MAX 9 trial, try it out

arshlevon

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=5972446

for anyone wanting to try it out here is it. i have been using it for a little while and i am happy with this release. stability is great, i have been torture testing it and tho it does hang everynow and then, like maya, it eventually chugs through it . personally i have not had a crash yet. so all you maya guys need to find something new to dis on max users for.

almighty_gir

whats the 64bit version like? i've been waiting to upgrade my OS to 64bit in the event some of the programs i use a LOT are gonna be implimented. but if the performance isnt worth the upgrade, i'll stick with what i have.

arshlevon

well as with most 64 bit applications your not going to notice a difference unless you need more memory, and in most cases 64 bit aplications are even a little slower than the 32 bit counterparts because there is more system overhead. so things like models with millions and billions of polies you will notice a difference, gigantic physics simulations, complex event driven particle systems or if your trying to animate a cinematic quality model in realtime, basically anything that would crash the pants off a 32 bit app.
the 32 bit version of 9 is a million times faster than 8 when it comes to polies and just feels snappier all around. i dont know if 32 to 64 is for you but 9 in general preforms the pants of 8. so if your looking for prefomance even the 32 bit version is more than worth it.

almighty_gir

is it possible, do you know, to buy a licence for both versions? or will i need to buy a sepperate license for each?

arshlevon

you dont have to buy 2 licenses when you buy max 9 it comes with both versions, and the files are compatible so you can open files from the 32 bit version and use them on the 64 bit version and vice versa. great if you plan on upgrading your os down the line.

almighty_gir

ahhhh, thanks a lot Arsh, gonna get the trial for now, and think about upgrading my OS during the next 30 days haha.

MoP

Got the full one at work, gonna give it a spin later this week! Also my machine at work is 64bit, so I'll see how it goes...

CrazyButcher

got to crash it on my first try to test the improved speed... created a highly subdivided box (200x200x200) and toggled in/out of max. but in total it really is faster.
the viewport "statistics" could be a bit better, as it is not always updating itself properly and there is no "polycounter" anymore
about 64 and 32 bit, there is quite a big uproar on the max forums about not being able to use 64 bit workstation and submit a job to a fully 32 bit renderfarm, the "workaround" autodesk suggests is install max twice (will work) and work in 64 bit save file and submit jobs with the 32 bit version, which is not exactly workflow friendly...

arshlevon

hey crazy butcher i couldn't reproduce your crash. i have been trying my damnedest to crash 9, it my new goal in life, really it just hangs up for me and if i leave it alone for a bit everything is dandy.
could you go into the circumstances that the viewport statistics inst updating ? i haven't had any problems with it. the old polycounter from the utilites panel would bring max to crawl in 8 , i had to open it, check the count, then close it,i am so glad that trash is gone. everything seems to stay the same even on really dense meshes with the viewport stats .

oh and the autoback folder has moved, it is in your my documents folder, i am sure you can change it, but if for any reason you need to get to it like i did, its there. really pissed me off too, because by the time i found it, max had already overwritten the file i was trying to get to.

CrazyButcher

the "projects" stuff being in your personal documents stuff, is really sucky, also there is some stuff in "local application data" in your user profile, too. (UI stuff, macroscripts...).
while it might make the use of multi-user OS operating on same MAX, more easily, that kind of use is a bit far fetched or ?

about the crash, I got a d3d device error, I will try to reproduce. It could be simply me not having enough VRAM (128 MB) or so. but still they should work around that and not crash it.

e.g I had the box and changed the subdivision of it, and the viewport stats for tris/verts did not change. Also I once deleted the object and the numbers in the stats were still the same. If one changes the stats to be "selection" based, then it is more accurate, but a bit sucky when working with sub-selections, as you will only get stats on what you selected (a bit more options on its behavior would be nice, but I guess one needs to pay another 1K for max10 to see such improvements).
all in all the speed update is definetely worth a lot, but honestly having updgraded max for a while now, after pumping so much money into them, one could expect a bit more "updgrading" without having to pay so much... there is not much "service" going on imo. but that has been an issue with max for longer now. I'd definetely favor a "custom" max license, like you pay for the "base" and then pay for the extra plugins, but lower the entry price (like I dont need mental ray, hair...). but autodesk isnt pressured to change that I guess, instead they just add here and there and buy in other plugins to justify the upgrade price.

Ruz

well the dirct x 9 on mine is screwed. works fine in version 8, but in 9 each window has text saying not enough video memory

FatAssasin

[ QUOTE ]
the "projects" stuff being in your personal documents stuff, is really sucky, also there is some stuff in "local application data" in your user profile, too. (UI stuff, macroscripts...).
while it might make the use of multi-user OS operating on same MAX, more easily, that kind of use is a bit far fetched or ?

[/ QUOTE ]

It's a Vista thing. Autodesk had to submit or face the wrath of Microsoft. It also has to do with the new relative path functionality. You can now take your Max scenes anywhere without getting the annoying "missing files" window, in theory.

