I've got to be honest I havn't done a lot to mess around with particles and such in Maya. But I have watched some of the instruction in my class and they always seem to render them out in Maya Hardware (as this is VERY quick) and then composite them into the project as this can be none in near realtime and you can give em any effects you like.

Now keep in mind when you render in harware you get whatever colour dots the emiiter spits out but it seems to be rather easy to get a number of looks out of them in After Effects (for example) with just a few tweaks and effects.