Drawings running way slow

Since I have been working here, for the most part I have been a "one man show" in the design room. We used to have a second designer here that is no longer with us. While he was working here we upgraded both SW computers with identical custom built machines.

Since we had a nice computer sitting there collecting dust, my boss asked me if I wanted to take it home to do some work from home in my spare time. I agreed.

Last week while I was out of work with a back injury, I spent a lot of time behind this system doing work from home. The system performed almost identical to my system at work (which it should), until I got to doing drawings. Drawings run like a dog on this machine. EVERYTHING drawing related seemed significantly slower, such as selecting geometry to invoking commands. But the most significant slowdown that I observed was when I had multiple drawings open (only 4 which I do regularly) and ctrl-tabbing between them. It takes like 5-10 seconds to switch to the next drawing. I feel sure it is related to the general slowdown that I am observing.

These were not super complex drawings. They were semi-busy with several sections, details, and lots of dimensions. But still just single sheet, single part drawings about 1-3MB in size. I even tried opening some simple drawings. Though a little faster, they were still way, way too slow compared to my identical system at work.

P4-540 800MHz 3.2GHz 1MB CACHE HyperThread

2GB 533MHZ DDR2 PC2-4200 DIMM Win XP Pro (all updates) nVidia Quadro 1300 (running 71.84 which is also same as work)

Unless I've overlooked something, everything is set-up pretty much like my work PC. I am at a loss as to what may be causing this slowdown on drawings. Anyone got any clues as to what it could be?

Reply to
Seth Renigar
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Hello Seth-

Have your tried this?

  1. Empty all Temp folders
  2. Defrag the drives

Best Regards, Devon T. Sowell

formatting link

"Seth Renigar" wrote in message news:psgfg.11224$ snipped-for-privacy@tornado.southeast.rr.com...

Reply to
Devon T. Sowell

I have. No luck.

Also forgot to mention. I started out using it at SW2006 SP0.0 (that's what was on it when I took it home). A few days later, I upgraded to SP4.1 with no change with this problem. So it would definitely seem that it is a hardware issue rather than a SP issue.

And, I doubt this has anything to do with it, but I am running dual monitors at home. The main monitor is the one that I took home with the PC. It is a Samsung SyncMaster 213T LCD, just like the one on my work PC. But I had an old generic 19" CRT at home and added this to the system. I just thought of this so I haven't tried unplugging it to see if this is the problem or not. But like I said, I doubt this is it.

Reply to
Seth Renigar

Does your work computer have hyperthreading turned on the same as the home one? When I did my extensive testing with hyperthreading, I found that it pretty much depended on the situation whether or not it helped or hurt. Just a thought.

WT

"Seth Renigar" wrote in message news:psgfg.11224$ snipped-for-privacy@tornado.southeast.rr.com...

Reply to
Wayne Tiffany

Sounds like a video card driver issue. When using non-quadro cards it is normal that when you have multiple documents open the graphics performance can slow down a lot! You DO have a quadro card though. So maybe installing the latest SW Certified drivers will help (see their website). Or maybe check to see that software opengl is not enabled. Under tools -> options -> performance.

Otherwise I can't really think of a reason why only drawings would be slow. Something like defragged hard drives, hyperthreading, etc, should affect SW system wide, not just in one document type.

Reply to
Mr. Who

Semi-corrupt drawing templates/sheet formats can cause the kind of slowdown to which you are referring. You might try a drawing with a standard SW shipped sheet format and see if that corrects the performance issue. If it does, you will need to remake your template or copy it from a known good source.

If that does not help, you might try nuking your personal settings registry entry which would create a new, clean template for you ( would need re-setup to your preferences ).

Reply to
Brian

Hmmm!!! Could be the culprit. Sounds logical since only drawings are multi-thread, and I am only having problems with drawings.

I didn't check this. As a matter of fact, I don't know how to check this. Could you give me a quick education on how to do this???

Reply to
Seth Renigar

I had already checked the video drivers, and I am using the latest SW certified drivers. Plus, its the same drivers as what I am using at work.

The one thing that I have not checked is the software opengl thing. I doubt it is set any different than my work PC though since I used the copy settings wizard from work to configure my settings at home. I will check this tonight though.

As for your other thoughts, as I mentioned in my reply to Wayne, it is my understanding that the drawings ARE multi-threaded. So the hyperthreading thingy could in theory effect drawings only rather than SW system wide. I will be checking this as well.

What blows my mind about the whole thing is that I never heard the previous designer that used that PC ever complain about a problem like this. Basically the only thing I did when I got it home was to create a different Windows user log-in, so I could start with a fresh Windows setup. I didn't change any OS settings or anything.

Reply to
Seth Renigar

With my computer its simple to alter hyperthreading. When booting up, go to the bios setup screen ( usually the delete key during memory check ). Look through the options in the different screens, for me its a simple "enable hyperthreading" yes/no. Be careful not to alter any other settings without consulting your motherboard manual.

Reply to
Brian

What a bizarre problem. Especially because you have the same machine at work! I don't think dual monitors would make a difference. I run duals at both work and home with no issues and I can't even think of why it would have an affect.

