Running Fusion with Rosetta 2 on Apple ARM-based M1 Chipsets

[keqingsong]

July 5, 2023 Update 

Hello all, the current Insider Build of Fusion now has native Apple Silicon support, and as you read some of the latest comments in this thread, the results are looking great. Our goal is make it available to everyone by our next product update, which should be happening towards the end of the month. If you want to try it now, you can sign up to join our Insider Program, and get access to the Insider Build. Keep in mind that once you become a member, you are under NDA and cannot sharing information publicly, with the exception of this particular project since it is already public knowledge. 

Click this link to sign-up and join: https://www.autodesk.com/campaigns/fusion-360/insider-program

Thank you to those you have who've expressed interested and have been testing it! Please continue to let us know about your experiences. 
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November 23, 2022 Update

As you know we have been working closely with Apple on native support for Fusion on Apple Silicon Chipsets (i.e. M1 & M2). We are pleased to announce that we expect to achieve full native support by Summer of 2023.

As we have explained in this thread, the delay is a result of the need to ensure 100% compatibility between components from over 100 3rd party vendors including Autodesk.

If you want to access this functionality as soon as possible, please consider joining the Insider Program. If you have any questions on the topic please contact @Rajkumar.ilanchelian.

October 28, 2021 Update

Hey all, thanks again for the passionate discussion here. Even though we haven't chimed into this thread as much as we wanted, we are reading every single response and are actively working on getting Fusion to be natively supported on the new Apple chipset. Here's what I know from talking to the development teams: 
We are actively working on getting native support. This is still going to take some time because Fusion uses a multitude of services to work the way it does (Autodesk-owned as well as 3rd party) many of which are also not natively supported on M1 chipsets yet. We are collaborating closely with those teams to taking the necessary steps to ensure that the services we use are also natively supported. There is a lot of passion internally to get this done as well, so we definitely feel you. Again, I can't not say when this will happen, but as soon as we have something more concrete to share, we'll be sure to update you all. 

April 29, 2021 Update

We've been actively working on resolving the issues mentioned below and are glad to report that these issues no longer exist when running Fusion on the M1 chipset. We are also working closely with Apple and are in the process of certifying Fusion as 100% compatible running on M1 chipsets via Rosetta 2. 

In terms of running Fusion natively on the M1 chipset without Rosetta 2, we are still working towards this goal but is going to take some time to reach. We are confident to say that running Fusion on the M1 chipset via Rosetta 2 should be indistinguishable from running it on an Intel-based chipset, if not faster. 

If there are specific issues you've experience and are not mentioned below (strike-through items), please chime in and respond to this thread so we are aware and can look into it ASAP. Thank you for your continued support! 

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Apple's original press release 

We are delighted to see Fusion being featured in the most recent Apple ARM-based M1 Macbook Pro announcement. Although Fusion isn’t natively compatible on Apple’s new M1 chipset architecture yet, Rosetta 2 should enable you to run Fusion*. We will be sure to keep you posted on our progress towards support of Apple’s new line of chipsets.   

-  
   
* While much of Fusion 360 works as expected under Rosetta 2, we discovered that some Fusion 360 components were not yet compatible. If you run Fusion 360 using Rosetta 2, you may experience issues in these areas:  

·         Switching Team Hubs in the Data Panel  

·         Insert from McMaster-Carr  

·         Explore Generative Design and Electronics Cooling Simulation results  

·         ECAD Tool Libraries and Content Manager  

·         Local Simulation Solves utilizing NASTRAN  

If you rely on the impacted areas for your work, we recommend you to stay on Intel-based Macs until we have these issues sorted out.   

[copumpkin]

Seconded. I think Autodesk would get more support from users on this if they could elaborate on what in particular is so challenging about the change. Something like "while most codebases are a big pile of source that can be trivially recompiled for a new architecture, Fusion 360 relies on several external libraries for CAM that have not yet released ARM versions, and are likely slow to do so because they write portions in assembly tuned for each processor architecture. We are working with those vendors to help speed up the process of porting those libraries, and the core of Fusion already works fine on ARM". I'm speculating, but something like that I think would help us understand why this is unusually challenging when just about every other commercial program for macOS released an ARM-native version long ago.

[FrodoLoggins]

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This is still going to take some time because Fusion 360 uses a multitude of services to work the way it does (Autodesk-owned as well as 3rd party) many of which are also not natively supported on M1 chipsets yet. We are collaborating closely with those teams to taking the necessary steps to ensure that the services we use are also natively supported.

