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Inventor vs SolidWorks - Which is better.

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Message 1 of 93
sprayvent
22599 Views, 92 Replies

Inventor vs SolidWorks - Which is better.

Hello,

I just talked to the owner of the comapny I work for about getting Inventor insead of getting Solidworks. Does anybody know of any sources that has some pro and cons of both software. I perfer Inventor, since I am Autodesk loyal. I also got my two Certifications in Inventor at AU 2009. I have used Inventor since R11 and love the user interface compared to solidworks. Since i know Inventor, I can save the company lots on training for me and others, since I can train them. Any inoformation Inv. vs sw. will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Sam
92 REPLIES 92
Message 41 of 93
stevec781
in reply to: mikeweb74


@mikeweb74 wrote:

Let's start with the sketcher:

  

2) Why must always I have projected geometry in the sketches, even if its only the center point


 

 

 

You dont.  Tools<application options<sketch tab  uncheck the auto project stuff.

 

identor

 was pretty pissed at having to expressly project edges from the model into sketches.

 

You dont.  Tools<application options<sketch tab  check auto project curves during curve creation.  When you hover over the edge it auto projects it in.

 

 

I have bagged IV many times here after coming from Swx.  I just started a new business, evaluated them all and to my surprise saw no option but to buy 2 more seats of Iv.  Sure there are lots of little things that are missing but overall its still better for what I need.  A big slice of humble pie for me!

Message 42 of 93
Tekniplaz
in reply to: stevec781

I am in exactly the same position.

Have used SWX for the last 11 years or more, started up my own business recently and evaluated the 3 software’s that seem to fit the bill.

Have to say I’m on the cusp of purchasing Inventor. The more i use the trial the more i actually like it and enjoy using it although it is a slightly different approach.

With the tools that come in the suites it saves me investing double in 3rd party bolt-ons to SWX that incur additional cost and maintenance, furthermore the user base is limited for these 3rd party bolt-ons therefore limited funds coming back for development.

I guess i just convinced myself that not only for a practical but also for a commercial and long term business decision that IV is the better choice in my case.

Message 43 of 93
Indentor
in reply to: stevec781

identor

was pretty pissed at having to expressly project edges from the model into sketches.

 

You dont.  Tools<application options<sketch tab  check auto project curves during curve creation.  When you hover over the edge it auto projects it in.

 

See...that's what I'm talking about...gets better all the time.  Just gotta know where the buttons are.

Message 44 of 93
divingdoug
in reply to: Indentor

Exactly, more buttons, wasted mouse clicks, wasted time not creating

 

And again, why on any planet would you allow the ability to delete the referenece to the origin.

 

Doug

Message 45 of 93
nkopilec
in reply to: sprayvent

Agree with indentor on the sketcher... When I first started using inventor, it took a while to figure out where my origin went if I happened to delete all of my geometry and a co-worker finally told me that you have to "project" the origin. Ridiculous.

 

For those on the fence about selection between SW and Inventor, here are a few things I find delightful and irritating about both:

 

Sketcher:

 

In addition to not having to project your origin in sketches, in SW you are able to make reference and constrain to actual part geometry. This is not a huge deal, but I've found it to be irritating on occasion when I need to make changes to sketch constraints based on part geometry.

 

Something I absolutely hate about inventor is that it doesn't require you to have closed sketch geometry. In other words, if you create an extrusion, you could have a line out in space somewhere completely unrelated to the feature and it doesn't matter if it's construction geometry or not. In SW you are required to have closed geometry for extrusion, revolve, etc. (excluding surface features). Any geometry that isn't closed MUST be construction geometry. When you are forced to do this, SW can now differentiate between construction geometry and geometry you intend to be part of the feature. Why is this a big deal? Consider, for example, that I have 20 different sized holes, rectangles, whatever, and I want to create an extruded cut feature. In SW, if I decide later that I want to delete or add one of these sketch entities, no problem... make the change and everything updates. In Inventor, deleting a sketch entity will cause an error because it now doesn't know which sketch entities you want to be part of the feature. This means you have to edit the feature and reselect EVERY sketch entity you had previously. I've wasted a lot of time because of this. There's really no point in having construction geometry in inventor other than aesthetic differentiation because it serves no purpose. In case you were wondering, in SW, if you for any reason wanted to exclude a sketch entity from a feature, there is a feature scope selection which allows you to choose to exclude geometry from a feature. The default, however, is that all normal geometry is part of the feature and all construction geometry is excluded from the feature scope.

