Inventor 2014 What's New

[jdits7]

Here is a quick rundown of What's New in Inventor 2014

http://inventortopix.blogspot.com/2013/03/inventor-2014-whats-new.html

[tuliobarata]

I like this item:

The graphics system now uses multiple cores to provide the best possible performance.

But I got one doubt. Thats would be for Graphic cards with more than one core, or for 2 Graphics Cards in the same machine ? Or even, for the main cpu core ?

Thanks.

[autocad.phil]

The delta is probably about 2500 (the list price is at the top of the table at http://www.autodesk.com/suites/product-design-suite/included-software and everything is usually less when we ask for a discount) 🙂

[mcgyvr]

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@Anonymous wrote:

The graphics system now uses multiple cores to provide the best possible performance.

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I wonder if this includes ATI crossfire or Nvidia SLI support too.

[scottmoyse]

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@karthur1 wrote:

Not only does the suite now include Professional, but also as of 4/1/13, subscription customers with Basic Support will be upgraded to Advanced Support. Advanced support includes phone support 24x5 and remote desktop assistance, plus other benefits.

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I thought this was only for those with the Ultimate suites... how can I find out what type of support we have on our subscription? 

[scottmoyse]

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@Michael_Kidd wrote:

Having used inventor since release 5, its going to be a hard sell to my boss this year to continue with subscription

"So you can now draw a slot" he will ask with one eyebrow raised

Michael

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This is a tad short sighted in my opinion. Users have been complaining for years now about a lack of basic functionality, Autodesk have finally listened and for the last two releases, more specifically this one, has introduced a lot of this tools (still no spell check). They've also fix hundreds and hundreds of bugs to drastically improve the quality of 2014 over and above 2013. This is well worth the subs cost, especially when you factor in all of the changes in the other Suite products and the cloud services. Now if you can't justify any of that to your management, maybe because they aren't interested in staying on the cutting edge of software development, then fair enough.

But that's a criticism of the company you work for and not of Autodesk itself.

Thats not to say complaints about a lack of updates to existing functionality, such as the sheet metal environment or content center or design accelerators, aren't fully justified. Because they are, maybe they will come next year?

I for one am happy with this release, especially when you look at the details and behind the scene fixes.

[ic198]

I called my re-seller to see if we can down-grade, as I don't need any of the features Inventor Professional offers over standard Inventor. Apparently AutoDesk regard this as an upgrade, and charge (something like $2500 per seat!) to drop a level.

[ic198]

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@scottmoyse wrote:

They've also fix hundreds and hundreds of bugs to drastically improve the quality of 2014 over and above 2013. This is well worth the subs cost,

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This raises an interesting question- why should we have to stay on subscription to get bugs fixed? If you bought a car as riddled with bugs as Inventor is you would expect the dealer to fix it, immediately and at their cost. With Inventor, we have to pay a yearly fee for Autodesk to eventually fix a few of the bugs, or more often, for their support staff to provide a 'workaround'. Workaround, I have discovered, is Autodesk-speak for "yes, there's a bug there but we don't know what caused it or how to fix it. In the mean time, here is a method which takes longer and doesn't work as well". I guess Workaround is quicker to type...

[scottmoyse]

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@ic198 wrote:

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@scottmoyse wrote:

They've also fix hundreds and hundreds of bugs to drastically improve the quality of 2014 over and above 2013. This is well worth the subs cost,

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This raises an interesting question- why should we have to stay on subscription to get bugs fixed? If you bought a car as riddled with bugs as Inventor is you would expect the dealer to fix it, immediately and at their cost. With Inventor, we have to pay a yearly fee for Autodesk to eventually fix a few of the bugs, or more often, for their support staff to provide a 'workaround'. Workaround, I have discovered, is Autodesk-speak for "yes, there's a bug there but we don't know what caused it or how to fix it. In the mean time, here is a method which takes longer and doesn't work as well". I guess Workaround is quicker to type...

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That is also my bosses perspective. It's an extremely valid point. One I agree with. However, it's not how the software industry works though but its exacerbated by the annual release cycles.... How do you feel about software as a service?

But I will also point out that car manufacturers only do product recalls for serious stuff. Other product manufacturers only have a 12 month warranty, if it fails outside of that period.. tough. Autodesk does have a mechanism for fixing serious bugs which impact your business, contact your reseller and work with them to submit a business case to fix the issue. I've been through that process, they took it seriously and provided a fix. I saw the fix within 3 months, which is pretty good for a company the size of Autodesk vs the size of our company.

[graemev]

... and if cars had seen the same level of improvement in capability and features as the software has, you'd be able to summit Everest at 140mph, cross the Sahara on 1/2 a gallon of gas, tow the Queen Mary, and listen to a stereo that has the identical acoustics to The Sydney Opera House.  Oh, and it'd be submersible to 5,000 feet.  Nag, nag, nag. 

[DRoam]

The posts on this thread are discussing just about everything except "Inventor 2014 What's New."

