wfincher Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 I suggested that one of our customers download the trial version of IronCAD. His company has about five seats of Inventor and he only has AutoCAD. His qustion to me after downloading IronCAD and liking what he saw was does IronCAD and Inventor seem to be on the same level of "professionallism". His supervisor kind of frowned on the idea of IronCAD and called it a "watered down, cheesy solid modeler" compared to Inventor. Inventor is one I have not used but I'm sure many of you have. What do you say? Bill Fincher Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Walter Moss Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 It's obvious that he doesn't have a clue of what he's talking. Ask him for the differences and since we are the ignorants, please tells us what's a watered down version of... My 2 cents. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tlehnhaeuser Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 Here it goes again. Here that one all the time. Ask him why AutoDesk and Dassault don't want to compare themselves to IC...because they know they can't. I constantly read the tips and tricks in the AutoDesk CAD digest it STILL amazes me that people want to use Inventor or AutoCAD foe that matter. I consistently see that AutoDesk products require 100-400% more effort to achiev the same results as IC. Its unforntunate that CAD users are forced to use Inventor and make their lives more difficult because their manager doesn't want o be more productive. I can't understand more people sticking with AutoCAD if they have no huge need for 3D, but I don't understand the Inventor syndrome. I have found that companies in USA are hugely pragmatic and hate change, wheres their European counterparts embrace change and innovation. I've seen Inventor, SolidWorks, ProE and they have all one thing in common besides the obvious and thats they are are trying to achieve the level of capability of IronCAD and since IC has great patents on their technology will NEVER achieve it. So, by purchasing something other than IronCAD puts you already behind the 8-ball (not the TRiBall, ha ha). Good Luck Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Lohman Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 My guess it that their use of the word "professionalism" has nothing to do with the level of quality of our products. They use Inventor because it has the big AutoCAD/AutoDESK label on it. There is a level of comfort that comes with using a name that you are familiar with and so they choose to stay within their comfort zone. I feel the same way when shopping for software. I want to know that the company that I am purchasing from has been around for a while; and that they will continue to exist for many years so that I don't "lose" my investment in them. No software is ever perfect so I'm always relying on product updates to improve my experience with software; and if the company name is unknown to me, then I'm initially uncomfortable with considering them. I have learned however, from my experience working here at IronCAD; that the unknown name could very well be a buried gem. Honeslty I can't blame the guy for wondering about us like that. The only thing we can say is that we've been around forever and we are here to stay. This product is not a hobby or some sort of shareware software. This is a serious cad application produced by a serious company. The thought just came to mind that...I wonder if he questioned the level of "professionalism" because the product is so easy to use? They have to work so hard at using Inventor that perhaps when they use IronCAD it feels like a toy because it is lacking the complexity (not functionality). If my view of professional CAD applications was always the ProE/SolidWorks way of modeling then perhaps IronCAD would seem to be lacking something because it's just soo much easier to use? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Allen Posted July 8, 2003 Share Posted July 8, 2003 Just because IronCAD is easy to learn and easy to use doesn't mean that any of the functionality has been "watered down." The simplicity of IronCAD's user interface is really what makes it such a powerful program. IronCAD allows you to be a professional designer, rather than forcing you to be a professional CAD operator. Too many CAD programs seem to be purposely designed to only be used effectively after months or years of training. But with IronCAD, the user can focus on creating rather than on how to constrain two parts together. It took me a few hours to get comfortable with the basics of the TriBall in IronCAD - and within a week I felt proficient with most of the rest of the program. Even assuming that Inventor's output appears equal to that of IronCAD, consider the time it takes to achieve that output and I think it will become instantly clear that IronCAD is the better program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joel Parrish Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 I recently had a customer visit to make some changes on a machine we are designing & building for them. The customer currently uses uptodate versions SolidWorks and Pro-E. And he had never heard of IC. I am certain that he was under the same "watered-down" impression. He was taken aback at how quickly I could make the changes he requested. I remember quotes like "you can't do that in..." & "doing that in ... takes forever" & "now I see why