Recommended specifications for a computer to run Bricscad V13

Yaacov Lazar

We've just purchased several licenses of Bricscad Pro V13.
(We've been running Autocad R14 for several years on Windows XP)
It seems we'll have to upgrade several computers.

Would anybody like to recommend general specifications for a computer to run Bricscad V13?
mainboard, RAM (8gb I think), video card, HDD, (SSD? 60 or 120 gb?), operating system (windows 7 pro 64 bit I guess)

Keep in mind that we can't afford top-end systems as we might have to replace as many as 10 boxes.

(Though I might be able to persuade my boss to buy me a more powerful system.
I tend to work on the heavier projects. I'll ask for a SSD, but everybody else will probably not get one)

We work on mostly 2d drafting; train stations, public buildings and schools.
The plans can be quite dense and detailed with as many as twenty or thirty sheets per file.
3d work is mostly basic presentation using Sketchup, though we have a couple of seats of Photoshop for competitions.
Everybody has LibreOffice and The Gimp installed.

Any pitfalls to watch out for?

martin@enco.us

For today's Bricscad any processor 3GHz or better should be fine.  I run an i7-3770 with 8G of ram.  My staff uses 2.8GHz AMD Phenom II  X3 720 computers with 4G of ram.  We use the video system on the CPU.  For Bricscad I can't see any difference between the on-board video and a relatively high-end video card.  We do not do any rendering or gaming.  We run Windows 7 64 bit.  I don't see any advantage to having an SSD on a computer running CAD software.  Boot time might be lower with an SSD, but we only boot once a day.  I would not keep working drawings on an SSD.

John Gaunt

My (xp) system is pretty basic 6yrs old with 2Gb of ram and nothing is really a problem except minor occasional lags in files over about 3.5mb, which are not too typical for me.

I do have one job now that size with 29 layouts (and counting). Just yesterday I went to print about the third in a series of prints to PDF and V13 lost its 'previous' plot... plot.

When I tried to put it back, the plot styles list contained all my layer names instead. Closing/reopening didn't help.

I went back to V11 and printing worked properly without restarting the machine, it works again today in V13.

Don't know if that's a bug or V13 needs a better machine and/or more ram than I'm presently willing to gamble.

Robt Deans

I find BricsCad not terribly resource hungry.
I finally upraded to Windows 7 Pro w/ Intel Core i3 - 2120 Processor 3.3 GHz desktop (for $430), and it is very fast.
I also run it on a relatively pathetic netbook 1.66GHz 2Mb RAM. It runs without complaint (with a bunch of other apps running), not terribly zippy, but sufficiently responsive w/ no lags such that tick me off doing mostly 2D stuff.

Yaacov Lazar

Thanks! I guess if I have enough RAM, then a SSD is unnecessary.

I think a big part of our problem is that our larger files have several sheets (or dozens!) on the single Acad R14 style "layout" (we plot by views using a set of lisps)
So we might have up to several dozen unlocked viewports open at once in a single layout.
Apparently Bcad doesn't handle this as well as Acad R14 (which ran well on 64mb ram!).
Several of our computers are 5 or 4 years old with 2 gb ram.
I work at home with a similar machine with only 1.75 gb ram and have no particular problems, but maybe I'm used to how Bcad feels.

Of course, we will transition to the modern multiple layout style, plotting using sheet sets, but it will take a while.
I'm enjoying learning how they work. Cool!
Does anybody have a lisp that can edit or find-and-replace multiple attributes or texts on multiple layouts?

In the meantime, I'm trying to get our people to refrain from zooming all in paperspace with all layers and viewports on, and to avoid dense, complex "pretty" hatches.
I tell them that I can crash any supercomputer with a 10 kilobyte file using ridiculous hatches, multiple nested blocks, etc.
I think some of them have a similar ambition.
Last week I had to work on a 15 mb (?!) file which, after half a day of Bcad locking up, I eventually discovered had floor tile "hatches"
which were actually clipped inserts of a block containing an exploded hatch!   Replacing the "hatch" with a proper hatch reduced the file size to 2.5 mb.
Maybe Acad R14 handled this kind of stuff better.

Could it also be Windows XP Home? I know we have to transition to a more modern Windows on the new computers.
Windows 7 or 8? Pro? retail or OEM?
 I've heard awful things about Windows 8, but how long can we still purchase Windows 7?
Can we download it directly from Micr

Thanks for the advice.

martin@enco.us

I see no advantage for Windows 8.  Windows 7 Home Premium works well as long as you don't have to log on to a domain and is what I recommend.  Be sure to turn off all the time wasting visual effects.  I don't know what the licensing restrictions for the OEM version are where you are.  I use retail because there is less trouble re-activating Windows if replace a motherboard or video card.

Philip Craven

 In my experience BricsCAD Platinum V13 slows down noticeably when the number of layouts in a drawing gets up to about 20. I routinely split jobs with more layouts than that into two or more drawing files. If a layout has an embedded spreadsheet on it activating that one is noticeably slower than the others.

You may want to look at Win 8 Pro (which I am running now). If you find you do not like Win 8 the Pro version (and only that one) gives you the option to downgrade to Win 7 Pro.

(I'm staying with Win 8. It does have annoying quirks but there are ever more good workarounds for those. It is more minimalist and I think (subjectively) a little faster than Win 7.)

Definitely get yourself an SSD. Some are faster than others. I have a Crucial M4 in my notebook. I was shocked at how huge a difference it made in all around performance.

John Gaunt

Multiple layouts have always slowed down Bcad/Icad when working on the layouts. Originally multiple vports did the same, before multiple layouts.

 I'm not sure they make much difference working in model space in the same file - there the file size matters more, and layouts don't add much to that.

Even xrefing out the model doesn't help and I'm not sure which part of the machine most effects pspace performance, or stability as that appears to be approaching an issue in my one current demanding file in V13 but not yet in V11.

Splitting multiple layout files would be a giant pain.

If the most recent OS and a newer machine apparently don't address this issue, and I have few others, just upgrading my aging HDD with an SSD might be a good idea.

Knut Hohenberg

I don't want to join the discussion about adequate hardware here (I mostly run BricsCAD on a linux netbook with 1GB RAM, and that's all I need for 2d), just in case some of you didn't realize: recent versions of Bricscad use a layout cache, so if you work on a heavy drawing with several dozen layouts, it might be advisable to turn CACHELAYOUT off in order to avoid swapping (unless you got plenty of RAM).