Hi, I honestly have almost 800+ GB's of poser content, V3/A3/M3/D3/H3 not much Girl. Then V4 (*and with her A4/G4/M4/Freak4... creature Morphs and everything else!)happened and I went insane buying so much content that now I am so over-bloated, I am at a loss as to how to really sort it all. I have always used outside RT's, but with the advent of EXP at Daz, I now have a LOT sitting actually inside of my Poser RT folder (*C:Poser).

How does the majority of you keep your RT's sorted? Stored? (*I have 3 1TB externals and 1 2TB external) But I am becoming concerned after the crash last month how to best re-install my RT's.

I have considered putting the Gen 3 characters into one RT. And the Gen 4 in another. I am also considering seperating V4 from everything else, as she seems to have most of the EXP content. This does not include all of the Elite stuff I picked up at the last daz sale(s).

One thing I was told by Tech at daz is that V4 will find any other open V4 anywhere on the computer and that can cause discrepencies and conflicts. I know that D/S does search for content, and I have PP2010 and Adobe Air also might do the same thing (*I'm not sure). DOES ANYONE KNOW THIS ANSWER? Does it count if it is zipped? But I need some real advice on how best to sort this (*mess that I love) whole thing the best way. Until EXP, I only loaded the "Base" figures and morphs.

Oh and one last thing. I love poser, but I am not as techy as many of you here. Please do not be snarky or rude about my question. I don't like or do code. It is difficult to understand for me. Heck if I knew how to do that I could do my own character(s) packaging!(*seperate issue but could use help in making CR2's and such) But I know enough that I need to get my files into a better system now.

I honestly can't believe how much I own! I have almost 1500 orders (*that's orders with up to 10-15 products!!!) just here alone! Not to mention Daz, Xurge, SanctumArt, the old PoserPros and of course rdna!  YIKES! I have thousands of products! AND most of them I use!

I do sort by Vendor (Aery Soul/Rhi/DM..etc), and by character too. Hair is an enity unto itself (I do be a Hair Whe LOL! Can't have enough!). o0

So could someone help me to create a new system/structure? What works for you? I would like to know because I have to re-install all of it over the next few months... :P
Best to do it right once.

Thank you all very much for your help in advance.
HugZ!
Ariana 

  

 

Is there water in your future or is it being shipped away to be resold to you?
Water, the ultimate weapon...
www.futurefantasydesign.com

Well - on my "bigboy" machine, which has to do most of the work, I've got 10 runtimes. I know for sure, that my "Poser7leftovers" RT has a V4.2 installed, as well as my "Poser7ProWrecks" and my "P2010StuffThatIDoNotNeedContinously" and the "P2010OwnFinishedProducts" and "P2010StuffThatIAmWorkingOn" as well. No problems so far.

Besides that, I have 2 RTs for one regular customer I do the most Poser-related work for and one each for hair, clothes and 3rdPartyTesting.

So, I do not experience any conflicts with more than 1 V4.2 installed. But I'm pretty sure that just ONE installation of the Daz People in 1 dedicated RT would do as well, I am using in almost every case the "P2010StuffThatIAmWorkingOn"

All over it's app. 4.8TB (incl. my original texture sets in *tif format) That's on the main machine, and a 3h time-delayed auto-backup of those folders is on the file-server. My render-machines have no RTs at all.

Everything is under Win7Ux64 (Ultimate by a different reason, any Win7 will do, and will do better than WinXP - believe me, I know... I also recommend x64)

I went through several re-installs during the last two years, and in your case I would recommend to split by any logical tags (logical for you, not for anybody else, it's your compi...)

If you are using cheap harddisks, be prepared to replace them without bigger hazzles once per year (I went from 250 a couple of years ago to 500 and last year to 1TB, but never used anything else but RaidEdition 24/7 HDDs, and yes, WesternDigital.

So if you want to set up just 1 system:

a VelociRaptor 300 or even 150 GB for the system
(I'm using a 600 in my main system, but that has other reasons than Poser)
a stack of 3 2TB RE4s
at least one free slot for an addtl. HDD when you're going to change one of the original HDDs
would be a good choice, and

an external solution (a cheap PC or a NAS, where PC is what I use except for my music collection, but that's private fun) to have at least the possibility for one full backup. I use a MiniTowercase with a handle, and it stands backside to front, so I can disconnect it from the KVMSwitch-/Network-/Power-cords and just carry it with me, if required. My other machines are just to big and heavy to be "quickly evacuated in case of emergency". The "portable" one is the one that has all Backups, incl. a copy of the other machines System Backup files, on it.

