I had this issue, couldn't get through a movie to save my life without it freezing up and coming back. Solution was to stop letting windows 7 put my hard drive to sleep. (not sleep mode, windows 7 cuts the drive after a while when it thinks you're idle or whatever - changing that setting, it fixed it)
oops, by bad, thanks Neolith :\! Here are the corrected links: Free textures :thumbup::thumbup: http://www.photosculpt.net/blog/2010/10/7/download-our-free-textures-10-pack.html tutorial: :thumbup: http://www.photosculpt.net/dump/2010/9/3/tutorial-7-create-your-3d-material-shader-with-photosculpt-t.html
Two weeks sounds about right from start to finish with those specs. It *could* be quicker (5-7 days if the gun is simple) but two weeks is a reasonable timeframe. Even if you cut it down to 7 days, that's still only 3 per month while risking quality and burning your animator(s) out in the process.