[Anonymous]

Just confirmed with my reseller, that I will be getting Product Design Suite Ultimate 2014 and it should be released tomorrow April 12th.

Will know what is new with Inventor 2014 very shortly..

Sean

[kstate92]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Just confirmed with my reseller, that I will be getting Product Design Suite Ultimate 2014 and it should be released tomorrow April 12th.

Will know what is new with Inventor 2014 very shortly..

Sean

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After you install, check which version(s) of ASME GD&T it has.  Not holding my breath about 2009 vs 1994, but still curious as I just had a course on this topic.

[Ray_Feiler]

Nope, but Wiki has been updated.

http://wikihelp.autodesk.com/Inventor/enu/2014/Help/0000-What_s_N0

mcgyvr

*Expert Elite*

Posts: 5,551

Registered: ‎12-01-2004

Re: Inventor 2014 What's New

04-05-2013 10:49 AM in reply to:karthur1

Is the "official" 2014 Whats new PDF published yet?

[Ray_Feiler]

Is the "official" 2014 Whats new PDF published yet?

[Anonymous]

Forgot this was asked, I suppose you were looking for 2009??

[kstate92]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Forgot this was asked, I suppose you were looking for 2009??

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Yes.  Unbelievable (and nearly indefensible).

[a_sima]

I agree with you. Which designer in the whole world makes his money creating slots 8 hours a day each day? I'm NOT amazed with all these things which Autodesk tries to show as BIG achievements!

AUTODESK should improve the Tooling module which is ****! The sketcher need a lot of improvement, not just to be nice and colored!. DO somethinng with entity name shomn in the tip of the arrow. Select a small entity (which you cannot see because of that stupid colored name tag!. Put the diametre symbol as default. Think how a hole is correcly dimensioned and correct the hole feature dialogue box image: the length of the thread  to be above the dimension of the total depth of the hole, you choose first the diametre, so move the diametre at the top. AUTODESK need to think not just to keep an army of troubleshooters!

Fancy things and a lot of clicks are for the beginners.

Long live the keyboard shortcuts but even here Autodesk forced reserved shorcuts. Why in the world in IV 2011 I could use ctrl+d as default (home) - as in proe and here in IV2013 they forced me to NOt use my shortcut. I hate companies which force the users to dance as their programmers sing!

[karthur1]

They would be glad to hear your ideas for improvements.  Its called Inventor IdeaStation.

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Inventor-IdeaStation/idb-p/v1232

Post each separately.

[Anonymous]

2 posts about new features and 8 pages of bitching.... awesome. Go use Solidoworks or a pencil and paper if you think Inventor is so bad. I do a lot of sheet metal and the slot sketching is highly valuable to me. Great Idea... 

[jletcher]

All I have to say is if you think the slot sketch is valuable, hate to say it but you don't know how to use Inventor.

I have not drawn a slot since Inventor 4.. All my slots are features drew it one time and never again to me the sketch slot was more wasted time the developers could have used to fix bugs..

But glad you are happy....

[Bill.Schmid]

I have a different take on software subscription.  Let's go with the car analogy since everyone seems to like that.  Yes, if there's a serious problem with a car, it gets recalled and they fix it for free.  But you have to pay for maintenance of the vehicle.  And if a new model comes out, you pay full price.  I think a car subscription might be pretty cool for some people.  You pay an annual fee and all the repairs are covered.  Plus you can get the new model whenever one's released.  Sweet!

CAD subscription is more than getting the upgrade every year.  It also gives you access to technical support when there are issues.  The annual upgrades seem to add new programs or better versions of existing software.

We are on subscription.  We started in 2008 or 09 buying Inventor.  That got upgraded to something like AutoCAD Inventor suite.  That then became Inventor Product Design Suite Premium.  AutoCAD Electrical and 3ds Max were eventually added to PDSP.  Inventor was upgraded to Inventor with Routed Systems.  This year we were upgrade to Inventor Professional.  Inventor Fusion got added somewhere along the line.  Each subsequent version of Inventor can import newer versions of competitor CAD files, too.

It's a cost of doing business.  If you're ever going to upgrade, do the math.  How many years of subscription do you have to skip to pay full price for a whole new seat?  A quick check on Autodesk's website shows PDSP to be $7,495 without subscription or $8,620 with subscription and basic support.  That's $1,125 difference for maintenance.  $7,495 / $1,125 = 6.7.  Really?  You're going to only upgrade every 7 years?  Maybe somebody has different numbers and it changes to 6 or even 5 years.

But hey, you can keep you're computer for 7 years then, too!  Why get a new computer when you're still running the same old software?  Still running Office 2003 on Windows XP, too?  Think of all the money you'll save.  Your boss will love you.

Do what you want.  Looks to me like you're going to have to either justify subscription or justify an upgrade at some point.  The periodic upgrades don't seem to save any money, unless they're spaced WAY out and they don't buy you any tech support.  We don't have to justify the maintenance.  It just goes in the budget every year - just like office supplies, which are also considered a cost of doing business.