And, of course, an application that actually DOES the back-ups and is able to perform a system-backup/restore. I am using ReuschTools, but I fear, there is no english manual for this at this point (it's my choice, because it proofed more than once on my own installations that I can have my system running after re-installing Win7 in less than 75 minutes.)

Before you start to set up your new poserWorldOrder, think about getting a duplicate file finder (but be careful when deleting stuff ... searchpaths are fine, findpaths are better when it comes to RTs ;-}

That's about all, what I have to tell about my paranoia... ;-}

Concerning the cr2 creation: feel free to sitemail me.

www.skin2pix.com

First... Thank you! For the detail, the break down and the insight!!!

I am soon to upgrade to a new machine after tax time (*April) and should purchase in June. I am going to ahem build my own system! Newegg gonna love me soon!!!

I currently have a Optiplex745 MiniTower, Win XP Pro, 32 bit, good CPU and 4 GBs ram... can't wait for a machine to keep up with me! :P

I have 1 500GB Buffaloe case (*w a Seagate Internal) external HD, 3 Seagate Extreme 1TB HDs, and 1 brand new 2TB Go-Flex. Since the HD that crashed was 3 years old I am not soured on Seagates.

So on the new system my priorities are Power Source (*at least 600-800 watts), CPU and Graphics card. Then MB and case. I have a few ideas... I am a nervous neally and like the Dell warrenty. But the crap systems they make is my main reason to go it alone. God help me...

OK so back to the RT...
I want to put all of the Gen 3 content on one of the TB HDs. And put the Gen 4 on the other. Back up both on the 2TB, leve the third for artwork. The 500GB I use to download since I rarely install immediately after purchases.

And you are secure that this supposed V4 issue is not what may have caused the crash? Because I was sort of led to believe this. I do not trust searh software as I am awful (*until now) about how I install... truthfully I was appalled at how many downloads of the same files I had! :/

Lastly, can I site mail you this weekend? About the CR2/Pacaging question? I have to go to Reno tomorrow and it is already snowing here. So I need to go to bed and be rested for the trip (*120mi round trip). Thank you for the offer and help in advance.

I am off to bed now. Sorry I too too long to answer I was downloading.

HuggerZ!
Ariana

Is there water in your future or is it being shipped away to be resold to you?
Water, the ultimate weapon...
www.futurefantasydesign.com

Building a PC by yourself is no rocket-science, even I can do that: throw everything you ordered in the case an shake until it works. (Will happen even faster, if you open the boxes before you throw everything in). No seriously, no problem at all.

Your existing machine would make a pretty good backup-server...

The V4 issue: I can only say, that I have never had a problem, with the situation being as described above.

And I sitemailed you concerning the cr2 thing.

 

www.skin2pix.com

To be brutally honest, if you have so much content installed, I would seriously doubt that most of that is utilized on a regular basis.  The issue here is maintenance, and the ultimate solution would be databasing your content and only installing what you absolutely need for your current project and uninstalling them afterwards.  If you don't use the content within 6 months, chances are you may not need it.  Probably not what you would like to hear, but may be true. 

I maintain a database, organized by several categories.  I, also, have several RT's organized by categories.  Content is installed by need and usage only, although most DAZ characters occupy one main Poser folder.  Once I am done with a specific project, the content will linger for a time before I retire it indefinitely.

G'Morning hborre,
I am currently on my way out to Reno! I understand what you are saying, and of course I do not use everything everyday! :) That is why I have outside RTs... ;)

But I do use Surreality products on a more regular basis and those are mixed EXP tech, and standard RT. The standard are kept outside of poser. But as daz keeps developing more products that are EXP I find more and more content in poser then I would like It also forces me to instal all of the base RTs which I was hoping to learn how to avoid from now on.

I have to run, but I will be back this evening (*Reno is a hundred and twenty mile round trip!) and will post more thenn! :)

HugZ!
Ariana

Arcebus I see your site mail but I have to scoot! :) I will reply  in a few hours from now!
HuggerZ!
Ariana

Is there water in your future or is it being shipped away to be resold to you?
Water, the ultimate weapon...
www.futurefantasydesign.com

I have to agree with hborre. I recently went to P8 from P5, and I just started over. Each item I'd used in the past I've kept, if necessary. The question for each is 'am I really going to use this?' I didn't have 800GB (heck, I don't have that much of anything, even with 3 CD cases...;), but anything that didn't run right, or came up with empty folders, didn't get loaded. Some characters didn't get reloaded, and having 60 hair colors for every hair out there (the same 60...;) wasn't as important.

But hey, I'm a guy...;)

Unless you're just constantly churning things out, it's kinda likely that you'll have plenty of stuff that never gets used. Add stuff as you need it, make backups of the zips and rars, etc. Heck, even uninstall things if you don't plan to use them again.

