Nothing in drawing space

[Anonymous]

I can't see anything in the drawing space in newly installed AutoCAD 2018 for Mac, not even my cursor! No grid, no drawing lines, nothing.  Help??

[maxim_k]

Hi Rebecca,

Please provide information about your Mac model and macOS installed on it.
Can you post screenshot of your desktop when AutoCAD is running?
Are you able to use AutoCAD command window (type commands and get response from AutoCAD)? Use AutoCAD menus, Tool Sets palette, Layers palette, etc.?

Maxim

[Anonymous]

Sure, I have a MacBook Pro running MacOS Sierra 10.12.4.  I can access all the tools and menus, I can even "draw" lines where the dimensions show up on the screen and everything.  Yes I can type in commands and access layers.  I just can't see anything in the drawing space including the cursor.  Like a big black blanket is covering up whatever is going on underneath.  Here is a screenshot to show what I mean:

Drawing a line? Cursor is in there somewhere

This was me trying to draw a line, the dimension boxes come up, but I can't see what I drew or the cursor.

[maxim_k]

Can you say more about your Macbook Pro? Year, graphics card, RAM, etc.

And - sorry, but you forgot to attach screenshot,

Maxim

[Anonymous]

2010 MacBook Pro,  8 GB 1067 MHz DDR3,  Intel HD Graphics 288 MB,  

and in my computer, the screenshot is embedded in the text right after the semi-colon.  You can't see it?  Let me see if I can attach it.

[maxim_k]

OK, now I see the screenshot in your previous post (looks like it was a temporary glitch on my side).

You can try these steps (if the step will not help, try next):

1/ Reset AutoCAD using menu AutoCAD -> Reset AutoCAD

2/ Turn off LINESMOOTHING system variable: at the command prompt type LINESMOOTHING, hit Return, then type OFF and hit Return again:

Command: LINESMOOTHING
Enter new value for LINESMOOTHING <ON>: off
Command:

3/ If you are on subscription, you can download and install previous AutoCAD versions. Start with 2016 version, try how it will work on your Mac.

Maxim

[Anonymous]

OK, steps one and two did nothing to change the situation, so I downloaded a trial version of AutoCAD 2016.  When  I try to open it, I get this error message in the screenshot:

[maxim_k]

I think something is wrong with the graphics system on your Mac.

Post screenshot of "About This Mac" window.

Do you use external display? If yes, how it is connected to your Mac?

Do you use Displaylink on your Mac:

http://www.displaylink.com/downloads/macos

Maxim

[Anonymous]

No external display, I never heard of DisplayLink, but if it would be in Applications, then no it's not there.  Here is the screenshot of about my mac:  

[Anonymous]

Any ideas??

[maxim_k]

Sorry, I have no more ideas.
Except reinstalling macOS on your Mac.

Maxim

[Anonymous]

I just did some more searching around in my mac and remembered one of my two GPU's quit a year or so ago.  They had me change my settings to leave it on "integrated only" and told me to leave it there to avoid problems.  When I change it to "dynamic switching", the display on AutoCad is viewable again.  Wierd!

[maxim_k]

>>>>>I .... remembered one of my two GPU's quit a year or so ago.

As I expected in my post:
https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/autocad-for-mac-forum/nothing-in-drawing-space/m-p/7973302/highlight/...

Maxim

[Anonymous]

If one of the two GPU's is corrupted, but it still runs AutoCAD on "dynamic switching", will it harm anything on my computer to just switch it over to dynamic while I'm in CAD? 

[maxim_k · Accepted solution]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

 ..will it harm anything on my computer to just switch it over to dynamic while I'm in CAD? 

---

Then I have to ask - what kind of corruption does the discrete card have on your Mac?

You are using 3-rd parity application to switch graphics card - gfxCardStatus, but if you will look at "Energy Saver" pane of macOS System preferences, you will see only two modes switch:

- Enable automatic graphics switching - which means Integrated graphics will be used by default every time and macOS will allow to switch to discrete graphics according to application request

- Disable automatic graphics switching - which means discrete graphics will be used all the time.

Suppose you don't have gfxCardStatus on your Mac, then the only one option you have is to Enable automatic graphics switching to let macOS to use integrated graphics. So I don't think such settings will harm anything on your computer.

Maxim

[Anonymous]

Thanks Maxim!!