ACAD - MicroStation informal survey

[nvy047]

We currently use both platforms for our work, ACAD for all private projects and MicroStation for DOT work. Internally there is a discssion to change to one platform, MicroStation.  I am against this. 

My question is what is your company doing, running both or just one? 

If possible let me know where you are located and/or what firm.

Thanks

[sboon]

This thread may help answer your question.

http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/AutoCAD-Civil-3D/AutoCAD-usage-by-DOTs/m-p/3371487/message-uid/3371487...

[Neilw_05]

One thing to ask is why do they want to standardize on Microstation and why are you against it?

With the compatability issues even within Autodesk products, file format has become less of an issue these days since there usually has to be data conversions regardless of platform.

[Cadguru42]

We are a local government and have been using Autocad for 20 years.  We talked about Microstation around 10 years ago, but it was going to be much more expensive to move to it, not withstanding the fact that no one knew how to even use it.  No colleges within 100 miles even teach CAD use with Microstation, so any new hire would have to learn how to do basic drafting as well as the road design aspect.

It just wasn't worth it, so we stuck with LDD and now Civil 3D.

[rnoyes]

We are located up and down the east coast, about 18 offices.  We are split somewhere around 50-50 private sector and public sector work.  We use both Bentley and Autodesk products.  MicroStation with InRoads or GeoPak for our public clients (couple exceptions RIDOT and MassDOT).  On all our private stuff we use Civil 3D and still are pulling LDD away from some users.

I agree with Mr. Wilson on some points, the data exchange has improved significantly, including Bentley's ability to load the Civil 3D object enabler, but it still is not perfect given some of the differences in how clients structure data.  Typically our Autodesk users think nothing about the public sector deliverable if they are working in autocad.  It leads to all kinds of incorrect block usage, issues with wipeouts/text masks, issues with how the plotted sheets are set up (paperspace scale or "real size"), etc etc etc.

The link that was mentioned in an early reply is in my opinion once of the issues with these discussions, people get on a rant about the software they prefer and dont stick to the questions asked.  As a company we find both software vendors provide solutions that work well when they are in the hands of trained users.  Both also fail miserably when in the hands of people with no understanding of the tools. 

I am our corporate cad/d manager for both the vendors, I cant see anytime where I would recommend we go to a single toolset.  First off our clients require the use of some tools when we do their work so we will have to maintain both unless we want to not go after work from certain clients.  Secondly there are some tasks that each vendor does really well and we want to utilize their tools when we can.

[JeffPaulsen]

I have read many posts on this subject and it appears to me, in most cases, people prefer the program they learned first. A 5-year AutoCAD veteran in most cases will prefer AutoCAD. A 5-year Microstation user will prefer Microstation.

With that said, a long-time colleague left to work for a DOT about 1.5 years ago and he still does not like working with Microstation.

Most companies that I know of that use Microstation use it strictly for DOT work and use AutoCAD for everything else. There could be a number of reason for this but the main one I think is collaboration. Most people working on DOT projects use Microstation and most people working on non-DOT work use AutoCAD. If you use the same software as other consultants it makes collaboration easier.

[Lisa_Pohlmeyer]

We are a county gov't transportation office in Williamson County, TX using Civil 3D 2012. I transitioned this office from LDD5 to Civil 3D when I came to work here 4 years ago.  We recently hired a design engineer that worked for TxDOT 10 years using Microstation/Geopak.  I'm not sure if he used all the features available in Geopak but he was only here a month and said he would never go back to Geopak.  He much prefers Civil 3D and it's dynamic features.  He's been very involved in designing transportation corridors lately and can't believe how easy it is compared to his previous software. It's always fun to train someone who "gets it".  That said, we don't have any requirements for submittals done in Geopak, although TxDOT does.  I have read of several DOTs that are moving away from Microstation/Geopak to Civil 3D.

I agree with Neil's comment about asking the tough question, Why Microstation?  Availability of trained personnel, the cost of training, etc. are important questions as well.