For our needs, and the needs of most of our customers, SolidWorks is the best choice. Easy to learn, non-temperamental, straight-forward - easy enough to teach almost anyone.

 

Starting a new job on Monday where i'll be using Solidworks for the first time in 12 months. Having used Inventor, ProE and Solidworks in the past I’m telling myself that it's like riding a bike!

But to put my mind at ease, can anyone recommend some on-line recourses / video etc to jog my memory?

Cheers!

 

SolidWorks is my all time favorite..

 

I think Inventor in its latest release rivals anything in its class and the Vault Data Manager puts it way ahead of the pack for the multi-user environment (though the enhanced DM tools, while very good and beneficial, are pricey and not enterprise friendly). I am handling very large machine assemblies with as many as 3500 separate parts and over 40K instances without any problems. I purchased a $200 sheet metal add on that lets me do the specialized sheet metal duct forms I couldn't easily and the improvements to the surfaces and thicken commands address the varying thicknesses that occur in designing stampings and that standard sheet metal won't handle. The flexibility of editing content center to create custom libraries and the ability to import so many file formats helps a lot. Up until Ver 2011 the frame generator made great frames and was easy to use but part numbering and the resultant file management were problematic; with the new version this issue has been resolved and it is now a great tool for machine bases, weldments and built up modular system frames. It integrates well with the content center and managing custom frame shapes is easy. Other biggies are the built in rendering tool (good for anything I do, but I'm not designing cars or airplane interiors) and the animation tool. I've been using routed systems for quite some time and am very pleased with piping and wire harnesses though I feel the interface with AutoCad Electrical is all but useless. I'm particularly excited to begin using the simulation tools now that I upgraded and have them.

 

I heard that Pro E is more powerful than SW but my god why is it difficult to use?

 

I vote SolidWorks, not only for the modelling but the ability to do stress analysis on the components. I work for a company full of reluctant civil engineers, can someone please suggest an easy freeware to use for solid modelling that also has a stress-analyzer. We cannot afford the licensing for SolidWorks.

 

I had to put my vote on Unigraphics.

I started out with AutoCAD from the days of AutoCAD 13 and then Inventor while in college. Inventor I found very functional for a students purposes and I really didn't explore it a lot but it/is a great modeling hobbiest software.

During my first job as an engineer I was exposed for the first time to something outside of Autodesk with Unigraphics, and initially I have to say I hated it! It was cumbersome and took way too long top do what in my opinion should have been simple modeling jobs. However, Once I understood the programs sketching capabilities and all the other stuff that goes into it, I loved it. I have since tried going back to Inventor, especially now that if you have a valid student e-mail address and academic 1 year license is free!

It's just not the same though. Unigraphics was superior in every way for my uses, and checking you modeling process is much more intuitive for me now. Further I found that while trying to share Inventor drawings with others it's not easily cross functional. In fact all of autodesk drawing and part formats aren't very cross-functional at all. Most main line modeling software programs do not allow importation of ipt's and dwg's are nightmares!

 

After 30 years in this business and some experience with many of the packages listed I would say that they all are about the same, interface, speed, useful tools and that's the way they want them.

Mostly configured for the new user to reduce the amount of time needed to come up to speed and mostly designed so that people that are only able to think in 2D can use the tool.

I am also of the opinion that large assemblies is the downfall of all of these packages unless you have some very tight and well enforced standards in place.

Now a days knowing how to use CAD is like knowing how to use a screw driver, if you can make shape your good.

IMHO

 

After using Computervision, Cadkey, Autocad, Anvil, SWX, Rhino, UG, and Inventor for real work, and demoed dozens of others from the mainstream to the weird, it's still KeyCreator (formerly Cadkey), hands down. No constraint, feature tree, or history limitations, and no file management issues (split your assembly into multiple files or keep it all in one file).