need some help with this, 3d-max-related

[Udaisa]

hey guyz..
i been asked to do some graphical work at work... yea, i used to be good at that.. but that's like ages ago lol.. im no more friendly with the interfaces of the softwares i used to use b4.. for example.. the latest release of 3d max ive used is 4.0.. and R9.0 fills the market.. the work ive been asked to do is not that complicated.. its just that im kinda afraid of not makin a good work as i used to before... anywayz.. the q is.. do the new releases of 3d max support the arabic script?? in past arabic letters looked separated from each other.. we used to write the text in a 2d photo (in black n white).. and then import it to 3d max.. then we add a modifier to turn it to a 3-dimensional object.. do we still have to do this now?? or we can simply add an arabic text into the scene?
another q if i may.. what r the minimum hardware requirements for 3d max 9 and 8??
thank u all.. and wish me luck with this..

[Udaisa]

HELLO???
im still waitin for an answer..