PLE 5.0 missing features?
 

I've been getting to know the basics of Maya through PLE 5.0.
I've been getting frustrated though, as it seems that many dialogue boxes ,which in manuals show bountiful input fields, are completely blank in my version of the software.

Create NURBS Cube>options, for instance, is completely blank. While in the manuals there are all sorts of dimension and scale info.
While
Create Polygon Cube>options has one field with the default value of: 1.000, but no indication what that value represents, nor are there any other fields that I would expect to be in this box.

As well
Duplicate>options is completely blank.

There are others. But also, not all dialogue boxes are empty.

Did the installation go wrong? If so, why does the program work at all??
More importantly how can I fix it?

It sounds like you might need to reinstall Maya PLE. Be sure to uninstall first.

Just that? Is there an option that I should be looking to check during installation?

There's nothing in the installation you can do different. You should have all the options there with the PLE version. If it's not an installation problem it may be graphic card/driver related.

Might try a fresh copy of the PLE from there websight also.. just to make sure.

Thanks for all these suggestions. Unfortunately, nothing has helped.

I actually took the PLE disk I've been using and installed it on an older computer running win2k, and it works fine. So, the data is good.
I've installed it over and over again on my Dell Inspiron 8500 running WinXP Professional, with the lates drivers and it still won't display information in the following dialogues: create>Nurbs>Cube>options...Nurbs>Sphere,>options Create>Poly.>cube>options...>sphere>cylinder>optio ns, etc.
or Duplicate>options.
There are others. I noticed in the tech forum somebody had this problem, but their solution was upgradeing to XP Pro from XP Home. Any other ideas? This is killing me!

The Solution has been found!!!
If you are using WinXP with a Ultra High Resolution Display, there is a feature in: Display Properties> Settings> Advanced: General.
It's called "DPI Setting". It's for Automatically scaling all fonts used by your apps, so that they are readable. Apparently, Maya doesn't like scaled fonts. So, if you've been having this problem, set the DPI to "Normal"
That will correct it.

Apparently Win2k has this feature, as well. So, the fix should work there as well.

That is all.
-R.

Ive used ple but now i have maya 5 unlimited. I never had problems like this and im on windows home xp

Perhaps you've never adjusted your Font DPI Setting.
The default is "normal", which Maya has no problem with.
All I can say is: when I set the DPI back to "normal" from "Large" the problem went away.
-R.