New Site for Info

Wow, it's been a year and about 6 days since I last posted! It's not that nothing has happened with AutoCAD Arch in the past year, quite a bit has...I've just haven't had the time with picking up a couple more Autodesk programs to support.



So, I've decided to discontinue posting to this particular blog and will now post any updates, tips, etc. to our MasterGraphics blog. I've been posting a couple things here and there about AutoCAD Arch and AutoCAD, so I've just decided to consolidate and keep the "AutoCAD" type info on the MG site that I contribute.

I'll keep this page open for quite a while if you need to reference anything I've already posted.

WAN Hotfix for AutoCAD 2007 Format DWG's

WAN acceleration technology typically relies on data-deduplication as a significant part of accelerating data transfer. The 2007 DWG format is written to disk with a type of error-checking that has the side-effect of nearly every byte of the file changing during full-save, even if little was changed. WAN accelerators fail to deduplicate the 2007 DWG data and must transfer nearly all bytes in the 2007 DWG file. This results in a slow-down during full-save when working over a slow WAN.

This hotfix will make a small change in the way the 2007 format DWG files are written to disk such that WAN acceleration hardware will be better able to deduplicate the 2007 DWG data; this will provide some performance gains for SAVE operations when users are saving across a WAN acceleration environment. The resulting 2007 DWG file will be readable whether or not others have this hotfix, but to achieve the best performance everyone working on the same DWG should install this hotfix.

You can download the hotfix for 2007, 2008 or 2009 programs here....

2009

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=11849251&linkID=9240618

2008

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=11856815&linkID=9242019

2007

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=11856704&linkID=9240618

2009 ACA (and AutoCAD) Service Pack Available

It's finally here, the service packs for AutoCAD based products.  You can find the downloads at the locations below....and remember to download the correct service pack!

AutoCAD Architecture 2009 Product Update 1 64-Bit

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=11632162&linkID=9240658

 

AutoCAD Architecture 2009 Product Update 1 32-Bit

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=11632121&linkID=9240658

 

Here's a quick little snip from the readme file...and of course all of the AutoCAD 2009 SP 1 updates apply as well.

 

General Updates to AutoCAD Architecture

The following defects have been fixed in AutoCAD Architecture 2009 Update 1:

AModeler

• The application might crash when cutting or refreshing sections or elevations containing certain structural members.

Drawing Management

• For localized versions of AutoCAD Architecture, callouts and labels would occasionally fail to resolve when dropping views onto sheets.
• The application might crash when viewing the external references of a project drawing that was resaved as a different project drawing type.
• It was not possible to drag a project entity from one file to another when hardware acceleration was enabled, if the host drawing did not use the 2d wireframe visual style.
• The application might crash when plotting immediately after canceling a previous plot job.

IFC

• Fillet radii would not be imported reliably for certain parametric profiles.
• Parametric profiles without voids would not be imported reliably.
• Spaces with clipping and holes would not import reliably.
• Wall styles would not be reliably converted and mapped on import.
• Curtain walls might not be import properly on localized versions of AutoCAD Architecture.

GBXML

• gbXML would export a value 1000 times too large for AirChangesPerHour in metric drawings.

OMF

• The application would occasionally crash on shutdown.

Wall Objects

• The face of a wall might not draw correctly in isometric view for certain endcap configurations.

Display System

• Autodesk Civil 3D users could end up with a style referencing a non-existent hatch.

Miscellaneous

• Memory would not be released to Windows when closing a drawing.

Hotfix for AutoCAD Architecture and MEP 2009

Yep, the product is only a couple weeks old (since the FCS date) and there is a Hotfix available on Autodesk's web site.  The Hotfix addresses publishing to the DWF or DWFx file format, while including “Publish Property Set Data” or the “Publish All Automatic Properties” AEC DWF Publishing Options, you may encounter the loss of Native Values for the published objects.

Note: Native Values enable other Autodesk products such as Autodesk Quantity Takeoff to accurately use local unit measurements on extracted data from the objects imported from DWF or DWFx files.

 

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=10884826&linkID=9240658

AutoCAD Architecture 2009 System Requirements

Here are the system requirements for AutoCAD Architecture as specified on the Autodesk web site...

