64 bit comments

I just spent 2 weeks experimenting with winxp64 on my new shiny conroe
computer. I thought "This is the time to make the switch, sw has 64
bit etc etc."

Today I rebuilt my system with my old win32 disc. Apart from
solidworks issues there were:

I'm wondering how other people put up with 64bit systems. Below is a
list representing about 10% of the problems I encountered. I'm
breathing a sigh of relief that the experiment is over!

No printer drivers for my 9650hp or my canon all-in-one
No cd burning in itunes (I need music to work!)
Nvidia 64bit drivers (solidworks cert ones) would not, no matter what,
respect dualview settings in regards to applications being limited or
not to one monitor - this was driving me batty.
2 plugins I use with sw wouldn't load of course
My online backup service would only work with a hack
Many very minor things functioned just slightly differently enough to
be noticable
SW64 crashed 'a lot'. It crashed just after opening, and select file
open probably 20 times. I had hosts of bizarre non-repeatable bugs and
ctd's. Including a cosmos motion dialogue popping up on screen
everytime photoworks finished rendering. Animator not respecting time
segment to render and rendering the whole thing etc. I wont bore you
with the details

Zander

 

this makes me not want to switch for a long time i was actually
thinking about it thanks for the details and I feel your pain

 

DISCLAIMER!!! PLEASE DON'T READ THIS POST AS BOB ZEE PICKING ON
ZANDER! BOB ZEE JUST WANTED TO BE THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN! (the
butt side...)
:~)>

bob z. feels you on this one. nobody has 64bit printer drivers. bob
z. uses a print to pdf program and then prints from another computer
that still uses that weak, embarrassing, poor excuse an operating
system, windows xp 32 bit.
link for the program can be found here:
http://www.pdf995.com/

bob zee feels no pain here. there is only one way to burn down rome
and that is to use NERO. bob zee NEEDS music also. bob zee uses a
program called 'cdngo' to rip the audio disc to create his ogg vorbis
files. these are just like mp3's, but better.

bob zee doesn't have 2 monitors so this was a non-issue for him. bob
zee is using a plain-jane geforce video card with the latest 64bit
drivers from nvidia with no issues. none.

the only real issue that has frustrated bob zee with this whole 64bit
thing is ultimatezip doesn't work in 64. ultimatezip rocks your face
off!
anti-virus is an issue that was not very difficult to overcome. this
company has anti-virus software for the 64bit platform:
http://www.avast.com/

bob zee has never had such rock solid stability as has been found in
his latest computer. bob zee built this thing back in May. not a
single CTD with swx2007-64 and windowsxp64.

here are the specs (just to brag a little):
shuttle SN25P case (socket 939 - nForce4 Ultra)
corsair 2gb pc3200 ram
athlon 64 x2 3800+ (2.0ghz)g
geforce 7600gt 256mb (pci-express)
pioneer 16x dvd burner
western digital caviar 250gb SATA 3.0
19" lcd

bob zee only replied to this post to let everyone know that 64bit
computing isn't as far off as it seems. bob zee hasn't had issues
lately, so we don't hear from him. when he is upset, he is loud -as
are most people.
:~)>

bob z.
p.s. No man of the flesh could ever stop me
The fight for this fish is a fight to the death

 

No worries bobzee... you didn't pick very hard!

I've used pdf995 for years but I'm too damn busy to slide over to
another machine
I use nod32 from eset for anitvirus -works on either 32 or 64.

I did have a very very hard time finding a 64bit firewall - tiny makes
one that barely works if you can download it and the avg one I found
difficult.

The mate bug in 2007x64 was driving me crazy, I know they'll fix it in
sp1 which will be out....shortly.

My old system was identical to yours except it has crucial instead of
corsair:
here are the specs (just to brag a little):

My new system is a conroe e6400 with 2gb of ocz ram. Asus p5b deluxe
wifi. I'm happy to say it benchmarks 50% faster than my x2 3800.

I'm surprised you've found sw2007 x64 so stable. One of my customers
use it as well and like me they are experiencing many crashes. As I
mentioned, all I needed to do was open sw and click on open to crash
(obviously not everytime but enough....) Who knows, could be something
like having a different video card or anything really.....

In any case I'm anxious to get back into the 64bit world, I loved not
being able to run out of memory. It just seems to early for a broad
suite of applications.

Zander

 

oh my goodness. that mate distance issue is a killer. bob z. will do
a measure first, copy the measured distance and then hit mate (while
the faces, edges, whatever are still selected) and paste the measured
distance into the box. an awful workaround, but a necessary one.

bob z.