 

A HUGE letdown, for me personally, is SW's cumbersome Excel based parameters. I prefer the simplicity of inventor's parameter list configuration in both Excel and Inventor. Firstly, SW lists the parameters horizontally in columns (I hate this) and Inventor lists them vertically in rows. I can create complex assemblies that have parts that are coherent and all linked to the same parameter sheet. In SW, each part/assembly must have its own parameter sheet. This makes it difficult to create assemblies that are controlled from one centralized parameter sheet.You have to create a sheet that does all the caluculations of your values and then link to those values from each workbook linked to each part. That would be manageable if that were the only problem, but if I make a change to that "centralized" parameter sheet, if I want all the parts that have values pulled from that sheet to update, I have to open each part and then open its parameter sheet and close it for it to get the updated values. Again, huge letdown. This is what keeps me from saying, unequivocally, that SW is better than Inventor.

 

There are obviously many more differences, but these are the biggest for me. If you design large assemblies that are considered "standard" products and only vary by a handful of parameters, use Inventor. You would benefit by how quickly you can modify and release an assembly to be manufactured by creating an intricate series of algorithms in Excel.

 

If you design something completely different every day and you cater more to industrial design or injection molded parts for the consumer industry, I would go with SW. SW is a very rich software. It has many, many more useful features than Inventor (too many to name in this post), especially surfacing (unless you have Fusion with Alias in Inventor).

 

If you need both aspects mentioned above, I would get SW and get really good at programming with the SW API... or wait for one or the other to fix the short-comings of their software packages.

 

Hope this helps a few people.

Message 46 of 93
mikeweb74
in reply to: nkopilec

I agree with your first point about the having to project geometry in the sketch plane, even if it only the center point. I also project anything that you chose. Like if you pick an axis for revolve it projects that. Alternatively, any model geometry.

You can have open sketch in SW if you want to have a thin feature, not just surfaces.

Forget having a feature update properly in IV if you try to modify a sketch after creating a feature from it!

I love the design tables in SW. You can create very complex configuration and assemblies, BTW there a ways to automated creating and updating the configurations. Have tried to embed the design tables into the SW documents.

I have designed both very large and very different assemblies in SW you just have to know how to set them up. I have also created many similar or families of parts in SW.

Yes, a programing background is very help full when using SW. SW is much more powerful then IV. I have a lot less crashes with SW.

With IV, you have to manage project files and you have to create a presentation file just to create exploded views. I seem to that IV is still 2-3 years behind SW.

And what about the dialog boxes the IV still has plus IV mini tool bar that does not have all of the options that the dialog box has.

Michael Webster, CD, CSWP
Purdue SWT, South Bend
South Bend, IN

Home/Work: Dell Precision 6700M
Win 7 64bit Pro
i7-3820QM 8 GB
Nvidia Quadro 3000M 2GB
Inventor 2014.
Message 47 of 93

Hi,

 

I think the title should be changed to Inventor vs Solidworks - Which suits you better.

Love using Inventor, no issues on assemblys upwards of 18,000 parts and I think Autodesk rock.

Really usefull ios and android apps as well, way ahead of the competition.

 

Hope your all having fun using your software of choice for to-day...............

Message 48 of 93
mflayler2
in reply to: mikeweb74


@mikeweb74 wrote:

Forget having a feature update properly in IV if you try to modify a sketch after creating a feature from it!

Yes, a programing background is very help full when using SW. SW is much more powerful then IV. I have a lot less crashes with SW.

