OK: so some more info as to detailing in Revit.
I found that once I learned how to work in Revit that it was vastly faster for me to produce details in it rather than in AutoCAD- to the point that a lot of the details I drew for a big state project being done on AutoCAD were drawn in Revit and exported out. This is due to the way that Revit 'helps' you draw, the ability for detail components to find and snap to each other, and many other benefits of using a BIM vs. a more traditional Drawing solution. Work with Revit a little, and try drawing some details with it, and if you're coming from a heavy AutoCAD background you'll hate it at first but soon find that you're producing a lot more work in the same amount of time, even when it comes to simple 2D details drawn from scratch... and when it comes to detailing off the model, then watch out! 🙂
As for ADT 2005, it has the ability to make keynotes that know what they are pointing to and a database-driven detail library that's pretty powerful in it's automation and ability to pull up what you need just by clicking of stuff within your drawings. It's a feature I'm rather jelous of. However it's a lot to set up and manage, and creating those details and bits in the first place I feel would take longer than it would in Revit, so unless you've got the support and time to set up the system this feature of ADT 2005 might not really be that useful for you, for you wouldn't be able to fully leverage it or it would cost more to set up and manage than it would gain you in efficiency...
The other MAJOR difference is that in ADT 2005 you're still just drawing stuff, and while you can generate details from your model, those just become static flat blocks. In Revit, if I cut a wall section, and then detail the heck out of it, but then that wall changes construction or something I can go back to that detail, change the wall there, have it then change *everywhere* within my project. Soooo let's say that the client has decided for cost reasons halfway through DD to use CMU on the exterior walls instead of metal stud. Changing all those wall details in ADT or AutoCAD mean redrawing and regenerating a bunch of stuff. In Revit, I grab one of those walls in any view, plan, section, detail, whatever, I tell Revit that the wall is now using CMU instead of metal stud, and on every single one of my wall sections it's now showing CMU- now I only have to change some notes.
One thing I talk about when showing Revit to people (I work for a reseller now) is that a decent hand-drafter and someone back in the day using AutoCAD 12 could almost stay neck-and-neck (and sometime the hand draft could go even faster) when it came to putting lines down on paper. But the moment there was any kind of revision or change the person on R12 was now way out in front, for they simply had to push some lines around and change some text, while the other guy was still getting out his electric eraser. Now, with Revit, the situation is almost the same. a decent ADT user can stay neck-and-neck with a Revit user in terms of generating Construction Documents (and sometimes the ADT guy can go even faster). But the moment there is a major design change, the Revit user will be way out in front because they can globally redefine and change things in any view very quickly, while the ADT user is still waiting for their section views to regenerate.... 😉