Joao Sapiro

hm...it crashes when i import a 1.5 million poly model...agh...

wille

ive had like one crasch in two weeks! wooop! max9 is tha shit ^_^ even tho the new powerbooleans isnt as neat as they were promised to be...for example they mess up uv cordinates it seems, atleast the ones not in channel 1..

Parnell

Crashed 2 out of the first 3 times i booted up.
I tried importing a 1.9 million mesh the first 2 times, the second time i brought in one subdivision layer lower, and it worked ok. Max 9 is MUCH faster when i moved the mesh it chugged a bit when i rotated it. However, rotating in Max 8 was far worse.
Both times it crashed it said I ran out of memory. 1 GB of RAM...looks like i need to upgrade!!
B

Ghostscape

All of my polys are showing two sided in the viewport and I can't figure out how to turn that off - they didn't default to that in any other version of Max! I could swear it was under viewport properties but they must've moved it

Also I'm so glad they rearranged things arbitrarily in the Quad Menus in the UV unwrap

I know I can just move it again because the UI is customizable but it's still a pain in the ass.

Ghostscape

Okay I needed to turn on backface culling in the object properties.

Why the hell isn't this a default?

spacemonkey

it seems far more dependant on faster cpu and ram than max 8, I guess thats how it handles more polies haha!

jec1183

I am using it on my slow computer and the difference in speed is definitely noticeable. The only thing I couldn't find is the polygon counter in the tools section. I mean I could hit "7" to turn on the normal one but I wanted to check out the tri count. For some reason the plugin just isn't there. Perhaps they got rid of it but I liked that plugin lol.

FatAssasin

[ QUOTE ]
Okay I needed to turn on backface culling in the object properties.

Why the hell isn't this a default?

[/ QUOTE ]

This has to do with the DX viewport speed improvements they made. It's much faster to draw polies with backface culling off because it doesn't have to test and find out which ones are facing the other direction, it just draws them all. So if you turn backface culling on you lose out on some of the speed optimizations.

CrazyButcher

jec, do a right click on the viewport and say "draw stats" that is similar to the "7" key...

Mark Dygert

[ QUOTE ]
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=5972446

for anyone wanting to try it out here is it. i have been using it for a little while and i am happy with this release. stability is great, i have been torture testing it and tho it does hang everynow and then, like maya, it eventually chugs through it . personally i have not had a crash yet. so all you maya guys need to find something new to dis on max users for.

[/ QUOTE ]
That chugging is more than likely the autoback up feature saving, if you don't use it you can shut it off and get rid of the chug

I am happy with it also, espeically the ablity to reverse animation with negitive frames. Oh and the ablity to place key frames after the last footstep is a VERY welcome change. The stablity is nice I haven't had it crash and I have loaded up some pretty buggy files that used to crash max 7 pretty often.

There are some big features I would like to see added but haven't made it in yet. Hopefully if I keep pestering their reps they will break thru heheh.

Ghostscape

Ok I didn't realize that it was faster to not backface cull. It doesn't really matter most of the time, but when I'm modelling a car and need to do the low interior, it's a pain to not see what is the exterior shell and what is the interior.

In any event, I solved the problem.

Also, the new viewports stats is awesome, as you can configure it for a lot of stuff under the viewport options, much more like maya's viewport stats now.

FatAssasin

Here's a couple new additions that aren't making the headlines, but that I think are pretty cool...

Smart Autoback! Now autoback only kicks in when you've made changes to the scene, so no more leaving for lunch and coming back to have all your backup files overwritten with the same file. And when you manually save, the timer gets reset. No more waiting for it to autoback five seconds after you just saved. Plus, the limit for backup files is now 99 instead of 9.

Hidden Line viewport display. Right click on the viewport name to set it. Give it a try, I think you'll like it.

arshlevon

yeah man, i am loving the hidden line mode. my personal fav, although not very useful for games, is the new point cache modifier. i recently had a series of crowd shots to do and instead of using the complicated crowd features and layout behaviors and such for simple walking crowds i just used the point cache mod and staggered the loop so they where cycling at different speeds and times. worked like a charm and was really quick and easy to set up.

FatAssasin

Another cool trick with the new point cache is to set the Playback Type to Playback Graph, manually set the frame range with animate on, and then you can move the keys to speed up or slow down the animation. And even better, you can use the curve editor to do things like bullet time effects, reverse the animation, or get really crazy and do something like ramp up, stop, then reverse, then go forward again; all by just adding new keys and playing with the curve. It really opens up a lot of possibilities for manipulating your animation, and it's a lot easier than dealing with all the keys on a rig.

j_bradford

Has anyone messed with 'paint selected region'? It's been in MAX for a while but I was hoping 9 would fix the problem of allowing you to ignore backfacing when you are selecting the polys. Am I missing something with it?

Joao Sapiro

this might be referred, but damn...no polycount tool ?

mvelasquez

they hacked the polycount utility, but expanded on the viewport hud counter thing. You can customize it through the viewport config.