i'm thinking of buying a new machine and i need opinions on what you all think are the best setups for poser and other 3D programs.what are the best PC's,video cards,and opperating systems for 3D?

If you're buying a new computer, Windows XP is the operating system you want. Personally, I went with Windows XP Home Edition. XP Professional has some extra features that I don't need. And it costs $100 more. If you are thinking of using dual monitors or dual processors, then you want Windows XP Professional. (You don't get those features in the Home Edition.) Those would be the two things you might be likely to want if you really want a "power graphics computer." The best thing I can say about computer hardware is: "Stick with major brand names." (For example: I will always buy a sound card from Creative Labs, maker of the SoundBlaster cards. I stay away from brands like "HiValue," etc.) You want a company that has been around for awhile and is likely to stay around for awhile. It's not always easy to make that kind of determination. I've heard many people buying great graphics cards only to see the company go out of business or drop that particular product. You would likely want to buy a computer from a company that allows you to pick who makes the parts, or at least tells you who makes the parts. Some good companies, such as Dell, offer alternatives to their basic package. Personally, I've never bought a "manufactured computer off a shelf." I've always built my own from parts. It's more rewarding sometimes. And I know what I have. On the other hand, if something goes wrong. I have to rely on myself for the fix.

well, everyone has an opinion, so heres mine.....thers no computer in the world like a custom built one. I build my own (other than the few i pick up here and there). I tend to stay away from proprietary machines. In my opinion, the best processor for image rendering is and AMD Athalon. I run an Athalon 850 right now. My video card (sadly not made anymore) is a Voodoo 3 5000. I also have an ATI Radeon in my other working computer, and I like it as well. When it comes to memory, MAX IT OUT!!!! lol. as cheap as RAM is now, get as much as you can before prices shoot up. As far as OS's, i wouldnt use winME if someone gave it to me and paid me by the hour. I will stick with win98 til linux supports all the art programs I use. Shuttle makes really good motherboards, and either Western Digital or Seagate would be my reccommended hard drives. Hope I have helped ya on your quest for what we all search for....the perfect machine....

Seems that awhile back I recall someone mentioning that there were some vid cards to avoid too (but I can't recall at the moment). Does anyone have info along those lines also (i.e., what to avoid)?

To my knowledge Poser doesnt support dual processors or those good video cards as it doesn't use Direct3d, or OpenGL (someone correct me if I'm wrong). I like ATI and Nvidia. I too have a Voodoo3 AGP TV card, but I don't use it, good card though. I can't recall the video boards to stay away from at this moment. If you decide to build your own or have it custom built. Make sure you/ they use name brand parts. Abit makes good motherboards also. STAY AWAY FROM INTEGRATED MOTHERBOARDS!!! Usally when one component screws up, the whole board messes up too. Besides some onboard stuff is well, lacking in performance. I agree, for sound stick with Creative. The processors, I recommend AMD Athlon also. Get the fastest processors the motherboard can support. If you can, get some good stuff that can use the DDR RAM... That stuff is FAST! However, I have to disagree with WyckedDreamz's HD recommendation. Maxtor is better in my opinion (Every HD failure I've ever had was a Western Digital. 3 Comps in 1 year). Seagate is good though I have never used many of them. But it's entirely what YOU want. I have read this post and took some suggestions once I build my "Perfect System"... However, what's perfect for others may not be perfect for you. Almost everyone has different requirements for a computer. But anyway. Hope I added some more help for you.

If you want a great magazine for the "power user" get Maximum PC. I think they have a web site too, with that name. In the past few years, I've had hard drives from 2 manufacturers: Western Digital and Maxtor. I've had excellent results from both companies. I currently have a Western Digital 20GB and Maxtor 30GB In the past year or so I've had to replace both drives due to some power load problems in our ancient house (plug in the iron in the wrong outlet, and the power goes out.), and a dead UPS battery. In both cases, the drives were under warranty. Each company sent me a replacement hard drive immediately. I just gave them my credit card info as insurance that I would send them the old drive. I don't remember the details, but Maxtor does have a longer warranty. I ended up with a computer that is not totally of my own choosing.. (A long story.) I do have a builtin sound card which I disabled in favor of the SoundBlaster Live. I'm stuck with the onboard Intel AGP video chip, but it seems to handle everything I've tossed at it. One day when we're more prosperous I intend to build another new computer from scratch, and have more control over the parts.

