solidworks2006 vs inventor11

hi,
i need to buy a 3d software for solid modelling. i have a choice
between solidworks2006 & inventor11. so plz advise as to which software
i should buy. also plz give some points to support your opinion.

 

That's no choice! That's like saying "choose between the Cadillac or the
KIA". UGS Solid Edge V19 and SolidWorks 2006 is a choice. Both on a stable
and capable modeling kernel (Parasolid from UGS), both use a state of the
art 2D/3D constraint manager (D-cubed from UGS), and both backed by
companies/personnel who have been involved with 3D mechanical CAD for more
than 2 decades.

Inventor employs a modified version of the ACIS modeling kernel which is not
used in any mid-high end CAD software. They are now responsible for their
own development and do not have an open data model, so their is no direct
model transfer format such as their is with Parasolid (X_T, X_B). Inventor
is behind both Solid Edge and SolidWorks in maturity, and their published
sales are a farce as they now bundle it with ACAD and most of the seats they
claim to have sold are still sitting on a customers shelf in an unopened
box. Just ask if Inventor has PMI (Product Manufacturing Information)
capability which allows annotation of a 3D model per ASME Y14.41 Product
Data Definition. Both Solid Edge V19 and SolidWorks 2006 do!

Ken

 

Buy what will allow you to work as seamlessly as you can with your
suppliers and most particuarly with your customers.

I am going to be a bit facetious, but if all your customers use Catia,
then learn Catia and use it.

Bo

 

May I , too (be facetious)?
Ten (or 15?) years ago, that's what was in use in this company, when I
joined it. Customers did not know a damn about CAD, and people here were
(almost) "forced" to use the rear side of used xerox copies to make
drawings.

We do not use the same tools as our customers anymore. We use SW.

If you are considering IV, do have SE and SW demos.

 

I a non-critical application, I can agree you don't need to use your
customer's CAD app.

But if you are doing something critical, say nuclear engineering,
airframes, etc., and your customer wants the data in native format they
use, then figure a way to do native format they way the customers
wants.

It gets back to the same old time worn aphorism from the machine shop.
"Use the best tool for the job." If SWks is a great tool, or the best
tool on that job, then go for it.

Bo

 

so plz advise as to which

I'd go with TurboCAD if I were you. You have a Lot to learn and you won't waste
a lot of money to boot.

Seriously; the fact you asked means you aren't qualified to evaluate the
answers. Get some trusted source help making the decision. For most cover all
the bases use it's a Solidworks | Pro/E toss up, maybe SE (look at user base and
compatibility). Inventor or Alibre for low end use. Which one depends on
whether or not you are doing medium (100+ parts) or smaller assemblies, need
multi-user collaboration capability. Keep in mind that one of those is a start
up, maybe some promise, the other looks like it's already peaked, one is focused
on 3D, the other is an overpriced sideline from a 2D CAD developer that's been
trying for a decade to make a name for itself in mechanical 3D and not quite
made it.

http://www.alibre.com/products/comparison.asp

 

Apart from many advises you have already received I would like to suggest
you read IV and SW discussion forums for a month before committing yourself
to a particular software. Subject, you are not in a hurry to buy one. I wish
the company I work for did just that. But alas...

Igor.

 

I have had IV 5 through IV10 and was so frustrated with IV in general
that I switched over to SW even though I had over $10k invested in IV
and about 2 years of struggling with it. When I changed over to SW I
estimated that I was comprobably on the learning curve after about 3
months with SW compartd to about 9 months with IV.

The major reason was that IV was fairly unstable. Some minor change
routinely resulted in dozens of errors that could take hours to track
down and corret.

I just saw some of the IV11 roleout stuff and they do really make IV
look good. SW looks like it is much harder to learn because things are
tucked away here and there at times but the advantages of layout are
only worth about two issues with IV and are shortly lost.

Hope this helps,

Ed

 

I meant some (most?) of us sell to end users, that require the product, a
user manual, and (for some) tips on installing the product. No CAD there.
If you are doing sub-contracting, things are different.

 

Jean Marc, I see your point, and it is valid.

What I also see, though, is that when I work with a particular
mold-maker for my plastic products, life goes a lot smoother if we
exchange native format information.

It just so happens that LOTS & LOTS of mold makers are using SolidWorks
in recent times. I find a lot of moldmakers using more than one 3D CAD
application, because they (in turn) see value in having the native
applications that THEIR customers use.

