CAD COMPARISONS

[cpariseau]

I am looking for a comparative test of ironcad v any other competitor especially solidworks. I need this info to help me prove that ironcad is as good or better than solidworks.

[Chris Lohman]

We have tried to get SW, PTC, and the other major CAD players to compete with us head to head in a public event, and they refuse to. So you may find it difficult to come across official metrics.

 

One thing to be aware of is that if you ask other CAD vendors how they're better than us; they will pull out an item for item list of features that they have that we do not. They will never address the fact that we are much faster and easier to use, because they can't compete with that; they'll instead try to get you with the feature comparison. They also won't tell you about how it takes soo much longer for someone to become an expert at their product (thousands of dollars of training and at least a year of use) than it does our (up an running in week, expert in 1-2 months w/no training).

 

When I worked for VDS, the company that purchased 3deye and turned trispectives into IRONCAD, I was supporting SolidDesigner by CoCreate. I remember the first time they dropped trispectives into our laps. My very first impression was, what a painful piece of crud this product is. I had that first impression because I was trying to use our product like it was SolidDesigner: IE, start by creating a 2d profile, then extrude the profile into a 3d shape. IronCAD was sooo simple that I didn't get it. Once someone finally explained that all I had to do was drag/drop and could create a part in 5 seconds verses 5 minutes, suddenly the grass outside became greener, the sun was warmer, birds were landing on my shoulder and whistling happy tunes...I was a changed man. So by telling you of my first experience with the product, if you really want to prove to someone that "faster and easier" really means faster by 3-400% and will save you thousands of dollars of salary wasted in drawing profiles and fighting with slow cad systems, then you really need to sit down with the person that you are proving this to and SHOW them ironcad. Let them drag/drop and create their own parts and realize for themself that this truly is a good move over solid works.

 

Since moving from SolidDesigner to IronCAD I've always realized that now that I've used ironcad, there is just no way I could ever support any other product. If for some reason I left this company, I could just never bring myself to work for any other CAD developer. I'd have to move away from the CAD industry entirely if I couldn't use IRONCAD every day.

 

Ok ok, I'll stop now. Oh by the way, I don't get a commission or anything. I honestly feel that ironcad is the fastest and easiest cad product and that anyone that truly gives it a chance will realize how ludicrous it is to struggle with those other cad applications.

 

 

[tlehnhaeuser]

I agrre with Chris, If I had to go to another company and be forced to use any otehr cad product other than IronCAD. I would seriously consider finding a new profession. Knowing that IronCAD exists and not being able to use it would be a sentence that i couldn't live with.

For years I 've heard many engineering professionals..."When is someone going to develop software thats easier"...Well someone did..thats IronCAD. So people need to listen to there intial pains again.

Just my 3 cents

 

 

[Andrew Owens]

If you had no other choice, you could just get that CAD job and secretly use IronCAD to do your work, then import into the other cad package. All the other poor schmucks working around you wouldnt be able to figure out why you're putting out 300% more work and spending half the day on coffee break! Just imagine the hell that would break loose when they found out your little secret. IronCAD LLC could hire and train corporate CAD infiltrators to instigate descent among I should stop now while Im ahead

 

Andy

 

[mmccall]

I speak from experience just like many others in the IronCad community.

 

I have had a significant number of hours... work hours designing real products... years of experience.... on nearly EVERY cad system out there today (except for the few new systems only a few months old, but not for long), and Ironcad IS the best that I have come across... I deal with new programs all the time... there are so many customers out there with other programs, I just simply have no choice.

 

In alot of ways, especially in how tough the program is, it reminds me of my Unigraphics days on the unix boxes begining with version 9... long before the Solid Edge look of today.... I remember all of these programs in their infant stages... I grew up with them... watching..

 

Ironcad gives you so much freedom... sit and go. In fact thats the way UG was for many years... no constraints... make a block, carve it up or go full parametrics ... rounds that never fail....

 

Hopefully without offending anyone, Ironcad is what UG should have become !!

 

 

I personally ran round and shelling feature tests of Ironcad 2.0 vs Pro-E v19 !!!... Ironcad smoked it on their second release!!!... Pro-E has been around for years.

 

I have worked on everything and once warmed up I can run with the big dogs on any system... there are alot of people out there that can do this also...

 

The real question is, do they like it ??.. Do they like working on a cad program that is so restrictive and difficult?

Despite anyones expertise in a program, they generally have enough humanity left in them to say "... this program takes years to master...", or " this program can be difficult"...

 

I NEVER feel that way with Ironcad.

 

Ironcad truly makes modeling fun and fast...

 

For my company... Ironcad is the program I prefer to use!!

[cborer]

Chris

I didn't know that your are a naturalist! ( birds, green grass ...)

But I agree with you all!