VoodooFiles at http://www.voodoofiles.com has updates For 3DFX Cards.Microsoft also has a patch for WindowsXP.

IF you are building a machine FOR Poser. You really don't need a hi end PC. The memory management of XP and > 512MB or ram will be useful. Standard AGP video cards work just fine for Poser 4 (Who knows about 5) as others have said it wasn't written to take advantage of OpenGL or other 3D hardware acceleration. BUT I can say that I can't live without my dual monitors and a Matrox G450 32MB Dualhead card. Poser is fantastic spread out over two monitors. One screen just for your working window and the other screen for your tools. Even though Poser wasn't written to take advantage of Dual Processors, the OS WAS. I find that my dual processor machines are more robust and you seldom see the hourglass. Plus I can burn CDs when I am designing in Poser. I put mine together for about the same money as a dual processor system. < 1000 dollars. You can use dual Celerons if you use slockets and dual slot 1 motherboards. tomshardware.com has done benchmarks between dual PIII and dual Celerons and the L2 Cache deficiency of the Celeron is negated in a dual configuration.

The best Hard drives I've ever used are IBM, Quantum and Western Digital. I've had 3 Maxtor drives fail in the first year of use and 2 Seagates go bad that didn't last much longer. NVidias most current video card versions are GeForce types. ATI brand video cards are great to and thier most current versions go by the Radeon name. Make sure the video card you get has 32Mb to 64Mbs of its own RAM on it. All graphics programs need that. I use bothe Intel and AMD CPUs. I'd stay with the Intel P4 or the AMD XP. (Avoid the intel Celeron though. I wanted to kill it for being so slow.) Your computers RAM should be HIGH. WinXP REQUIRES at least 256Mb RAM so you need more than that to run your 3D programs well. Sales people are most often not familiar with what 3D Programs need so 512Mb RAM is a starting point. Many here claim to be using over 1Gb of RAM. (I've gone almost that high)

Attached Link: http://www.crucial.com

Memory is cheap these days. I suggest you find out the maximum amount of memory your computer will handle, and plan ahead. You may not want to max out the memory right away. But if your motherboard only has 2 memory slots, and maxxes out at 512MB, you can end up wasting memory modules and money if you don't look ahead. I have one of those Intel Celeron Motherboards with 2 RAM slots, and a maximum of 512MB capacity. A year or so ago, memory was more expensive. I addeed a 64MB SDRAM to get 128MB of RAM. A few months later memory was cheaper, so I bought a 256MB SDRAM memory module, and gave a 64MB RAM to my wife. That doubled her memory, and both her memory slots are full. My wife is happy, since she isn't a power user. A few months later, memory dropped once again. I bought another 256MB of SDRAM for half what I paid for the last one. In order to use this memory I had to remove my other 64MB SDRAM... that one had apparently gone bad anyway. Do you get the point? 1.) Find out your maximum allowable memory on the motherboard. 2.) Find out the configuration (How many slots available? How many slots are already taken?) 3.) Check memory prices, and get the best deal. If you're looking for memory, try www.crucial.com. I've bought from them twice now, and had excellent service. The last time they shipped to me OVERNIGHT for FREE, Can't beat that.

Custom building a PC is sometimes useful - but not nearly as much as it was int he old days. These days I go with either Dell's (for clients), alienware.com for power users and e-machines (e4me.com) for normal folks. E-machines is notable in particular because they don;t use funky parts - and alienware is all off the shelf.

In my estimation, there are different ways "to build your own computer." You can buy the parts and assemble yourself. You can find a company that will do the work for you. The key here is to find a company that will provide a computer full of "identified parts," and give you the options to make your choices. They should do this without charging a whole lot more. I worked, for a short time, at Radio Shack. They made a big deal about a plan they had that allowed you to "build your own computer" by selecting parts using a program they had. In the end, you paid lots more for all the parts... I mentioned that to the manager, and he didn't see any problem with it. Maybe that's one of the reasons I no longer work at Radio Shack, and I won't buy a computer there.