Well here goes:
When I set my max unit scale in metric (system unit scale) and mesure my default grid, the grid ends up being 140x140 meters.
And If I create an object 1x1x1 meters its tiny on the grid. Now if I have a cheracter that supposed to be exectly 2 m (in metric system scale) how can I work with it???
If when I zoom into it my camera starts jumping and crashing thru it.
Is this an error or em I looking at this wrong?
you can change your grid spacing under customise/grid and snap setup
Yes max gets into trouble when you animate or work with very small objects.
I would suggest switching the system unit setup to centimeters.
samuel you see, we are required to work in metric…so when we port models from lightwave thru deep exploration it automaticly converts the model to match (in meters) and they end up sooo small on the grid.
Silicon, the grid is not what Im talking about, its the max internal unit scale issue.
you can work in user view. I know that it’s a bad thing but…
I had the same problem and this is the only one issue That I know. 
If this can help you.
You have to set both the display unit scale and the system unit setup to meters I think.
As soon as a detail gets smaller than 1 max unit you will get into trouble (according to the max help).
You could try the “rescale world units” tool that you can find under /utilities/
more/rescale world units/. Actually I have no experience with that.
But I think it was made for such cases.
correct, rescaling world units will upsize the models however:
did you know that in max there is global world scale space, and then local world scale space?
Aparently if you make a sphere which is 1x1x1 units in max, then make same sphere in maya then import it into max visually they will look the same, but on the subobject level their scale will be 1 to 1000 or something like that.
So if you apply procedural texture to both they will look totally different…
My question still stands…I need to work in metric and where 1 unit = 1 meter…
I know of the work arounds and rescale world units and etc…that doesnt solve the problem
Maybe I don’t follow…
But I had problems with Maya imports - until I figured out the “vertex scale” setting on the obj import. If you leave it at default - the obj imports at 1200x (or something) smaller.
I don’t know what vertex scale works best with metric.
Good Luck.
ok lets pretend we’r not improting anything…just in max we are…
so set your system units to metric, 1 unit = 1 meter
make a 2 meters object..imagine this is your cheracter which you need to zoom into and rig and model…the model is so small its impossible to work with
im not really following the problem. I did what you suggested: I set 1 unito = 1 meter, set max units to metric and created a 2.0 meter box.
Sure it was pretty small, but I zoom extents selected on it and i was able to manipulate it fine without a hitch. Granted I didn’t try and rig it complex like, but I added some bones and setup some simple Ik…I had no issues.
i guess what im saying is that at these settings the model should be much bigger on the grid…or, when you try to manipulate vertexes realy closly and zoom into it camera starts crashing thru and etc…
point one seems to be a grid size thats too large
point two is the default clipping planes of max (near plane at 1, far plane at 1000)
you can adjust that one using either viewport clipping (persp) or camera clipping planes
for very small objects its actually pretty easy to come closer than the one unit default near clip
anyway, you should be able to use different system units and rescale+collapse imported objects to match the scale
this should not make any difference in terms of vertices etc.
the only area i know of where system units not equalling 1 meter cause problems is reactor - there you have to adjust the settings (gravity) to account for other values
mike
(working with 1cm, because vray fisheye cams wont allow you to get closer to objects than 1 sys unit )
I think that you must write to discreet.
Autodesk
I don’t work in metric (base 10 is too easy, 12 is much more satisfying) but I would assume cm would be best to work with since it is closest to an inch 