I was on a show where somebody tried to create a rotation body with mechanical desktop, he tried about 20 minutes. I do it with IC in 5 seconds.

But the best is that I can change the ground-shapes after many operations.

Carlo

 

 

[Per-Arne Almeflo]

See the shoot-out between Inventor and Solid Works on:

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/item?siteID=123112&id=2178040&linkID=2749403

 

This was carried out by a couple of Autodesk User Groups.

Solid Works did not have the guts to send a guy there, but someone hired a SW user that was currently unemployed to work the SW software.

Much critisism was arised in the SW community about biased tests and such, but now its in black on white on the Autodesk home page anyway. Why don't turn the bias in favour of IronCAD for once?

The test should include a large conceptual change half way to the finish. This is what the CAD visionaries are looking for and it would give them something to write home about.

 

It should not be impossible to carry out such a test, if you really want to do it.

 

 

[Guest IronKevin]

This article describes the true story behind the Solidworks vs. Inventor "shootout":

 

http://www.cadserver.co.uk/common/viewer/archive/2002/Aug/13/news1.phtm

 

The problem with these kinds of competitions is that they are notoriously biased.

 

IronKevin

 

 

[Guest IronKevin]

Here's a document that outlines the differences between IronCAD and most other solid modeling systems out there:

 

 

 

IronKevin

 

The IRONCAD Difference.doc

[Guest rbame]

I have been playing around with what is considered the best modelers in the indusry, 3DS Max and Maya. The simple modeling is nowhere near as good as IC, and you will not believe how spoiled you are with the Tri-Ball, drag and drop parts and basic camera control. The only seperations are Mesh Deformation, rendering and Animation. I think the animation is the weakest feature in IC, even though most CAD packages don't even try it. I have now started exporting to these packages for animation.

 

My other complaint which deals with only Solid Edge is the ability to export to a web interface. Another is the ability to export a part to Illustrator or Corel Draw.

 

I do not even considered it fair to compete with other CAD packages, since IC is on the fence with CAD and modeling packages.

 

[dsulli]

Has anyone read the March 2003 issue of CADENCE magazine? Joe Greco wrote an article called "Taking Stock of MCAD, Greco's picks for Bragging rights."

 

In the article he picks the MCAD programs that he feels are tops in various catagories. If there is anyone around who knows quite a bit (not everything, but more than most non-users) about almost every MCAD program in existence, Joe is that person. Here's a brief summary of his picks and catagories: (note: IronCAD version tested was 5.0.)

 

Industrial Design: Think3

Honorable mention: VX CAD/CAM and Cobalt from Ashlar-Vellum

 

Machine Design: SolidWorks

Honorable mention: Solid Edge and Inventor

 

Manufacturing (CAM): VX Corp

HM: SolidWorks

 

Mold Design: VX (Mold Edition)

HM: SolidWorks

 

Plastic parts: ImpactXoft IX SPeeD

HM: Inventor

 

Sheet Metal Design: Tie between Solid Edge and SolidWorks

HM: Think3 and IronCAD

 

Weldment Design: Solid Edge

HM: Inventor

 

Collaboration: Alibre Design

HM: IX SPeeD

 

Conceptual Modeling: IronCAD

HM: Pro/Desktop from PTC

 

Design Communication: SolidWorks

HM: Inventor, Solid Edge, VX CAD/CAM

 

Drafting: Solid Edge

HM: IronCAD, Inventor and Think3

 

Surfacing: VXCAD/CAM and Cobalt

HM: Think3, SolidWorks, Inventor and Solid Edge

 

PDM: Solid Edge

HM: IronCAD, SolidWorks, Alibre, Think3

 

Interoperability: Solid Edge and VX CAD/CAM

HM: SolidWorks

 

Visualization: IronCAD

HM: SolidWorks

 

Analysis: SolidWorks

HM: Solid Edge

 

Design Knowledge: Solid Edge

HM: Think3

 

Motion: SolidWorks

HM: Solid Edge

 

Third Party Support: SolidWorks

HM: Solid Edge and Inventor

 

My Opinion? Often, using a program that boasts of having the MOST features ends up being the most time-consuming to use and master. AutoCAD has evolved into a program that takes literally years to master and many of us who have spent years learning know that it is one of the most difficult 2D programs out there - too many dang bells and whistles that are often very cumbersome to utilize effectively. Mechanical Desktop was even more complicated and was abandoned in huge numbers because of it.

 

Solid Works, Solid Edge, and Inventor strive to be all things for all people, but the fact remains that if you want design freedom and the ability to learn quickly and get the job done, MOST mechanical designers would find IronCAD to be the best.

 

There are some people in my company who want SolidWorks, primarily because if they ever leave the company, they will be more marketable. Recently, we were forced to buy two seats of SW for a government contract and a couple of the SW-requesters have been trying to learn it. After two or three weeks, I no longer hear that SolidWorks is the better program. They are learning quickly that the TriBall has no equal; they are very much spoiled rotten by IronCAD's ease-of-use.

