What's the problem? I tend to think MoI is quite restrained with its T&Cs.

Martin.

"This free download:

• Is available to any active maker, CAD enthusiast, or design challenge competitor interested in using CAD to bring their ideas to life.
• Is intended for personal use, and may not be used for commercial purposes

Note: Files created in this edition cannot be opened in commercial versions of Solid Edge and 2D drawings are watermarked, but your designed parts and assemblies can be 3D printed so you can easily create prototypes."

I've looked through the Solid Edge-CE 'EULA' SoD – and didn't see anything that particularly bothered (or surprised me). The restrictions stated above don't really concern me.

What is it that worried you in practical terms about it's use by Hobbyists?

Regards,

IanT

I tried FreeCAD 0.20 a few days ago. I was very dissapointed to discover that the old problems still exist. It's no good adding more functions to a programme if the old functions are still faulty.

I did try MOI a year or two ago, I can't remember why I didn't get on with it. Maybe it was the trial period thing.

My copy of Solid edge is the community version 2021. It has never asked me to log on to the Solid edge website or update the licence. I tried modifying a design I started months ago, but I still find the interface and usability of the programme very clumsy. I know, too impatient! In reality, the programme is taking up space on my hard drive, I should delete it, but it's a big drive so I will leave it a bit longer.

For me, it's Designspark mechanical. The programme is so easy to use. It lacks a few features, mirror being one of them and a decent text creation tool. I don't miss having a mirror tool, but it would be handy now and then. The lack of a text tool is no problem.

If I could buy a cut down version of Solidworks for £150 will a lifetime licence, I would jump at it. And if there were upgrades now and then that you could opt out of or take advantage of, count me in.

I also have a paid for copy of a programme called Viacad. The youtuber, Myfordboy uses it to produce his 3D printed parts for sand casting. Viacad is installed on an old windows 7 computer that doesn't get much use.

I've been using OnShape for a couple of years now. I agree that the learning curve is steep (and I'm still on it), but I found it easier to get to grips with than a few others I tried at the same time.

I expect I'm not using it as an engineer would, but it does enough for all the things I want to do.

I actually really like it and I would certainly recommend it as an option. Especially as it is free if you don't mind exposing your jottings to the universe. If anyone is mad enough to steal my models, they deserve everything that happens to them!

I think there are a few other users and it does pop up from time to time, but I agree it's not as popular as many. Perhaps because it's the new kid on the block…

Iain

I find Onshape the most intuitive one and have had very few problems with it other that lack of speed for complex models, possibly because of not yet having high speed a fibre connection here.

My introduction to CAD was in the early 1980s when, as technical manager of an electronics company, I was put in charge of the drawing office and wanted to bring it up to date. The chief draftsman was sceptical but I bought a portable IBM AT and installed Autocad v.1.2. Having spent a few evenings learning to use it myself I persuaded him to take it home just to play with it. After a couple of weeks he was converted and wanted to replace all but one drawing boards with workstations!

In the next decade I employed an outside design house to design some stylish housings and they used Solidworks. On a business trip to Malasia I visited a shopping centre and found a computer store selling pirate copies of software and bought a CD of Solidworks 2000. When I got home I was surprised to find that it worked and I used that for hobby 3D design. After a few years it ceased to work on my new home computer as it wanted an obsolete CPU. Then Onshape appeared, designed by some programmers who had left Solidworks. I found the transition easy and intuitive. Onshape is free to use provided you don't mind your models being in the public domain. That doesn't bother me as I am retired and don't do commercial work.

I have dabbled with Fusion 360 but don't like the lack of Linux support as I'm trying to get rid of Windoze on my computers. Worse still is the gradual removal of features in the free version.

Freecad is great in principle, works on Windows, Linux, and Mac. It is however a work in progress and the developers seem to be trying to run before they can walk. I have spent some time following tutorials succesfully but when I come to do my own projects I keep hitting snags.

So for now Onshape is my goto 3D software.

Russell

Typo I think Pete, they meant to say your crash is the 2 per month one, and are prioritising more common causes.

I've crashed FreeCAD, Fusion360, and am currently crashing Solid Edge several times per day. Part of the problem is the difficulty of handling errors caused by models with illegal geometries, which are easily produced by trainees not quite in tune with how the software works.

Noticeable that now I'm familiar with it, I rarely crash FreeCAD, but many others find it unstable. Of the three CAD packages I've invested significant time in, I found Fusion least likely to crash. In comparison Solid Edge is very unstable, but:

• I'm using an elderly second-hand graphics card to drive two screens and the drivers were out-of-date. Updating them and switching off advanced graphics seems to have reduced the number of crashes.
• The crashes occur in one model, which is a complex assembly, an engine, and almost always occur when the model is animated. (Single parts and non-moving assemblies are very unlikely to crash.) The model could be faulty:
  • My understanding of how 'Synchronous Mode' and 'Design Intent' works was initially poor, and is still imperfect. The tools are powerful, and mostly intuitive, but editing can produce broken geometries.
  • Likewise, my understanding of relationships (used to define how parts move together in assemblies), is also weak, making it likely the model is logically flawed.

A long career in Information Technology exposed me to many different packages and the Garbage In, Garbage Out problem. Many of the business programs I developed as a youngster had more code validating input than did the actual work. Users are remarkably inventive when it comes to finding new ways to 'confuse a computer'. Of all the many software packages I've learned, I think 3D-CAD has by far the most complicated user interface and it must be hard to make it completely foolproof. Word Processors, Speadsheets, Email clients and Browsers are comparatively simple! Not tried Onshape, but like Fusion, it's relatively modern, and likely to have benefited from the painful experience of early software, where pioneers understood less about GUI design of complex user interfaces. Solid Edge is noticeably not completely 'orthogonal', that is it has similar functions with unnecessarily different control layouts. (Often caused when products are developed incrementally over several years:  often discovered what seemed best in 1992 can be improved.)

The user is adrift is a sea of confusion! Older CAD often has a long history of continuous development with lots of features, is mostly debugged and a large user base. But older software tends to bloat and is always vulnerable to being leapfrogged by slick new products, which work better, faster, easier and support the latest ideas. Problem is early adopters usually find lots of bugs in new products, so making the switch can be painful.

Best advice I can offer is to persist, and don't hop too quickly between high-end software hoping to find one is easier to learn than the others! I don't know of a full 3D CAD package that's completely useless, and I don't know of one that's easy to learn!

Dave

Edited By SillyOldDuffer on 23/06/2022 10:29:59

Almost in every discussion about CAD programs, we read about the 'steep learning curve'. Now I cannot speak for all, but among these I tried (and I tried many), Onshape is by far the easiest. I just went back to see what question I answered in the users' forum, and yes, they are all still there, back to 2015. And all of these had been answered fast and helpfully. Maybe the questions don't show much without the details, but nonetheless – here they are and may give an idea about the type of problems I could not solve myself:

– Cylinder with non-planar end April 2015

– Onshape insists my browser(s) don't have WebGL August 2015

– How can I fill out the fields in the drawing templates? September 2015

– Drawing does not change when part is changed!? September 2015

– How to arrange several views in the correct relationship? September 2015

– Stuck with flexed cylinder September 2015

– Scale of drawings September 2015

– What's happening in that knurl demo video? (Sept. 30, 2015) October 2015

– Changing presentation in a drawing March 2016

– Problem with loading drawings June 2016

– Making 3 radial holes in a cylinder March 2019

– Stopping that nerving wild rotations July 2019

– Troubles with Loft July 2019

– Problem creating a fillet between two tubes April 2022

Kind regards
Hans

Edited By Versaboss on 18/07/2022 13:44:50