I created a database in Access to track my stuff, and it blew up (apparently, you can't make an Access database larger than 2gb) just trying to track 40 or so Gb.

So simplify, simplify, simplify...

 

 

I wish I'd said that.. The Staircase Wit

anahl nathrak uth vas betude doth yel dyenvey..;)

I have not installed any of the DAZ3D content to my Base Library. All have their own Library. There has not been a requirement since Poser 4 that Content be installed into the Main Library. Since Poser 7 (7.0.4.220) there has not been a requirement that the Main Library be in the Program Files with the Poser Program File.

If you are using Vista or Windows 7, it is best if the content not be in the Program Files folder or even in the Main Program Folder.

 

 

ratscloset
aka John

Always use external hard media to archive your content Zips, Rars, and Exe installers.  And use a cataloguing software to find them quick and easy.  Then you can re-install when you need.

I burn to DVD or CDRom.  Better to lose 4GB of data if one DVD is destroyed, than all 100+GB stored on one external hard disk drive.

(My recent experience with corrupted files on my personal and private Amazon S3 cloud storage, also informs me that it is WA-AY too early for me to store my precious content online.  Not to mention that many digital content providers may need to update their ToU to reflect the movement towards cloud storage options.)

 

Eternal Hobbyist

 

I had 2 hard drives fail in one year. I understand your pain.

I now have 2 internal hard drives and 1 external backup drive. All my programs go on the main harddrive. All my content (installed & zipped) go on the second internal hard drive. And I back it all up to an external backup drive.

I first bought a 1TB Western Digital external backup drive but it's software failed to work properly with Win 7 even after the WD patch I downloaded, so now it's just a dumb external harddrive. Then I bought a 1TB Seagate external backup drive that purrs along nicely. However I notice since adding the external backup drives my PC takes longer to startup and shutdown.

If your getting a new PC then go Win7 Pro 64bit so you can pile on a lot of RAM upto whatever you motherboard has slots for. Also the Pro version of Win 7 gives you backward compatibility to 32bit programs.

I have one Runtime which is subdivided by categories such as:

Animals

People

Scenery

Vehicles

Weapons

and so on.

I find it fairly easy to navigate around and maintaining the structure is simple enough, as I install things of similar types at any one time, then organize them before installing anything else.

I doubt that installing a minimum of content would work for me, since I often use things not usually associated with each other in the same project.  In any case, if I don't have an item installed, I'd probably forget I had it.  :)

The only things I uninstalled/deleted are freebies I have no use for, self created items that I've updated and a couple of bought things which I no longer use.

Coppula eam se non posit acceptera jocularum.

My Store

My Gallery

I found that lots of runtimes became too much of a headache to keep track of and switching between them on pre-P8 versions too slow.

Soooo, like SamTherapy, I keep everything in one runtime - and that's now Poser's own. It's not just because of the whole exp thing but also because some Python scripts need to find items in their default location.

The primary subdivisions are fairly basic:

Human

Fauna

Props & Places

Toons

The Human catagory is then subdivided by family (ie DAZ/e-frontier generations), and then by figures. Within each human figure there are further simple subdivisions.

For Character: Figure, Body Props (such as creature creator, wings, etc) and Clothes (subdivided into Modern, Historical, Fantasy, etc).

For Poses: Characters, Injections,Body Props, Clothes (further divided into the same catagories as the clothes character files), Magnetize, and Poses.

The Fauna get divided into Fantasy (which is further divided into Dragons, Ogres, Nursoda, Smay, aliens, etc), Robots, Domestic, Mounts, and Wild (divided into Aquatic, Bugs & Insects, Birds, Reptiles, Simians, etc).

Props and Places are divided into Modern, Historic, Fantasy, Other Cultures, Environment. Modern is then divided into Exteriors, Interiors, Furnishings, Vehicles, Weapons, Props. There are further divisions from them.

It takes a little while to set up but is well worth it. And once it is done it is done and easy to maintain. I maintain three copies of the runtime. One is Poser's own and so in the internal hard drive, the second is on the back up of my external drive, and the third is on my laptop.

The steps to maintaining these are fairly easy. Once my initial runtime was created, I made an empty runtime with all of the catagories that I had created, this empty template was then put into a zip folder. When I'm ready to install my purchases, I simply unzip the template to a temporary folder and install the content to that. Next I run a simply runtime repair utility (optional, I guess). Now I start to move the items into their correct catagories, copy the result to the external drive, the internal runtime and then move it to a usb stick to transfer to the laptop.

