Just tried to render some glass from that render of mine ages ago. But there were 36 glasses, all turbo smoothed at rendertime.
Now I am assuming this error is just a general running out of memory error, but seemed abit odd and i havnt seen it before so though i might post it here to see if anyone else has experienced it before.
Max itself didnt crash but the render obviously couldnt proceed.
Simple scene 2 vray lights a couple of cameras and the cups.
could you maybe share the scene? what version of max is it?
I can share the scene if you want.
3dsmax7
Vray 1.47.03
I am fairly certain that the problem could be solved with vray proxies or lower Turbosmooth level but seeing as i havnt see this error before or on this forum thought i would ask around.
Will upload the file now and PM you the link.
Actually I just lowered the turbosmooth by one level and it rendered fine in 14m10s. So it was definitly just a running out of memory error just one that I havnt seen before.
It renders fine with 2million faces but it couldnt quite cope with the 8million faces at the next level of turbosmooth…odd error tho.
What are the most common ways of rendering this many polys? Are vray proxies the only option? I would like to test out some options.
If you like I can still upload the file for you to have a look at, just let me know.
no i suppose its not necessary. just thought it might be a way to see if anyone else could render it. I dont have max 7 though…
i think in an instance where you need heavy smoothness on multiple objects which forces your computer to runout of memory vrayDisplacement mod with sudivision setting could come in handy.
percydaman:
Ah ok, well as you can see I got it to render anyway, just without as higher Turbosmooth as i originally had, probably doesnt even need that high. Now im just try to see if I can find a way to make it render the scene with atleast 8 million polys 
Morbid Angel:
Good idea I will give that a shot, wonder if i can get it to render 8million polys without crashing
are all of the glasses instanced?
i think if you are dealing with high million count then vrayProxy is best. All tho I never used it. But I heard it works well.
jacksc02:
Initially they were copies, then I instanced them.
Morbid Angel:
Yeah i figured vray proxy would be best. Gonna try that now.
Ok, after proxying 1 glass that had been turbosmooth at the higher level and collapsed to editable poly, I was able to render out 36 glasses and i assume it had the same number of polys as previous just before it crash so it was just over 8.1million polys 
Memory usage according to task manager was a mere 462mb for Physical and 515mb for Virtual.
Render time 22mins.
You could also enable the /3GB to allow 3dsmax reach a vm bigger than 1.6-1.7 Gb. We have a current work in progress that has lots and lots details, and is about 25-30 Million polys and renders ok with a mix o vrayproxies and non vrayproxies, and memory usage is about 2.2 in virtual memory for max.
I could look this up but im feeling lazy… hehe so i will just ask.
Does the 3gb switch work with windows2000?
no, only winxp. winxp64 bit has it built in.
Mmm after a little digging it may be possible according to this page
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx
Meh im gonna install winxp on my raid0 setup once I get it.. LOL
I think that would be windows 2000 server, in any case, if you force win2k to do something it was not designed to, it will be unstable, as winxp 3gb switch can be very unstable for some, and totally kill others.
Good point. Might wait till im using Xp before I try it.
Thanks 8)
are you going to install 32bit or 64bit XP??
32bit, might dual it with 64.
But there is alot of stuff that i use that i reckon wouldnt be so 64bit happy.
yep, i feel your pain there.
I think there needs to be some further development by microsoft to get xp64 working better