With IV, you have to manage project files and you have to create a presentation file just to create exploded views. I seem to that IV is still 2-3 years behind SW.

And what about the dialog boxes the IV still has plus IV mini tool bar that does not have all of the options that the dialog box has.


No problems with features updating from my sketches.

I always had more crashes with SW than I did Inventor

Presentation Files are different, doesn't mean they are behind SW 2-3 years, I think the configurations are a horrible way to go with anything that deserves good tracking and accountability in DM software (not just for explosions but for design tables as well)

98% of what you need is in the Minitoolbar, the only thing I find missing that I want is the All Fillets and All Rounds with the fillet command, but even then I don't need it that often.

 

As for programming, what do you have in SW that equals the power of iLogic?  Certainly not DriveWorks Express?  I also see that you are a certified SW professional, what training or certification have you received in Inventor?

 

Even from your post you can see that users that spend more time in one software or the other can sometimes not know the best way to do it in the other software, even some of the basic taskes can be different, doesn't make one better than the other in that regard.

 

As a side note, if you really want to compare SolidWorks to Inventor you DO need to look at the what you are getting with each.  This really should be a thread on SolidWorks vs Product Design Suite or Factory Design Suite.  The fact that when you get Alias Design in PrDS Ulitmate, that just blows away SW surfacing and the Alias data can be read right into Inventor.  I have a previous post that no-one seemed to want to refute because its true or they just don't know enough about the other products to compare them.

 

This will be my last post on the matter.

Did you find this reply helpful ? If so please use the Accept as Solution or Kudos button below.

Mark Flayler - Engagement Engineer

IMAGINiT Manufacturing Solutions Blog: https://resources.imaginit.com/manufacturing-solutions-blog

Message 49 of 93
nkopilec
in reply to: mikeweb74

Sorry, you are correct about the thin feature. As I mentioned before, SW has a lot of features... it's difficult to recall them all! I'm curious, how do you handle interconnectivity of parts and assemblies with design tables and how do you get all the parts to update when you change parameters from one sheet?

Message 50 of 93
nkopilec
in reply to: stephen_inventor

I agree with you. I personally think that Inventor is a "best bang for your buck" type of software. Baseline, it doesn't have nearly as many features as SW, but I use both on a daily basis and really have no problem using either. I'm partial to both in different regards. Inventor's baseline cost makes it appealing, which is why it's a best-seller. You get more with SW, but it's more expensive.

Message 51 of 93
MikahB
in reply to: sprayvent

In 2009 I had to go through the decision process of SW versus INV when I started my business.  At that point, I had about 1 year experience with each.  In the end, the only really determining factor was that Inventor had native support for the creation of gears and gear systems - something which I had an immediate need for.  Solidworks had nothing similar to offer except in a 3rd party add-on which I tried it and found to be clunky at best.

 

But, in the nearly 4 years I've been using Inventor, I've never found something that I needed to do that I couldn't accomplish with Inventor.  I remember the SW guys showing me a tool called TolAnalyst that would be nice to have (automatically ran parts through their tolerance limits and checked for interference in the assembly), but all in all I'm happy with my choice.

 

Really comes down to your individual needs but I think both software packages are very good and very competitive.

Mikah Barnett
All Angles Design
Product Design Suite Ultimate 2014
Windows 7 Professional x64
Intel i7-3770k @ 4.5GHz
32GB DDR3-2400 RAM
GeForce GTX 670 4GB
Message 52 of 93
stevec781
in reply to: mikeweb74


@mikeweb74 wrote:

And what about the dialog boxes the IV still has plus IV mini tool bar that does not have all of the options that the dialog box has.


Far superior in Inv.  The solidworks dialog box is way worse.  They replace the whole feature/assembly tree area with one big dialog box, and then throw the assembly/feature tree into the workspace.  At least I can move the dialog box out of the way.  In Swx you have to move the model away from under the tree that just landed on top of it.  The mini tool bar is not for me but it doesnt get in the way, but the right click marking menu is far superior to the SWx S key short cut.  Then there is the context senitive short cuts that inv has that Swx doesnt.  Click a plane in Swx nothing happens,  but click a plane, face, edge etc in Inv and a context sensive toolbar displays at the mouse pointer, no right click or s key required.  Yes there are some things that Swx does better, but menus and tool bars arent one of them.