It all sounds long winded but it is simple in practice and means that I can find what I need and sleep secure in the knowledge that if anything goes wrong, there should still be one working copy of the runtime to rescue me.

I feel your pain in so many ways. I have an over-abundance of content myself, with currently about 150gb in my main runtime and another 50gb in a secondary runtime.  I have never been so great at organizing.  I too hate coding, scripting, programming, etc... and have learned just enough of some of it here and there to get buy at some tasks. Here are things I have tried and still do to try to keep organization - though time consuming.

1. I was still using Poser 4 Pro Pack up until 2007, mainly to maintain Lightwave compatibility.  The biggest drawback is that you can not have more than 255 items in any section of your runtime or folder, and it does not recognize subfolders beyond the first set.  I easily exceed the 255 item limit, and had a lot of trouble loading content for the longest time (until I started using a third party library manager).  I would go through windows explorer and manual regroup items within the runtime - good old copy paste.  Putting as many M3 items as i could in one folder, grouping them by rough Genere (i.e. M3 SciFi Clothes, Sets - Urban, Sets - Fantasy, Aircraft, etc...).  The first time I re-organized this way took about 12 hours, and depending on how much content I installed in between could take 1 to 4 hours per update.  Very time consuming, and I occasionally ended up with duplicate CR2s when installing updates etc...  Then after I started using Advance Library Manager I got lazy and let over a year, and several hundred product installs go by - so my runtime is a mess.  I still sort of use this method, but with a twist now.

2. I read in another forum a trick that I rather liked, and adapted to fit my own method - that is to install new content to an external runtime named for the content or figure type. You would create a seperate runtime on a part of your HD easy to find (great when using USB devices for runtimes) for each figure or theme of content ( Michael 3, Victoria 3, Michael 4, Sci-Fi Sets, Fantasy Sets, etc...).  Under the recomendation these would then simply be loaded as external runtimes - but I prefer to then go into these runtimes and further streamline the installed folders to match pre-established folder groups from my method 1 above - then just merge this new runtime in, pre-organized.  This saves a lot of time in adding/organizing new content, as when editing these external runtimes, I already know what has to be moved to which folders, and don't have to hunt through my overly massive runtime for the new content.

3. In about 2005/6 ish I discovered a program called Advanced Library Manager, I like the interface about 1000 times better than any version of Posers interface. It is very customizable, though it can be a pain to set up initially (once you get the hang of it it's a snap).  On the downside, with particularly large runtimes, sometimes content seems to become "lost" or not show up in it, not sure why, but then the versions supporting Poser Pro and Poser 8 are beta only.  It is still worth the occasional problem, as it has made searching through my runtime a snap (with thumbnails on the left, and folder tree for ALL categories on the right you can just scroll down through the folders one by one and look at the thumbs until something catches your eye, or you see the content you are looking for.  Also, folders are not limited to those in Poser Runtimes, you can add pretty much any folder, great for rapid importing of other object formats.

4. I also periodicly zip my two runtimes into multi-part zips and save them off to a USB drive as an archived backup - just so I wont have to re-install and reorganize from scratch.

As for machine wise, I really cant afford anything fancy at this point (all of my spare money has gone to software, and/or content, and I still do not have everything I want).  I am doing the bulk of my work on a Celeron 2.66ghz single core that I built myself, and periodicly add new parts too - running 3.5gb of ram, and 1.5TB of HD space.  This is in a local network with other mixed machines I use mainly as render nodes, the oldest being Celeron 2.66ghz single core with 2gb ram, and the newest being Intel Core 2 Quads with 4gb of Ram (hoping soon to upgrade to 8gb).  Also on the network, and hosting one of the runtimes I use is a Celeron 833mmx with 240gb HDs and 512mb ram that was my workstation up until 2006.  I desperately need a new workstation, and have priced out parts to build one several times, but just do not have the funds at this time.  About once every 6 months I pick up a 1tb external HD for backups purposes - next time I plan on getting a 2tb.  For HDs I recomend sticking to good quality HDs, I try to stick to Western Digital, and I try to go with Black whenever possible, but have settled for blue on a few occasion with good luck.  My computers run nearly 24/7, and I check the HDs for errors about monthly.  My oldest HD is coming up on 4 years old, with nor errors, bad sectors, or data loss yet (I could not say this when I used to use Maxtors or Samsungs).  Have good cooling fans in your case, and if possible try to have a large one right near or in front of the drive bays.

Don't know if any of that will be helpful to you, but best wishes.

The New HD Toaster from Wamco toasts bread more evenly and acurately than Standard Toasters. Take advantage of the FULL resolution of your bread and try one today, because if your toast isn't in High Definition, you are not getting the most of your toast!