Graphics

I am considering buying 3D models of counties (.3ds) in my area and would like to know if anybody has experience with large numbers of 3D models in a single scene. I'd like to add satellite imagery to each county with roads and town names. Will this create performance issues with 20 counties? What if I include every county (maybe 300) in surrounding states?

It depends entirely on the polycon count of the models and the resolutions of the textures and videos used on the models.

Not all models are created equal.

One efficiently built scene that includes several virtual sets will perform better than another scene with a single badly built element that uses resources wastefully.
#XPression

The state of Alabama map with its 67 counties has 10,600 polygons. I am working 1280x720 and would like to start with the entire state and zoom into a group of several counties so I'd be using something like a 360x360 .png to texture each county. 67 counties at 129600 pixels each is 8683200 pixels or about nine and a half 1280x720 still images---am I asking too much of the machine before I barely get started?
#XPression

I actually think that sounds pretty reasonable. Is it an OBJ or 3DS file?
#XPression

I can choose either .obj or.3ds, but I'm not sure that I would get both for one price. I've considered modeling the counties myself in Blender, but $19 for the whole thing seems pretty reasonable---if they are indeed compatible with Xpression.
#XPression