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Memory issue

15 REPLIES 15
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Message 1 of 16
teflon
722 Views, 15 Replies

Memory issue

I am running C3d 2012/64 on a machine with 8 GB memory.

Monitoring performance I noticed that no more then 4 GB is used by CAD.

I supposed the OS is using up to 2 GB.

How can I  make CAD use more memory?

15 REPLIES 15
Message 2 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

>> How can I  make CAD use more memory?

Make your drawings containing more data and the memory-consumption will raise. But Civil3D will not "take additional/more memory" then it needs it.

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
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(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 3 of 16
teflon
in reply to: teflon

Thank you for your reply!

The problem arise during for example working with grading!

The program freezes and I have to hit Ctrl+Alt+Delete to wake it up!

It should not be a memory issue but it still is!

Is not it?

Message 4 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

>> It should not be a memory issue but it still is!

If your taskmanager shows only 4GB of 8GB used then I guess it's no memory problem.

Try to copy the basic elements of your current drawing (needed for creating the grading) and try to create the grading there again.

Also quite often a problem when creating gradings is the geometry you used as edges. If that were polylines that had e.g. more than one vertex per coordinate, or segments are drawn in a (ugly) way like from vertex 1 to 2 to 3 to 2 to 3 to 4 (so the segment 2-3 is trippeled). In that cases I suggest to use the cleanup-functionality (weed points) when converting a poly to a feature line.

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 5 of 16
teflon
in reply to: teflon

I supposed I missed the fact that "Civil 3d 64 bit" is not actually a real 64 program!

So 4 Gb is the limit!

 

Message 6 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

>> I missed the fact that "Civil 3d 64 bit" is not actually a real 64 program!

Where do you have that story from? 😉

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 7 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

>> So 4 Gb is the limit!

Especially for you, open Civil3D 2012x64, open parallel to it the Windows taskmanager and look to the processes ==> acad.exe.

Then open the drawing attached here and report:

a) what's the memory consumtion after this drawing is finished with opening

b) what's the memory consumption after a ZOOM 0.03x + _REGENALL if it does not start the regeneration itself (if you have enough memory now) 😉

 

My screenshot:

2013-03-12 19-55-19.png

 

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 8 of 16
teflon
in reply to: Alfred.NESWADBA

The computer I am having problem with is at my work. It is a new and powerful laptop.There are 8 GB available but Civil takes just less then 4 GB and crashes all the time.

Her at home I am using a desktop and as you can see CAD is using more then 4.5 GB of 6 GB! So Civil is using more memory (about 97%) despite the fact that less memory is available!

 

So what is the problem????

Message 9 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

is your office-laptop also running Win8? So then I guess I know why you have crashes multipe times, and that has nothing to do with memory. Civil3D 2012 is not tested on..., not developed for... and not supported for Win8.

 

>> So Civil is using more memory

Great that you tested it and you know now that your message with "Civil is not really a 64bit app" is wrong.

(SCNR: you should have tested that before 😉 )

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 10 of 16
teflon
in reply to: Alfred.NESWADBA

Hi Alfred!

 

I am aware of Civil 3D not been tested for Win 8 but in this case the question is about getting Civil to use more memory!

I am just making a comparison! If Civil does uses more then 4GB, which is shown in the pic, so why isn´t it doing it?

 

Laptop-Win 7-8GB RAM available: Civil hardly uses 4GB (I can not get anywork done!).

Desktop-Win 8-6GB RAM:Civil uses more than 4.5GB; see the pic!

 

 

 

Message 11 of 16
Alfred.NESWADBA
in reply to: teflon

Hi,

 

>> [...] the question is about getting Civil to use more memory! [...]

>> If Civil does uses more then 4GB, which is shown in the pic, so why isn´t it doing it?

Civil3D does not catch memory that it does not need. If the drawing fits into the first 2GB to get it handled (in the memory) why should Civil3D then use 8GB?

 

>> Laptop-Win 7-8GB RAM available: Civil hardly uses 4GB (I can not get anywork done!)

What happens if you open my drawing on this laptop? Does it use more than 4GB or does it crash.

If it crashes then let us know the message that raises up with the crash.

Also try then to start your Windows in diagnostic-mode and try the same again.

If you get a blue screen, then either the upper memory modules are defect or in the bios the speed for accessing the memory banks is set to high or you have done anything like processor overclocking. But that might only be valid if the upper memory-modules are not the same as the lower bank(s).

 

- alfred -

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alfred NESWADBA
Ingenieur Studio HOLLAUS ... www.hollaus.at ... blog.hollaus.at ... CDay 2024
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(not an Autodesk consultant)
Message 12 of 16
AllenJessup
in reply to: teflon

As far as I know. Civil will only use as much memory as it and the OS decides it should. To test. Keep opening drawings, as large as available, keep track of memory usage as each drawing is opened.

 

Also. Task manager is OK but at the bottom of the task manager is a button of the Resource Manger. This can be better for tracking the resources used by each process.

 

I don't know enough about the OS's to know if 8 manages resources differently than 7.

 

Allen Jessup



Allen Jessup
Engineering Specialist / CAD Manager

Message 13 of 16
teflon
in reply to: AllenJessup

Has anybody any suggestion about a computer powerful enough for Civil3D 2012?

Jag tried a DELL T3600, the latest model, but was not impressed!

Any recommendations?

Message 14 of 16
AllenJessup
in reply to: teflon

Mine works well. The current version is the T7600. We'll be getting a couple of them later this year.

 

Allen Jessup


Civil 3D 2012 SP 2.1
Dell Precision T7400, Xeon CPU 3.16 GHz
Win 7 Pro, 64-bit,12 GB RAM, Nvidia Quadro FX 4600



Allen Jessup
Engineering Specialist / CAD Manager

Message 15 of 16
dgorsman
in reply to: teflon

If the CPU speed is in the 1.6 GHz range, it won't matter if you have 8 or 32 GB of RAM - things will still crawl.  Everything works together to get the final product - hard drive, CPU, RAM, video card, network connection (if applicable), OS, software, data, and meatware.  If there is a major bottleneck in one component, the rest can be bleeding edge and the entire system will still under-perform.

 

So you'll want something on the high-end for speed, typically at or above 3 GHz, but some water cooled gamer rig overclocked to 6 GHz will cause more problems than it solves.  Include a decent amount of RAM, but consider what the motherboard can support and what you need to run (OS + application + data + a few extras).  And all that will be irrelevant if the files and data aren't well managed.

----------------------------------
If you are going to fly by the seat of your pants, expect friction burns.
"I don't know" is the beginning of knowledge, not the end.


Message 16 of 16
teflon
in reply to: teflon

Now I got a state of art computer with 16 GB of RAM! The latest model by Dell!

But C3D is still very slow and uses only up to 5 GB of RAM!

I had to wait for ages when working with grading eller surfaces!  

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