Virtual Memory

[Diego_Massaro]

Okay, I’ll try to combine all of the basic english words I’ve learned through the years to formulate my question…

First of all, the usual stuff: ZBrush is great, all of the artist featured in here are AWESOME, etc.

I’ve been using ZBrush for a week now, so you will have to excuse me if my question is kinda stupid

Now, to the problem: I start ZBrush and draw a simple object, like a Sphere3D. I make any minor modification to it, with any type of brush. I hit Ctrl+Z to Undo and… “Reading Virtual Mem” pops up on the higher left. I have a rather old computer (Pentium 3, 1 Ghz, 512 RAM, no 3D card -just a 16 MB adapter, or some sh*t-), so I would expect this message to appear every once in a while, but not so soon. I can assure you I have no other applications or major processes running in the back (I guess I can’t prove it to you, but trust me on that one), and I swear to God I haven’t messed with any of the default settings (and even if I accidentaly did, never saved them). The “Compact memory” slider is set on 256 MB, so that should guarantee a fair amount of polygons before trying to store on disk. I’m completely confused, and add that to the fact that the first couple of times I used ZBrush nothing seemed to be wrong. So: a) What the hell is happening? b) What did I do to diserve it? c) How do I fix it?

Please, if anyone has an answer to this… before it’s too late

[aurick]

Well, the problem is that your system barely falls within the minimum system requirements for ZBrush, and well before the recommended requirements. You didn’t say which OS you’re running, but my guess is XP. That OS alone is going to use about half of your available RAM. Then you get ZBrush added in. Then you finally get any polygons that you’re pushing.

The bottom line is that with so little RAM, ZBrush is going to have to write to disk a LOT. You really should have about 1 GB for working with ZBrush. 2 GB is perfect, if possible.

[Diego_Massaro]

Thanks for the quick reply, Aurick. I was hoping it would be some kind of configuration problem, but I guess I’ll have to improve my system after all (not so affordable here in Argentina).

I’m afraid that, in my rush to get that problem outta the way, I haven’t kissed as much ass as I would have wanted for my first post, so here it goes:

ZBrush: KICK ASS PIECE OF SOFTWARE!
ZBrush Central: AWESOME SITE! Both useful and inspiring!
ZGuys all over the world: all of the stuff you’re posting is

U-N-B-E-L-I-E-V-A-B-L-E

I hope the next time I post something, it’ll be some of my work, or, at least a photo of the new computer I’ll have to steal in order to get some work done

See ya
Besos en la cola…

[shokan]

Will a larger hard drive (in my case, 10G) improve ZBrush performance?

[aurick]

That depends on how much free space is on the drive that ZBrush is installed on. More space is better, but that still won’t allow you to work with larger meshes more efficiently.