PLANT 3D

[Anonymous]

TAKING PLANT 3D AT LEE COLLEGE, TEXAS. PROBLEMS I'M HAVING ARE UNABLE TO USE STUDENT VERSION 2017 WITH SCHOOL VERSION 2015. I AM ABLE TO GO FROM SCHOOL WITH DRAWING AN UPLOAD AT HOME FINE. BUT FROM HOME TO SCHOOL I HAVE PROBLEMS. I'VE TRIED SAVING TO AN OLDER VERSION SUCH AS 2013 TO COPY TO 2015. WE HAVE USED XREFERENCING IN THIS CLASS FOR OUR DRAWINGS. I'M WANTING TO KNOW WHY I CAN'T USE THE STUDENT VERSION 2017 WITH 2015. I HAD TO USE A WBLOCK COMMAND LAST CLASS AN CREATE A NEW DRAWING IN ORDER TO SAVE SCHOOL WORK. IS IT BECAUSE OF SAVING TO 2013 LT,OR BECAUSE OF XREFERENCING OR JUST THE DIFFERENT VERSIONS. I NEED TO BE ABLE TO USE SOFTWARE AT HOME TO KEEP UP WITH CLASS WORK.  COULD SOMEONE EMAIL OR CALL ME BACK ON WHAT TO DO FROM HERE. HELP PLEASE!

SINCERELY,

RHONDA

[matthew.d]

Hi @Anonymous,

Welcome to the community!

Sorry to hear about the issue using 2017 at home. Could you tell us more about what specifically happens when you try to use 2017? Is the program starting up correctly? Are you receiving an error message? Have you tried running the 2015 version on your home computer? As not to switch between versions.

Let me know a bit more and I am happy to assist further.

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately, with most of these programs there is not true "backwards compatibility" meaning you can usually update older models into the newer version, but the newer version models will not function in the older version.  So, what you describe would be accurate.

The only way I am aware of that this might work is to use the PCF import/export to transfer between the two versions, but I think that first came out in the 2016 version so not going to work in 2015.

That being the case, you could export your 2017 work to solids by right clicking on the drawing in project manager and choosing "export to autocad", but the drawback there is you would get DWG objects without the spec driven "piping" intelligence.  Navisworks NWD would let you combine the two versions into one file, but again, only graphical representations. with very limited intelligence.

Maybe someone else is aware of another way??

[dave.wolfe]

Autodesk products are free for educational use. Your school can use the 2017 product for free. I'm not sure why they would stay on previous releases. As mentioned, the program is not backwards compatible.