 

ok, i forgot to mention this in my previous post. ---oops fell out of
character for a second!
:~)>

bob zee forgot to mention this in the previous post. bob zee installed
swx2007-64 on his home computer. it would not run! as soon as it
started and the splash screen disappeared, swx would CTD. INSTANTLY!!!

bob zee is a little embarrassed to say... his C: drive was full.
that is it. that was the only problem. no warning messages, no signs,
nothing. kinda weird. deleted some files and voila! all better.
:~)>

bob z.

 

Just curious if anyone is seeing "failed to save document" type
messages since switching to the 64 bit version of SolidWorks? Our
company is currently testing 64 bit and I have been selected to be the
guinea pig. On several occasions I have done work on a part or drawing
with some rather large assemblies in lightweight mode. After making a
couple changes I try to save the file and get the message that I cannot
save the document. Are there any work arounds for this problem?

 

That's strange, I had that error a whole bunch of times with x64 but
never figured out a solution.

 

G3nut is writing:
I have been using XP64 from 1st release and Swx64 since pre-release
initially drivers were thin on the ground but eventually I had all the
x64 drivers I needed (Bar one HP 9300 printer).
The A2 Epson COLOR 3000 has x64 drivers. SWx64 I my opinion is more
stable the it's 32bit counterpart. Currently running SWx64 2007 SP0.0
but have just downloaded SP0.1
Dual monitors has never been a bproblem but nVidia dual screen desktop
contol program needs avoiding as at best it is flakey leaving ghost
images from icons all over the displays.

current system:
Dual Core 939 AMD 4600+ x64 Athlon
2 x WD 10k 36gb drive in a raid 0 array
4Gb of Corsair DDR 400 Memory
nVidia Quadro FX700 AGP Graphics
Dual 20.1 Ilyama TFT LCD's

Since the release of SW2007 x64 the only major problem I am having is
slow saving times this is despite SolidWorks suggesting that the save
times have been improved.

 

Thanks for the info. My problem with the nvidia dual view setup is
that option that doesn't allow apps to span monitors doesn't work
properly - it has a mind of it's own, working then not working over and
over. I usually have all apps restricted to one monitor except
solidworks and a few other 3d things.

Zander

 

Out of curiosity, why are you running SWx64? You only have 4 GB of RAM
which renders any advantage of SWx64 null and you then need to put up with
the x64 immaturity issues.

Ken

 

well, Ken, we can't all be the ones who stand around and wait for the
'biggest guy' to step forward. some of us little guys have to go into
the DEEP end of the pool!

bob z. just got a FAILED TO SAVE. oh my goodness. why won't they let
good ol' bob zee save his work? he did this work for a reason and then
the won't let him save? oh the humanity!!!

poor bob z. is about to have a nervous breakdown...

bob z.
p.s. http://bobzee1.googlepages.com/failedtosave

 

bob zee obviously didn't have his ducts in a row.

 

After receiving a "failed to save document" message what I discovered
you can do is to save the file to a new location and then replace the
older file with the new one. What a major pain in the arse this is. I
hope SolidWorks is working on a fix for this problem. I cannot believe
they would have released this software with such a major screw-up as
this.

 

G3nut Writes:
Correct! "out of curiosity" initially but 32bit is limited to 2Gb or
3Gb with the switch wheras x64 uses all of the 4Gb. Again initially x64
SW2006 was more stable than 32bit SW2006 but I am know in the position
of running x64 SW2007 only although I have it installed on a very
similar system at home (sad) that is 32bit. It works ok but is slower
by a factor of about 2. I am also running a dual boot with XP pro &
Vista Ultimate and SW2007 x32 runs with no problems. Vista has a neat
trick with memory in that if you plug in a USB memory Key it with ask
if you would like to use this as system memory so your motherboard
memory can be extended. I curently use a (cheaper then DDR) 4Gb USB
Key.
Food for thought.

 

Hi Ken,

As mentioned with SWx64 running on winxp64 the memory usage of
soldiworks can actually exceed the 1.6gb limitation of win32 and even
exceed the physical 4gb in my system because 64bit software running in
a 64bit os can theoretically access upto 16TB of ram!!!!! See borked
table below:

Memory Component 32-bit 64-bit
Virtual memory 4GB 16TB
Page file size 16TB 512TB
Hyperspace 4MB 8GB
Paged Pool 470MB 128GB
Nonpaged Pool 256MB 128GB
System Cache 1GB 1TB
Page Table Entries 660MB 128GB

Zander

 

Seen this occasionally just use the save as option, it then works ;o()
You can then rename the file back to your original and all seems ok
again (till the next time)

 

This problem has reached the point where I was no longer able to even
save the file to a different location. SolidWorks corporate has
acknowledged this as a serious problem and promises a fix to be issued
with sp1.1 (release date to be announced). The fix was to uninstall
sp1.0 and re-install sp0.0 until an update is ready.