[swando]

mm personally i havent found mental ray useful for matters of animation, too cumbersome and no need for photo realism in the animation enviornment. a simple raytrace skylight gets an acceptable effect without the complicated renderer.
however, mental ray is fun to play with, but my usual suggestion of 'video drivers' doesnt appear to be valid in this case. ive never had a problem with max that wasnt video drivers, but i dont see how video drivers would effect a rendering plug in freezing the load....