you said this is faster to model with than ... " I ended up spending an extra hour or so showing him different features and functionality of IC. I think I sold him on trying the demo. I think part of the 'watered-down' problem is name recognition. AutoDesk, SolidWorks, Pro-E all have the dollars to shove advertisements infront of potential customers. The next problem is, I havn't seen a recent review of IC in Cadence or Cadalyst in a long time. Anyone know a ghost writer? Or does anyone have the time to write a review and submit somewhere that would print or post it for other CAD users to see? There was some talk about IC advertising with Rhino. But I hav'nt seen any yet. Another thing, I havn't been to a trade show in a year or so. But I don't recall anyone displaying IC next to SolidWorks, SolidEdge, Inventor, Pro-E since it was a part of VDS. Basically what I am getting at is IC has all the functionality that the over blown CAD guys have. The speed of modeling complex assemblies is what keeps me with IC. (If I modeled the same part everyday with slight variations, I might use one of the others that is more 'strict' parametricly.) Let's all start a campaign "Take the IC challenge!!!" Challenge Inventor, SolidWorks, SolidEdge, Pro-E, users to download and try IC for the 30 days. Joel Parrish www.pai-design.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Per-Arne Almeflo Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 There can be no denial that efficiency in everyday commands and a manageble 3D tool like the triball, that is exclusive to IronCad, far outweight most bells and whistles of the others. But you must also consider that the latest D-Cubed tools for constraints and mechanism simulation are essential for designing machines. Others have them, IronCad may eventually get them. Hopefully sooner than later. Another thing that all 3D cad software have in common are the bugs. Search the other guys discussion groups for "crash to desktop" (it's so common they even created an acronym: "ctd") and you will see that IronCAD is not all that bad. But that's not much comfort when you try to fight the way through our own bugs though. A virtually bug-free environment would be a vast advantage over the others. Keep up the good work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tlehnhaeuser Posted July 9, 2003 Share Posted July 9, 2003 Following up with Joels experience, heres my quick story. I was sub-contractor by a large military company to work on a project for Boeing. Boeing's primary software was ProE. The Boeing rep came to my location with a native ProE file that required some tweaking assuming of course that I had ProE. Well much to his surprise I did not and was using IC. The first thing out of his mouth was "Oh! no. not another PC-based friggin CAD program!. Well, i basically said politically of course, shut-up and sit down. I took his native ProE file and brought it into IC 100% which astonished him right off the bat, then he directed my to eliminate some the features on the design and to add some. So through IC's built-in Auto-Feature, deleting the features took 2 clicks. and modifying a fairly comples pocket feature right before his eyes with no problems. DONE! it took all of 3 minutes which i suspect even in its own native ProE would have taken about 15 minutes. He was so astonished, that he though I did some smoke and mirrors and made me do all over again from the start...which I did because I'm a sucker for making a ProE user's jaw drop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Werner Schappacher Posted July 11, 2003 Share Posted July 11, 2003 Very interesting informations about IV users. http://discussion.autodesk.com/WebX?14@206.iipMazTbttJ.0@.f1591b5 Read this Thread: Logic and strategy for launching Autodesk Inventor Professional Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Lohman Posted July 11, 2003 Share Posted July 11, 2003 Eesh, I read much of that thread but just had to stop. Talk about setting their user forums on fire... Thanks Werner Tom you made me laugh too loud from reading your ProE post and I disturbed others in my work environment...THANKS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tlehnhaeuser Posted July 14, 2003 Share Posted July 14, 2003 Hi Chris, Always willing to bring a smile to someones face. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Floris Stam Posted July 14, 2003 Share Posted July 14, 2003 If you need help with inventor they will send you a design doctor. So you need a degree to really figure out Inventor?...hmm Seems that the doctor himself has to go true the manuals. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cborer Posted July 15, 2003 Share Posted July 15, 2003 I agree with all that and I love to work with IC But there is one thing they do better: They can produce proper dxf files! Where IC is lightyears away from! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Per-Arne Almeflo Posted July 15, 2003 Share Posted July 15, 2003 quote: Originally posted by cborer: But there is one thing they do better: They can produce proper dxf files! Where IC is lightyears away from! id=quote>id=quote> I heard even IV had problems with their DXF output, producing double lines that laser cutting machines could not handle. Some of the IC DXF issues are comma/dot oriented with different language settings. Should be fixable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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