You are correct that if you used file and transfer wizard that the opengl setting should be identical.

WT had a good point about drawings doing multithreaded stuff. I had forgotten about that. If you can't figure out how to disable HT from BIOS (some pc manufacturers dont let you in there) you can go to task manager, right mouse button Solidworks.exe and choose set affinity. Then assign the application to only use one processor. As far as background processing of drawings is concerned, I think a process called sldworksbg.exe or something gets launched. You could check for the presence of this and see what it is doing. Which makes me think of a good idea. Have you checked task manager to make sure that when you have a drawing open nothing crazy is going on? Like your cpu is pegged at 100% usage or something? Or your system memory gets all gobbled up? That would cause slowdowns too.

Reply to
Mr. Who

I did not check the task manager to see if there was anything strange happening there. I'll do that tonight as well.

I sure hope I can get this problem resolved. It's got to be costing me at least 20% productivity. Yes, its that slow...

Reply to
Seth Renigar

To all that piped in on this, Checked the task manager last night. Nothing out of the ordinary. Checked the software opengl setting. Was turned off like it should be. Unplugged the second monitor. As expected, no change. Checked the hyperthread setting. It was turned ON, just like my identically built computer at work. For grins and giggles, I turned it OFF. Guess what!!! This made a HUGE difference. Still seemed marginally slower. But overall tons faster than it was before. What has me confused is that I don't see this slowdown on my work computer with this turned ON, even with the exact same drawings loaded. Something is still very fishy here. Either I have something else still going on, or multi-thread capabilities of SW drawings aren't all their cracked up to be.

Anyone got a logical explanation as to why hyperthreading is working on one system and not the other?

And also thanks to all that have given me suggestions to help pinpoint this problem.

Reply to
Seth Renigar

Seth,

Different Bios revision on motherboard ? Check the Bios rev no on boot. I don't think the hyperthreading handling was that wonderful on earlier boards. Quite often they are updated by manufacturer -even weekly on newly manufactured boards. You could have one board from one batch and another from a later one ?

Reply to
Nev Williams

Interesting! This actually sounds very logical based on my scenario with these 2 systems. We hired a local PC business to build these 2 systems, to identical specifications. The one that I am having problems with was built about 2 weeks before the other one. Could be it. These Intel motherboards were new to the market then, so its probable that they did go through some early revisions with the hyperthread thing.

I'll check this tonight.

Reply to
Seth Renigar

Hello Seth-

I've built 6 computers in the last 5 years or so. I tried 2 different Intel motherboards, they were extremely slow and buggy. I like to use MSI motherboards now.

Cheers, Devon

"Seth Renigar" wrote in message news:pOAfg.18803$ snipped-for-privacy@southeast.rr.com...

Reply to
Devon T. Sowell

I have spec'd about 12 computers for our company in the last 6 years or so, and have always used Intel boards. I have never had any speed or bug issues. Unless the one I am experiencing now is a bug!?!?! They have always been fast and extraordinarily reliable and stable. SW rarely crashes with me, comparatively speaking, including old versions of SW. As a matter of fact, most everyone's least favorite version, SW2004, was my favorite version on my old Intel based system. It ran lightening fast, and probably only crashed 3-4 times the whole year+ that I used it (8-10 hrs/day). I only reboot my systems every 2-3 weeks, whether it needed it or not.... But usually it wasn't needed.

However, I am not close-minded on this subject either. I realize that, especially in the last few years, AMD based systems with some of the higher end Taiwan motherboards do have better performance. And, their reliability and stability has come a long way as well.

That being said, I had already made my mind up about a year ago that the next CAD system that I spec will be AMD based with a high end motherboard like the MSI. However, at the rate we are going, that won't happen for probably another 8-12 months.

Seth

Reply to
Seth Renigar

I have built a large number of systems myself, lost track of how many, and Intel boards, although not always the fastest, are normally the most stable you can purchase. There is a reason they are the world's biggest processor and chipset distributor in the world. It is because they do a good job. I can definitely say it is not because they are cheaper =). Manufacturer's, like MSI, have a big influence on motherboard stability, but they are dependent on the chipset that is provided. For example, I wouldn't be surprised if the MSI mobo you built your computer on was using an Intel chipset. Although they could be using Nvidia, ATI, SIS, or VIA. I have had very bad experiences with VIA in the past, but their chipsets have gotten much better. ATI is a new player in the chipset market and I'm wary of those who haven't proven themselves. I think Nvidia has done a very good job despite being a relative newcomer. SIS is usually very cheap and very stable, but lacking in performance.

Reply to
Mr. Who

Neville,

U DA MAN. I checked the bois revisions and sure enough, the system that I was having problems with was about 5 revisions older than my system at work. I updated it to a revision that is even way later than my work computer, and then turned hyperthreading back on. I don't completely understand why, but, she screams now!!!

I still can't figure out why the previous designer that used this system never complained about this problem. Maybe its because he had come from a company that had provided him a total junk system to use. He was always so happy that this system was "so fast". He should see it now....

Man I love this group ;-)

Reply to
Seth Renigar

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