as we may, we are never
able to know ourselves fully as we are, especially the evil side of us.
This we can do only if we are not angry with our critics but will take in good
heart whatever they might have to say." - Ghandi

Try:

• MinShadingRate: 0.2 is a very popular setting here but I usually use 1
• Pixel Samples: 9. Will be pretty slow but edges will be very smooth
• Post Filter Size: 4
• Post Filter Type: Sinc. Your image will be very crisp; Gaussian / 3 will look more like film

There is a huge anti-filter bias in the forums, so most people leave theirs set at Box / 1, which is about the worst filter setting you can use especially since you can't turn off the filter. Blurs everything indiscriminately.

One other thing you might check on is the texture itself. If it's supposed to be a solid color then open it in any image software you may have and zoom in on it several times to see if you notice any spotiness or dots or weired pixels.