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Alibre software really lags during various processes

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Howie17

Member
Alibre software really lags during various processes

Our Drafting and Computer Aided Design 30 class is just about complete their final project (Mars Rover) and we have a concern about the the time it takes to process the various tasks in Alibre (3D AutoCAD software) on my lab's machines. It commonly takes 5-10 minutes to process and render commands and tasks (saving is really slow as well)...

my question: Is there anything that can be done to speed this up? It might be a combination of slow video memory and under-powered RAM and and CPU power. It also might be that they say that the OS of preference is Windows XP. Your thoughts on what can be done? It appears we meet the system requirements of Alibre...

We are presently running this hardware:
P4 1.6 GHz. CPU
Windows 98 SE
256 MB RAM
Intel onboard graphics - (Intel(R) 82845G Graphics Controller)

Cory Lechner
teacher
 
A

Anonymous

Guest


Up the ram. 256mb is the bare minimum just to have windows run reasonably.
 
J

jemmej

Senior Member


1. 512MB is a good start, but 1 GB would be better. However, I realize budgets probably don't support this (especially since you need to see #3).

2. Your processor is fine.

3. Integrated graphics?!!!!! on a CAD machine!!!???? AIEEEEE!!!!
That ought to summarize what I think.

3A. Integrated graphics suck in general (except for the bare office essentials) and hardly would be able to handle well 2D CAD applications let alone a 3D modeller such as Alibre.

3B. Integrated graphics usually have no video memory of their own, and thus share the system memory. Not only do you have low memory to begin with, you also are now chunking that memory away from the program for your graphics. All-in-all a bad situation.

I'd hazard to say that you could get by with the 256MB if you had a stand-alone graphics card (retail class for Alibre since it uses DirectX).

But, the best situation would be to upgrade the memory and the video card.

For reference, I have a P4-1.7Ghz with 1GB of PC2100 memory and a crappy 64MB graphics card (I didn't pick it, trust me....). My computer slows down substantially at anything more than a modest size assembly.

Jim
 
H

Howie17

Member


I looked on the Intel site in reference to the graphics controllers we have. It too states that the graphics controller uses system memory... hmmm... we will have to look into hardware upgrades... video cards can be expensive eh?
 
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jemmej

Senior Member


Yes. They can, though you don't necessarily need top tier cards.

However, given the computers you were allowed/told/had to use for a CAD application, I would say that they probably would consider them expensive.

If you get a budget number and/or estimate, some folks here (including me) could probably help you pick some cards. Make sure, if you do give numbers, that you specify CDN dollars or US dollars. Also, pricing can be much different in Canada and U.S. (as I'm sure you are aware) so that can make recommending a vid card a little more tricky.

Jim
 
swertel

swertel

Alibre Super User


A couple things:

Win 98SE is not for professional apps like Alibre Design. The latest Windows OS does a terrible job of memory management, Win98 has none. Working with a memory intense application such as AD will knock Win98 to its knees. Definitely look into upgrading the OS. Can Win98 even handle 1Gb memory?

Processor speed is fine. You'll only get a bottleneck from the processor during part regeneration. Basically, when you first create a feature or when you edit any other features. Don't forget, when you edit a feature up in the design explorer, then all the features below it have to regenerate also. I think. Some CAD programs only regenerate the child/parent dependant features and not the rest. Some regenerate all the features. I'm not sure how Alibre handles it.

Definitely need more memory. I don't remember if Win98 has a task manager that gives performance metrics. If it does, have it running while using AD and see what the peak memory usage is. That will tell you what minimum to get.

For reference, I run an
AMD Athlon XP 1800+
1Gb PC 2100 RAM
nVidia GeForceFX 5700 LE

I picked up the graphics card at Best Buy for $80 and it runs fine. It replaced an nVidia GeForce2 MX440. The GeForce2 was a little sluggish, but otherwise worked fine for Alibre.
 
J

jemmej

Senior Member


Besides whether Win98 is "professional" or not, Alibre requirements are Windows XP Pro or Home.

A small caveat, if you ARE going to upgrade your OS, you DEFINITELY need 1 GB memory. First, XP takes up a LOT more RAM just in overhead. Secondly, the NT kernel (which XP is based upon) has a 1/2 allocation memory issue that won't be addressed until the brand new Longhorn kernel from Microsoft. Essentially, if you have 1GB installed, you have roughly 512MB available for actual use by other applications besides Windows.

General consensus from the computer hardware community is that you need at least 512MB to use Windows XP productively/stably (despite whatever MS minimum requirements may say).

Jim
 
H

Howie17

Member


One of my students has Alibre 7.0 installed at home and he has a 1 GB RAM memory installed, an ATI X800 Pro 256 bit video card (256 MB video memory), running Windows XP Professional. He claims that he only notices about a 2X increase in processing speed... hmmmm... not a big jump in power... comments anyone?
 
J

jemmej

Senior Member


1. How does he quantify this increase in speed. Gut feel, benchmarks, something else?

2. 2X is pretty impressive. Your talking about running something twice as fast. Considering most new processors result in a 5-10% increase in speed when they are REALLY good updates (on comparably equipped systems), a 100% increase in speed is pretty good.

3. There is a reason that complex 3D modelling is still done on dedicated workstations specificially designed for the task. While a typical desktop processor is a tremendous engineering achievement, able to handle a mind-boggling array of math and logic processes. It still does not hold a candle to a microprocessor that is specifically designed to do mathematical calculation quickly.

4. You didn't mention what type of processor he has at all...?

Jim
 
H

Howie17

Member


My student has a P4, 2.4 GHz cpu...

What would we use to benchmark speed? Loading time? processing time? I'm not sure what he used to compare...
 
C

cclark440

Alibre Super User


Would you be interested in uploading your assembly, and let some users try it on thier systems? We can then report back to you how long it took to load, and our system configurations.

I understand if you don't want to do this. I just thought it might be the best solution for you, before you go out and spend a bunch of money on a combination that you think will work.
 
J

jemmej

Senior Member


I don't know what he could use....but....if he got 100% performance increase from a 50% increase in clockspeed, I wouldn't be complaining :)

You could do some basic benchmarking using a stopwatch, but, those timings would be for the entire system (including the I/O subsystem which is the biggest bottleneck of current computer systems).

Jim
 
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