Message 53 of 93
nkopilec
in reply to: mflayler2

I have more crashes with SW than I do with Inventor, but I also do more graphics intensive procedures in SW than with Inventor.

 

I think in regard to controlling assembies, functionally, Inventor and SW accomplish the same things, but in different manners. Inventor has iLogic, which I like, and in SW you control suppression states of features and components from the design tables in Excel. Either way, I use Excel and/or VB/C++ to accomplish what I need from either software. I simply don't use parameters without using Excel in SW or Inventor.

 

I can't really comment on toolbars/UI issues because I almost never use them. with the way I've got my 3d mouse programmed, I pretty much don't need them. I do like SW mouse gestures better than the Alias style hotbox, though, because it's quicker and I don't have to look at what I'm doing. It's involuntary.

 

Something I wish would be changed in Inventor is filtering of parts in drawings via assembly view representation. This is backwards. This should be done by LOD. It makes more sense for your parts list to display parts based on which parts are suppressed/unsuppressed in a LOD rather than which parts are visible. If I want a part constrained so that it's not affected by changes in an assembly, I don't constrain it to something I know is going to change often. I more than likely constrain it the origin in the assembly. The same logic is applied to the parts list filtering. I change the visibility of parts often while working in assemblies and I don't want my parts list based on a tool I use during a design process.

 

In regard to surfacing, baseline SW is terrific for surfacing. I use surfaces a lot for mold design and I choose to use SW for this because it has more features that accommodate me. With that said, I LOVE Alias in Inventor. For industrial design of consumer products it's awesome. The ability to freeform drag surfaces, edges, vertices, etc. with Alias is something that SW does not have. I often design certain types of products in Inventor with Alias and design the tooling in SW. I, however, have my own custom application that I use for mold design in SW, so no comment on mold tools in Inventor vs. SW.

 

Bottom line? I don't think it's possible to say which software is better. I like each one for different reasons. It would be nice to have everything under one roof, but I don't think I'll ever be satisfied with any software in its entirety until I finally take the plunge and develop my own.

Message 54 of 93
pablomarcel
in reply to: mikeweb74

Chevy guy (GM guy) is supposed to be a NX user, right?
Message 55 of 93
The_Angry_Elf
in reply to: pablomarcel

Oh the good ole argument of Inventor vs Solidworks......good fun.

 

Let me go back to my days of running my own consulting firm and even further back when I was a CAD Admin for a company that had both CAD packages.

 

First, I chose INV for my business for the simple fact that it allowed me to work with many more CAD platforms than SW did at the time. Being able to import/export other CAD formats was key in being able to land numerous clients without having to purchase seats of numerous other CAD programs.

 

Second, during my CAD Admin days, my employer had both Inventor an SW in house. There came a day when a decision had to be made as to which one they'd keep moving forward. Aside from my frustration of having to deal with the SW updates/patches every other month along with dealing with their security dongle that never seemed to recogize the licenses during these updates....but I digress. They had a 3rd party come in and do some benchmark testing based on what and how we worked on a daily basis. Most parts in house were being held to 3 or 4 decimal places.

 

The testing company took 10 random neutral part files and imported them into each software....the results?

The files imported into Inventor were accurate out to the 9th decimal 10 out of 10 parts, the SolidWorks imports.....6 out of 10 were randomly off as of the 3rd decimal place. That's a 60% failure rate! There was no way the company was willing to risk their million dollar machines based on a 60% failure rate.

 

So you can guess which way they went. It all comes down to your needs. Each program has its own way of doing things, you just need to learn them and proceed. For years, I had one engineer at the above company who was a bed wetting SW guy, twice a day he'd make an effort to come over and claim "SW does this, Inventor can't!" and then I'd proceed to show him just how to do that specific thing in Inventor. He'd walk away in a huff, only to be back yet again and once again, fail to accomplish what he was trying to do.