System Requirements

Hardware and Software Requirements for Workstations
Hardware/Software	32-Bit Requirements	64-Bit Requirements
Operating Systems Find more information on Windows Vista versions	Windows® XP Professional SP 2 (recommended) Windows XP Home SP 2 Windows Vista® Ultimate Windows Vista Enterprise Windows Vista Business Windows Vista Home Premium Windows Vista Home Basic	Windows XP Professional x64, SP 2 Windows Vista Ultimate Windows Vista Enterprise Windows Vista Business Windows Vista Home Premium
Web Browser	Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6.0, SP 1 (or later)	Microsoft© Internet Explorer 6.0, SP 1 (or later)
Processor (Multiple processors supported)	Intel® Pentium® 4 3.0 GHz or greater  (recommended)	AMD Athlon 64
AMD Athlon , 3.0 GHz or greater  (recommended)	AMD Opteron
Dual core supported	Intel Xeon with Intel EM64T support
	Intel Pentium 4 with Intel EM64T support
Memory (RAM)	2 GB (minimum) 3 GB (recommended)	2 GB (minimum) 4 GB (recommended)
Display Resolution	1,024x768 true color (minimum) 1,280x1024 true color (recommended)	1,024x768 true color (minimum) 1,280x1,024 true color (recommended)
Display Card	128 MB video card (minimum) 256 MB or greater, direct 3D-compatible 3D video card (recommended)	128 MB video card (minimum) 256 MB or greater, direct 3D-compatible 3D video card (recommended)
Hard Disk	Default installation 2 GB Full installation 2.5 GB, depending upon installation options	Default installation 3 GB Full installation 3.5 GB, depending upon installation options
Pointing Device	Microsoft Mouse-compliant	Microsoft Mouse-compliant
DVD	Any speed (for installation only)	Any speed (for installation only)
Optional Hardware	OpenGL®-compatible 3D video card Currently supported video cards Printer or plotter Digitizer Internet access Network interface card	Printer or plotter Internet access Network interface card

Modifying the 2008 Product Installation to install on 64bit OS

I just got a new laptop which of course is Vista 64-bit OS.  When I went to install AutoCAD Architecture 2008, it said it could not be installed.  So I searched the Autodesk Discussion Groups and found a discussion on this very topic.  Below is an excerpt from that discussion that has what you need to do to get AutoCAD Architecture 2008 installed on 64-bit OS.   It's amazing that I have not run into this until I actually tried to install it...I guess it just shows how many people are not using 64-bit OS's.

Note: These instructions use AutoCAD Architecture as the example, but can be used for AutoCAD MEP as well..

1. Download and install Orca from Microsoft.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/255905

1. Copy the contents of the DVD to your hard drive or a network folder.
2. Backup the files of the product .msi (ex: ACA.msi) and Setup.ini
3. Edit the product .msi (ex: ACA.msi) with Orca and delete the action found in the table
   "InstallExecuteSequence" that is called "CheckFor64BitOS" Delete the same
   line under table "CustomAction"
4. Save and close the product .msi (ex: ACA.msi)
5. Edit the Setup.ini with Notepad. Delete the line under
   "#==================== Platform Requirement" that is labeled
   "PLATFORM=NO_WOW_64_PROCESS"
6. Double-click the Setup.exe and you should be able to install without any
   problems.
7. If you leave the default paths for the installation of the content, this may or may not apply.
   1. Some support paths under the "Files" tab of the configuration dialog box
      have incorrect paths. The installer adds and extra "\AppData\AppData" to
      some support paths located in the user profile. For example the Main
      Customization File's path is listed as
      "C:\Users\%username%\AppData\AppData\AppData\Roaming\Autodesk\ACD-A
      2008\enu\Support\ADT" when it should be
      "C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Autodesk\ACD-A 2008\enu\Support\ADT"
8. Fix the incorrect paths (if necessary), hit apply, and you are good to go.

New Features Now Available Exclusively for Autodesk Subscription Customers

Effective March 28, Autodesk® Subscription members, as part of their benefits, can download the following new feature releases listed below. New feature releases include e-Learning and product downloads available exclusively for subscription members.

Autodesk® Impression 2 software and e-Learning lessons
Autodesk® Vault 2009 software
Autodesk® VIZ 2008 ProBooleans
Drawing Compare for AutoCAD® Architecture 2009 or AutoCAD® MEP 2009 software
Land Desktop Companion Extension for AutoCAD® Civil 3D® 2008 software

You can download these exciting new feature releases via the Subscription Center.