 

....my two cents.....

 

Dave

 

[tlehnhaeuser]

One thing I have noticed in these "un-biased" articles is that you should take them witha grain of salt. I have seen and caught many errors in them . I don't know if its just as simple as not knowing of something more sinister.

So, that being said. In that above list IronCAD should have topped many of the catagories.

Just my paranoid 2 cents.

 

 

[Mike Twining]

Geez... I hope by "Drafting" Joe meant ability to create stuff in 3D and not 2D. If IC gets honorable mention for 2D I don't think I can trust old Joe G. anymore (no offence to you IronWood guys... you have done some great things with the 2D lately...making it usable and what not... but I think it still needs a little tweaking). My $.02.

 

MikeT

[dsulli]

Holy cow! I thought you had left the clan! Welcome back, Mike. It sounds like you haven't tried the latest version of IronCAD. 2D is vastly improved over version 2 and 3 that you had mastered. Try the download and you'll see that Joe is right. There still aren't as many gizmos as in SolidWorks, but Joe did deem IronCAD as the best in the world when it comes to conceptual design and presentation.

 

It's good to hear that you are still an IronCAD guy.

 

Dave Sulli

RD Instruments

[Jeff Myler]

I am an Industrial Designer/Engineer for a display design firm. Our firm has several guys on Macs using formZ who struggle to to bring concepts to production because of its 3D-2D associative weakness and inability to communicate with PC dominated manufacturing vendors. Everyone has been amazed of how I can produce photo realistic renderings, quickly produce detailed part drawings for quote and provide usable electronic files for manufacturing to vendors on just about any platform. Our only other PC engineer who uses AutoCAD no longer does part drawings as it takes too long. Try revising parts and drawings in FomZ, forget it. I could not do without IronCad's sheet metal and unfolding capabilities. With IronCAD I provide usable electonic files for SLA modles, cutting molds, cutting metal or plastics and get parts for approval quickly and at less cost. I can email unfolded parts and have them cut and back to me the next day. I quicly got buried with all the engineering and the mac guys said we can't do that, so we hired another PC guy who wanted to work on Pro-E since he had been trained on it. I was anxious to see what this big expensive package could do. I see a lot of frustration, feature failures, and head aches to achieve parts and communications that are a breeze in IronCAD. The Pro-E guy is always asking how would I model a part in IronCAD and I show him in a few minutes. And to top it off, I drag on realistic materials, image maps with graphics and spin it by simply dragging on animation. Management was bummed to find they spent so much money on Pro-E and they could not get realisitc renderings from it without shelling out thousands more. My IronCAD catalog is full of display related models ie: push fasteners, casters, ect. that I can drag and drop. IronCad's fastener module is the best I've seen. I like learning new better software, but I have not found one yet that beats Ironcad's features and intuitiveness. Our business, like advertising, is fast paced and IronCAD gives me the freedom and speed to try out quick ideas and the CAD power and ability to detail and produce accurate parts. Animation could use some additions, but as for most of us, it's not a priority in getting our daily work done.

 

[Shaun Murphy]

Greetings friends of IronCAD;

 

I thought you might be interested in a customers view of why they prefer IronCAD to Solidworks. There are many other people out there who would prefer to work the IronCAD way; they just dont know it exists.

 

These are the things IC does better:

 

Island sketches, SW can only do single continuous line in sketch. No base feature required. Working in the Assembly environment is way better. In SW it is awkward to design new part in the context of the existing parts. IC still wins the learning curve. I trained my replacement at Forte in one day. IC does not require Center Lines, points, axiss. IC does not require exclusive use of planes. In IC there is no X, Y, Z. The biggest draw back in SW is all this talk about design intent. How can you predict your entire design at the clean sheet phase. And once you start down a path you are locked in. SW calls making parts in the Assembly environment as "In Context Design", yet, I have yet to see any documentation on how to do it. And that is because, how do you write a manual on "design intent". There is a bunch of Parent/Child stuff in SW that IC doesnt require. SW drawing package is a little better, but IC is catching up. I have yet to see how part properties is used in SW. They are not using any at Ray O Vac (ROV) so I figure it doesnt exist.

 

I Design with IC and simulate with SW.

 

Cheers

 

 

 

 

[gbird]

Hello all,

 

Thanks Kevin for your help in getting me back on board.

 

I have not used IronCAD for 6 months because my new employer only uses Pro E.

 

There is no compison between IronCAD to Pro E 2001(up to PTC's Wildfire). They are so different in ease of use it is like comparing a Porche to a Donkey cart - with a very irritable donkey.

 

Hopefully I can get back to using IronCAD soon and do some fast work and have a lot of fun at the same time.

 

Cheers

 

Geoffrey