topic Re: CPU Usage in AutoCAD Architecture Forum

CPU Usage

cto — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 00:22:21 GMT

I have a very large drawing and every other move takes from 10 seconds to sometime a minute.

Even the cursor lacks responsiveness.

There are several xRef Pdfs located on a 7200 rpm drive where the os and application are on a SSD

The drawing has lots of blocks and details totalling about 40 meg.

I have a i7-6700 cpu @ 3.4 GHz with 64 bit Windows 10.

When the lack of responsiveness occurs the task manager indicated the computer CPU #7 is at 100% while the other 7 cores are relatively quiet.

Is there any way to redirect the threads to other processors?

Re: CPU Usage

David_W_Koch — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 01:33:47 GMT

Most operations in AutoCAD are single-threaded. See this Autodesk Knowledge Network article for details: https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad/learn-explore/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/Support-for-multi-core-processors-with-AutoCAD.html

Re: CPU Usage

cto — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 03:14:58 GMT

Did not specifically address my issue.

Re: CPU Usage

David_W_Koch — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 13:34:02 GMT

AutoCAD is, for the most part, single-threaded and you cannot direct some tasks to a second processor.

40 MB is a large drawing file. Externally referencing PDFs add to the burden. I would not expect that file to be fast. If UCSDETECT is set to 1, try setting it to 0.

Re: CPU Usage

Victoria.Studley — Fri, 08 Sep 2017 13:54:04 GMT

Hi @cto,

Welcome to the Autodesk Community, and thank you for posting your question here in the AutoCAD Architecture forum!

It sounds like you're struggling with performance of large drawings (+40MB) with multiple PDF attachments stored on a separate drive from AutoCAD Architecture itself. Is this accurate?

t wasn't clear from your description whether the parent DWG file is stored on the same drive as the application, or an external drive alongside the PDFs/Xrefs. Could you clarify?

As @David_W_Koch noted, AutoCAD can only use multi-core technology for a couple of processes, as described in this article. As far as I'm aware, there is no way to adjust or configure this.

To address the underlying issue here though, there are several things you can do to narrow down the cause of the performance issue and address it:

Make sure your machine meets the system requirements for your version of AutoCAD Architecture.
Make sure you're using a graphics card that is certified for use with your combination of operating system and AutoCAD version.
Run through the system optimization tips that we provide to ensure you're system is set up to run AutoCAD well.
Check for file corruption. I recommend starting with the steps under the "If the drawing file still opens" section of this article.
The size of the drawing is likely contributing to the performance degradation you're seeing. Consider reducing the size by breaking the file into smaller portions and utilizing Xrefs when you need to combine the content for presentation purposes.

Give these a shot, and let us know if the performance improves for you. If you'd like us to take a look at your system information file here, feel free to zip it up and post it here for analysis. Same with the DWG files, if you'd like us to take a look.

If one or more of these posts helped answer your question, please click Accept as Solution on the posts that helped you so others in the community can find them easily.

Re: CPU Usage

Victoria.Studley — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 12:52:19 GMT

Hi @cto,

I'm just checking in again to see if you need more help with this. Did my post from last week help you resolve the issue?

If so, please click Accept as Solution on the posts that helped you so others in the community can find them easily.

Re: CPU Usage

cto — Mon, 11 Sep 2017 14:21:58 GMT

It did not help.

VStudley also sent me a multi-point list of things perform and to try and
none have made a difference in the cursor hesitations and slow response with
this large file.

I also split the file in 2 - one withal the PDF attachments and one with all
the line drawings.

They both are slow and the cursor hesitates and screen refreshes from layout
to model or layout to layout take 30 seconds or so.

I'm going to keep the main large file as is, and work on the subsets then
simply put the subset in to the main drawing only for each page layout and
the final hopper for the project. I will not or cannot work inside of this
drawing any longer, the hesitations and wait times are unbearable.

Hopefully I'll make it to the end of this project.