AutoCAD Point cloud performance issues on High Spec PC.

[callumfisher96]

Hi I'm having trouble with a very high spec PC used for drawing point cloud data.

It underperforms other PC's we use for point cloud drawings by quite a noticeable difference and lags when panning, cropping, undoing crops and general interaction with point clouds. It varies how badly it performs doing these tasks but never performs to a usable state so the PC is wasted currently.

I've completely reset and updated every possible corner of the pc, installed drivers, re-seated components etc. I've been experiencing this issue for since we got the PC and recently upgraded the Ram to 64GB and another M.2 SSD Drive, With a new scanner upgrade we recently did the data has become more detailed and larger files and this has worsened the issue quite a bit.

• The PC has 2 M.2 NVME SSD's one for point clouds and one for programs and windows as seen below.

• We attach the point clouds as recap files and insert them by the XREF menu and usually use a 20% Transparency and '1' Point Size and adjust the detail as needed.

• Hardware Acceleration is on and is set to the Quadro GPU.

• We have the issue on past versions of AutoCAD too

• A company built this for us specifically for CAD and REVIT and have checked it and said all parts are fine and working.

• Performance issues vary depending on the point cloud on the High spec and not lower.

• Cad also lags when loading up sometimes.

High Spec (ISSUE PC)

Intel Xeon CPU E5-1650 v4 @ 3.60GHz

Nvidia Quadro P5000

64GB Ram @ 2400MHz

970 EVO 250TB (CAD INSTALLED)

970 PRO 1TB (POINTCLOUD STORAGE)

Lower Spec (BETTER PERFORMACE)

Intel Core i7-9700K CPU @ 3.60GHz

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980

65GB Ram @ 2133MHz

860 EVO 250GB (CAD INSTALLED)

970 PRO 1TB (POINTCLOUD STORAGE)

Below I've included to links to a recording on a lower spec PC vs the One we're having trouble with. It can vary though so it might not be as bad in the videos.

[callumfisher96]

Lower Spec : https://youtu.be/WDGdEaQn8TE

High Spec : https://youtu.be/ehZEbCgM0zo

[pendean]

You cannot purchase a PC fast enough for clunky AutoCAD to work exceptionally smoothly with Point louds.

- With that in mind, if you are going top purchase a new PC why are you not going for processors (i7s or i9s, 10th or 11th generation)) in the 4.2ghz and higher speeds?

- Also, the days of tiny C: drives in the 250GB range are gone, you will run out of space sooner that you think.

- Are you purchasing a WORKSTATION as labelled by the brand(s) of computers you are looking at, or are you only looking at sad consumer offerings that really don't hold up except for light-duties? Or is this a homebuild?

[callumfisher96]

@pendean 

The PC in question was built my a company we paid to build a machine specifically for our needs, e.g. CAD, REVIT, RECAP, The PC aswel is about a year and a half old and we spent about £4000 on it.

The 250gb SSD's do the job for windows and cad, as much doesn't change or get installed on them, the M.2's are the main use for all our work as the transfer rate is much faster.

[rkreiss375]

What version of AutoCAD are you using?

We have been having a terrible time with 2021 and point clouds.

2020 seems to work much better with point clouds.

[braudpat]

Hello

For Big/Huge Lidar point cloud data, you need

-- A very fast Core i5/i7/i9 with 4/6/8 Cores - The speed is a very important point !

Numebr of cores is important when indexing the point cloud date and a little bit less important after ...

-- Enough memory (32-64 Gb)

-- A good graphic card but a high end very expensive is not necessary for ReCap

( BUT Leica / Trimble / Faro / etc, software can use better high end graphic cards )

For example this summer,  I have played with an OLD 2015/2016 PC with the OLD (2015) famous Core i7 4790K overclocked by a factor of 10-15% about ... Which means 4.6-5.0 Ghz (on the 4 Cores) for the OLD 4790K ...

32 GB Ram , OLD SSD and the OLD Famous NVidia GTX 980 TI ...

This OLD PC was / is VERY Fast and not "ridiculous" compared the latest available hardware ...

So today a good PC for you task, must be based on the following processors :

-- 9th generation -- Core i9 9900K/KS (8C/16T - 4.0-5.0 Ghz - 16 Mb cache)

-- or 10th generation -- Core i7 10700K/KS (8C/16T - 3.8-5.1 Ghz - 16 Mb cache)

-- or 10th generation -- Core i7 10900K/KS (10C/20T - 3.7-5.3 Ghz - 16 Mb cache)

For me the best choice is the "good old" i9 9900K (cheap !?) with a high performance fan like Noctua NH-U12S or maybe Water Cooling to get about 10-15% overclocking ...

-- Fast memory 3200 Mhz - Dual 16 Gb ou quadruple 16 Gb

-- Very fast M2/SSD

-- NVidia RTX 2070 Super (speed equivalent to the RTX 2080)

-- and NOW the RTX 3080 which is very fast and "cheap" (maybe the future low cost 3070)

---- And if you are Admin of your PC !?

You can increase the priority of the task : ACAD.exe / ReCap.exe / etc ...

to "Superior" and maybe "High" but be careful with the "High" option !?

In term of ACAD version, I prefer the 2017 / 2019 (sometimes 2020) and not the 2018 / 2021 !

To improve a little bit the speed, with 2016-2019, you can run with :

LINEFADING & LINESMOOTHING = Disabled AND HQGEOM = 0

Autodesk has removed the HQGEOM variable with the 2020 version !

LINEFADING & LINESMOOTHING = Disabled is OK with 2015-2021

I hope this Info can help you !?

THE HEALTH (Stay Safe, Stay Home, Stay Live), Regards, Patrice (The Retired Old French EE Froggy)

[seversone647CV]

The "lower spec" pc has a better processor for point clouds.  That processor boosts up to 4.9ghz so it should outperform the Xeon.  Clock speed, not just core count, will matter a lot in performance.