It works both ways.

Bo

 

Ken,

Actually, Inventor will read and write standard ACIS version 7 .sat files.
We have a vendor in the U.K. that's using it.

We also have a new client that's currently using Solid Edge, they're
switching over to Solidworks. Not because of capability, but because
everyone they deal with uses Solidworks.

Mark

 

MM, and all, ... I rest my case.

Bo

 

The fact that Inventor reads/writes ACIS V7 files does no good when the rest
of the industry is using ACIS V15. So if Autodesk developed Shapemanager
beyond the capabilities that existed when they took the source code (V7),
and Spatial developed ACIS beyond the capabilities of V7, then any app using
a newer version of ACIS and the current version of Inventor must perform a
conversion to render the internally stored model back to a V7 format model.
What do you think happens with any features that required the newer version
to exist??? That is not a neutral geometry transfer!.

Ken

 

I think this is highly dependent on the work that you do. If you are a
manufacturer that makes most of what you produce from raw material, or
otherwise design it in whole, then you use whatever works for you. If you
are a job shop or supplier, then you work with whatever works for your
customers because you are at their mercy.

No manufacturers that I know of ask what their vendors use (many mandate
what their vendors must use), but I've seen it the other way around for
sure. In my industry, if we asked our vendors what to use, we'd be on
AutoCAD :^(

Ken

 

Ken,

Neither .sat (ACIS) or .x_b/t (Parasolid) carry over feature information.
They aren't neutral formats, they are kernal level geometry descriptions.
All they contain is B-rep information, faces, vertices, boundary curves,
etc. You end up with a dumb solid.

Solidworks can read parasolid back to version 8, and acis back to version
1.6. This seems to be the rule rather than the exception with CAD software
these days. The only system that I know of that won't read older kernal
level files is U.G.. And they may have changed of late.

There will come a time when it may be an issue for I.V. though. I don't
think reading older versions comes for free. There must be at least a
minimal amount of coding necessary to maintain it.

Mark

 

These are all great discussions and I absolutely agree that it is
extremely important to use the same software as your clients, (if
possible). A similar issue, possibly more important is what is
compatable with the shops that will be used.

The shop that I use has Master CAM which has a free module for reading
SW files directly. This is very helpful.

Most of my clients use SW and most of the shops that I work with are
compatable with SW, but beyone these two things, if the CAD software is
unstable and hard to use, (which is the case with IV) then I'm not sure
that compatability really matters.

Ed

 

Mark,
I know what SAT/Parasolid file formats are. I know the specific
modelers feature history is removed and that the result is a native rep of
the internally stored B-rep model. My point is, if an app using Parasolid
V18 saves a X_T file out to an earlier version, the risk is that some
geometry may have to be approximated or completely removed due to the
inability of an earlier Parasolid version to support it. The same is true
for ShapeManager as well as ACIS based products.

And "Neutral" was not what I wanted to use. I was looking for something
that meant translationless.

Being that they are geometry kernel models, there is no translation when
sending them to another app using the same kernel (unless it is a much older
version). So it is more of a geometry "exchange". In fact, apps based on
the same kernel can often times directly open another apps files and get to
it's geometry by directly reading the Parasolid stream from the file, and it
is fast as there is no conversion.

Ken

 

That sounds like a native data exchange compatibility driven change.

Something to consider while on the subject of compatibility, to my knowledge
Solid Edge and Pro/E are the only two commonly named systems that have any kind
of associative cross-release and / or cross-product interoperability. I'm
suprised Solidworks and Catia don't seem to be investigating possibilities for
direct data exchange. Kernel barrier?

 

Ken,

Kinda figured you did know, just a terminology thing.

I just know that I've never had a problem saving recent Solidworks files
into any older kernal file,,,yet.

Don't know about ACIS, but parasolid really only uses two types surfaces,
analytic, and algorithmic. Analytic covers several sub types, planar,
revolved, etc., and algorithmic covers the rest including most fillets. This
basic surface math hasn't changed much (if at all) over the years. What has
changed are the kernal level functions used to manipulate them.

Mark

 

I don't know about you, bubba, but I wouldn't consider a program from a
developer that can't think up an original name for the program and corporate
execs video tape themselves running around in their underwear and masks.