 

In closing, I'm a Jeep guy...no idea what that means in this...LOL


Cheers,

Jim O'Flaherty
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Message 56 of 93
lesmfunk
in reply to: The_Angry_Elf

I don't really have a preference, but do wonder if SW is actually $1000 better.

 

On the accuracy to 3rd or 9th decimal, could it be that SW seems to more stable and less prone to crashes due to less stringent accuracy? It's a trade-off. I don't have any proof for this, just my experience working with SW for 7 years after working with INV for 4.

 

Now I am back in INV and also use it for my own business. INV gives better value for price IMO.

 

Funny thing, when you talk to a Solidworks reseller, Inventor doesn't exist. It isn't in their vocabulary. They are still focused on luring AutoCAD users with Solidworks as the only 3D solution. Good thing we know better.

Message 57 of 93
brien
in reply to: lesmfunk

Last year I baught a license of Solidworks because I had a a lot of prospective work for a few companys that use it. It was early spring and that is when the nightmare started. Being a long time user of Inventor I had no idea what a buggy unstable program really was. The multiple times per day crashes and random bugs have driven me to hate Solidworks. I detest it! To be honest I cannot believe that the company is still cranking out sutch junk. In my office I have officialy renamed it to Solid Junk. I envy the days when I could concentrate on design instead of working around bugs, restarting my computer or hearing "It is your hardware" even thogh it does the same thing on every computer I own. I so miss working with inventor. I am saving up to buy my own licence of inventor and when I do I will never ever go back. If there is any of you long time Autodesk users thinking about going the SW route all I can say is you must be crazy and gluttons for punishment. In all the years I have used inventor "from 2002 to 2013" I have never had as many issues in entirety as I have had with SolidJunk in the past year. Honestly I feel like a runaway child that ran down the street and is now sobbing to go back home.   

Message 58 of 93
MechMachineMan
in reply to: brien

Does Solidworks have anything similiar to iLogic or parameter driven models/the ability to work with the API so easily?


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Justin K
Inventor 2018.2.3, Build 227 | Excel 2013+ VBA
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Message 59 of 93
brien
in reply to: MechMachineMan

It does have parameter driven models but it is not quite as fully parametric as in Inventor. Inventor really kicks butt doing in-process modeling in assembly's. After using Inventor and then using Solidworks it seems like in certain things the parametrics are broken in Solidworks. Especially in assembly's. It does have scripting and I have yet to play around with any API stuff as I have with inventor in the past. Drawing and BOM creation is horrid compared to inventor. Solidworks has graphical bugs O plenty where I don't even remember any in Inventor. SW has a hard time with big assemblies and will start to flake out and crash were inventor just slows down. The interface and menus in SW is non intuitive and cumbersome. At the end of the day you will get ten times the amount of work done in Inventor because you wont be chasing or working around bugs. Honestly I don't think SW gives a crap about actually fixing anything and is just still trying to pull in old 2D AutoCad users with there junk software. Seriously the tone in the SW official forums is Deal with the bugs and crashing in hopes for fixes in the next release that just adds more bugs. Honestly I would invest in Inventor stock because sooner or later there is going to be a lot of people jumping from the SW ship. Fanboyism don't last and I think that is the only thing keeping SW going. SW does have ability but it is like buying a demo that only half works.

Message 60 of 93
lesmfunk
in reply to: brien

From my experience, if you are using proper hardware, SW seems to be a bit more stable. Having said that, Inventor is much more versatile regarding hardware investment. Inventor hardware requirements are not as stringent.

 

I understand your pain from switching platforms, but after spending a lot of time with both, you will find they are not much different in capabilities--just different methods.

 

Now pricing strategies are another issue altogether....

 

By the way, several of us Inventor users are also certified with SW. So, I'm not sure who you are trying to score points with by knocking SW on an Inventor discussion forum.

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