It seems that a laptop is what you are needing for school, the only advice I have for you is make sure you get one with a dedicated video card and NOT an integrated one. There are many options available but your price bracket is from about $1200 to $$$$ I am not a Dell fan but must say the XPS range is proving to be a great product for 3D work, they have a few configurations available that are dual core / core Duo with speeds from 1.83 ghz to 2.6 ghz, with up to 4 Gb ram and Nvidia 8000 series dedicated cards, generally a good combination for the uses you require.

@solo said: We are like 10 year olds discussing which super hero is the best ... you never gonna win. Aaahhh, the good ol' days.

Thats some serious facial hair!

'Tis a wonderous feeling, I assume, John. Amen, Brother!

I was at an IKEA today and was very tempted to buy a Helmer...

I'm a climate change skeptic. I've followed the debate closely and I believe the scientific community has failed to prove any of the conclusions Al Gore so forcefully presented. here's a fair summary of my views as presented by Prof Don Aitken. http://www.abc.net.au/rn/ockhamsrazor/stories/2008/2226464.htm note the snide introduction by Robyn Williams, the presenter of the Science show and a confirmed GW believer. There is also a reply to Prof Aitken's remarks here. http://www.abc.net.au/rn/ockhamsrazor/stories/2008/2249809.htm#transcript

That Rhino newsletter from Bob McNeel is always fascinating, and usually includes one or two new tools free for the testing (this is how Rhino beta tests things). If only certain other software companies worked that way! By the way, the future of scripting might be something described here, linked in that same newsletter (I've also been testing this): http://designreform.net/category/_tutorials-rhino/ They call it "Explicit History", but you should really think of it as scripting with a graphical interface based on the concept of nodes. Blender and Nvidia's shader designer have incorporated similar interfaces, as have certain FEA tools and various performance/video packages like Max/Jitter, PD, and VVVV.

@unknownuser said: Thanks Mauritz, I think I'll have to have a look at Renditioner! BTW, are there any Joburg SU users out there on this forum??? After a couple of really short nights I'm finally done with the PC version. You're welcome to download a trial. I should also have it on our SA site before the end of the weekend.

LOL and again!

very refreshing, cheers boo.

Sorry BooFredlay, I havn't made the first thing we must do each time we post something: searching for similar purpose. Everything is already in your Animusic - Pipe Dream. ... Happy we share the same taste for that sort of work. ++simonlebon Ps: perhaps you will like this (havn't search yet on the forum) Amateur - Lasse Gjertsen awesome human beatbox "Lasse Gjertsen" Giovanni Sollima - Sogno ad Occhi Aperti (Daydream) PART 1 (absolutly nothing to do with SketchUp)

If your lazy, you can use the 24x24 size for both the large and small - SketchUp will shrink it to the right size, but it won't look as nice as if you made a small one. Cursors are 32x32 , by the way.

Among other things he is the inventor of invisible car, that might be the answer - If these prices of gas continue rocketing like this I think that will be the best option for many.

you are right alan, same people that did sultans elephant. and no, its more complicated than a giant webcam with no sound. use the link in my first post, you'll see

Dear Remus, With reference to your link and a previous thread on SU shortcuts, see: http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/photo-app-keyboards/ Regards, Bob

hi Susan thanks, got your email... Sydney Australia - but Sydney Nova Scotia sounds interesting... E

@remus said: there's a tool that lets you select parts of the render to concentrate on, would be very useful for clearing up noise i imagine.Edit: re-read your post and realised this was totally off topic, its still pretty cool though That is indeed a cool feature. Though it would be better if unbiased rendering just got faster. @kwistenbiebel said: Fry is comparable to Maxwell, though someone needs to put some more effort on the Maxwell plugin for SU as it really is far behind the exporters for other host apps. No sh*t. While I'm truly fond of Maxwell (it does yield fantastic results, doesn't it?), I'm not fond of NL's "philosophy". With Maxwell, a streamlined workflow seems to be out of the question. Almost everything is a hassle. The plugin has it charms, but it certainly falls short compared to SkIndigo. It baffles me that an independent developer like Whaat can come up with such a great plugin for free, while a whole company cannot deliver an equally good one with it's € 1000 app. And I'm not even mentioning the bugs. I'm under the impression NL hasn't got much of a clue of what SU users want - or that they couldn't care less. EDIT: These are my preliminary thoughts on Maxwell and (Sk)Indigo: both produce excellent results, but Maxwell seems to do a slightly better job on really fine details if you want to try out different lighting setups, Maxwell is the way to go, as it's got Multilight if not, choose Indigo. Certainly for daylight renders, as Indigo's got skyportals (these speed up rendering) the same goes for skydome renders: Indigo Maxwell generally seems to go easier on yer RAM (can anyone confirm this?) EDIT 2: I should add to the above that, despite it's clunkyness, I'm steadily growing fond of the Studio. All in all that one's quite a powerful and versatile tool.

It doesn't affect FormFonts at all...any more than it would affect a car rental company, because we don't sell content, we rent it. If we were selling it, the annual subscription would be 50 times what it is at present. Those terms are right there on the site...available to anyone before they sign up. Putting it simplistically, renting a car for a few dollars a day does not give you the right to then sell it to someone else for several thousand dollars....or to sub-let or even loan it to someone else without the knowledge or permission of the hire company. Even software companies that sell software (or content) on a retail basis are safe enough behind the premise that they are selling it to one person. If that person decided they wanted to sell it on, they would have to do so on that same basis, without continuing to use the product themselves. They would need to sell it cheaper, because the understanding would be that they were in no position to guarantee its usability, or to offer any kind of support or upgrade path. Any attempt to have their cake and eat it or distribute duplicated copies would be a clear case of software piracy. The whole Autodesk case rests around the fact that a company is offering software at what any reasonable person would regard as a retail price, yet still maintaining that it is only leasing it to you on a non-transferable basis...then hiding that fact on the inside of a shrink-wrapped package.

hehehe well i like instrumental and simphonical music

As a former Application Engineer for Autodesk all I can say is BOO-YA!!! __________ ______________________________ ____________________ ____________________ ______________________________ __________