Civil 3d 2012 on Windows Xp

[manateejim]

Is any one running civil 3d 2012 in a 32 bit windows xp environment.  Unfortunatly I work for the government and they don't want to buy "wizbang" windows 7 machines for only certain departments.  Can any one tell me if it is worth arguing just to put 2012 on our old machines.  Also we are on Civil 3d 2010.

-Jim

Microsoft Windows Xp Pro Version 2002 SP3

Intel Xeon CPU

2.93 ghz, 3.23 GB Ram

[neilyj666 · Accepted solution]

I would suggest not but you could always download the trial version and see how it performs before spending any money but the machine in your signature would be at the lowest end of the recommended system requirements. You should also bear in mind that Civil 2012 objects are not compatible with Civil 2010 objects (a particular gripe of mine) or indeed any other earlier versions (incl 2011).

I'd guess it depends on the type of work you do e.g. size of surfaces, corridors etc etc but I think it wouldn't be worth the hassle.......

[Sinc]

What's your CPU?  There have been quite a few different Xeon models that ran at 2.93 GHz, and performance varied a lot.  If you have Xeons in there, then you probably also have room to expand, so as long as the chip isn't too old, you could conceivably just throw in some more RAM and install Win 7 x64 on the machines you already have.

Although regardless of what it takes, my recommendation is that if you're going to be using C3D 2012, you should be on Win 7 x64.  When you're running a $7000 state-of-the-art application, I wouldn't say it's "wizbang" to want an OS that isn't ten years old and almost dead.

[manateejim]

Thanks alot for the honest answer. 

[manateejim]

Thanks Sinc

my cpu is a Xeon w3450

Guess I better add that to my tag.

-Jim

[peterfunkautodesk]

I know that governments work slowly, but Windows 7 was released in October 2009, and Microsoft stopped mainstream support of Windows XP in April if 2009. The best investment in your current hardware would be to upgrade the SO. Adding more RAM would be nice as well.

That said, we did do work in both 2011 and 2012 to try to reduce the memory use on the 32 bit versions, but you are still constrained by the 2 gig memory limit that Microsoft added to XP when it was released in 2001.

Regards,

Peter Funk

Autodesk, Inc.

[manateejim]

Thanks Pete

I will forward this on to the powers that think they be.

-Jim