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[copumpkin]

Yeah, but that was almost a year ago and it'd be nice to get more specific about what's still left to do. As I and I think others have said, we don't need it to be full-featured out of the box. I'm willing to beta test things, or to try a preview version without XYZ feature, or whatever it takes to show progress here. The program is basically several programs in one, and if an ARM (I'd say M1 but so much time has passed that Apple's already moved to M2) version of Fusion only supports the Design workspace I'd still give it a go, especially if it can coexist with the Intel version and let me switch back if I want to use other workspaces.

[lance.carocci]

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@copumpkin wrote:
The program is basically several programs in one, and if an ARM (I'd say M1 but so much time has passed that Apple's already moved to M2) version of Fusion only supports the Design workspace I'd still give it a go, especially if it can coexist with the Intel version and let me switch back if I want to use other workspaces.

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Unfortunately it's not feasible due to the need for native components that are shared across workspaces (for example, the graphics canvas). If it was just a matter of moving processing to the cloud, independent of local client architecture, that could simply migration of some commands, but it would still be a very disjointed experience without the rest of the puzzle pieces.

Another wrinkle that isn't discussed much is how this transition impacts our internal development, too. Our software has traditionally been designed around x86_64, and so are the build and testing pipelines that support it - suffice to say, not every team is working directly on a native Fusion client, but are also working on systems that support development of a native client; since we are not providing status updates on this front, I imagine that contributes to the radio silence from us on ARM development.

What I can suggest in the near-term is to take a look at Autodesk University coming up at the end of September - this tends to be the event where users can get a glimpse of what we've been up to for the last year.

[t_giorno]

M1 ultra chip is 35% slower than Intel Mac book pro top of the line when handling complex mesh operations. 

[brandonXNQ6E]

Looks like AU is going on now.  I am not registered and cannot find any announcements about the Apple Silicon version of Fusion 360.  Are there any updates?

[stefanFPK7R]

Und die Arbeit über Rosetta 2 ist nicht wirklich als flüssig zu bezeichnen...

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"And the work on Rosetta 2 can't really be called smooth...."

@stone.oven  Kommentar übersetzt 

[stone.oven]

Can we re appreciate Mojave then? At least for us cavemen? Let's face it, no MacBook has surpassed the late 2013 architecture change. M1, sorry 2, has left ppl in the dark. Laptops without fans are the modern lightbulb = planned obsolescence. Plus we all see past the graphs and know its slower pound for pound. You refuse to accommodate the penguins so what were left with is essentially going to Gates and operating a NUC or similar w/ windows 10 and our man size Kleenex getting used up on tears from our bleeding eyes.
There is scad though guys so were not done for yet!

[stone.oven]

Its apple that doesn't care about us tho also. Or they wouldn't fuse everything to the f*****g board!

[stone.oven]

It's the f360 route that creates the quirk, almost like the "gesture" is copyright to another platform. Which it isn't is it?

Seemingly, from my light browsing of the forum, You rectify a great swathe of dilemmas for people! Therefore I always make a point to scan your responses. Its nice to know your old "old"tech or have been until recently. Im a Mac baby, only had one windows machine about 20 years ago. Since then all apple products, everything has let me down except the iPhone7+ (which I have bought 4 of and thus do not carry a supercomputer around in my pocket to bolster their global domination at my own expense) and the late 2012 i7 MPB which has served me fine for F360 untill now. With the advent of the poorly performing apple silicone and the single core capabilities of the 12th gen i5 the time to jump ship has come! I feel Apple has let Autodesk down, Autodesk perhaps realising apple have killed them off, are avoiding staying it out aloud, although the timeframes this team layout are often fascinating even to the immortal so we could be a year or moths away, who knows. We could see a shiny F360 for the M4 chip first the way apple pump out the revisions! 

[stone.oven]

It really isnt good for single thread processes. Bang for buck your better off with a 300 shmekle late 2013 MBP that a 3000 shmeckle M1 book or mini. Apples benchmarks are jargon. the only argument now the EU has subjected its citizens to inflammatory hikes in energy costs and you could see your tower cost a shmeckle a day to power apposed to  2 shmeckles a week. Still doest account for the 2k difference between an intel rig and a new Apple product. 

[bentwookie]

Any other frugalists want to come in and wax poetic about something that doesn't affect them? Maybe drop a hot take about the lack of a parallel port? These machines run plenty fast and they do it longer without melting a hole in your tray table. If that's not for you, then neat. I don't care. 

Plenty of us love our Apple Silicon Macs and all we want is for the tools we pay money for to be compiled natively so they're faster. It blows my mind that this triggers in some people a need to drop in and defend the current situation. 

Autodesk. We need some kind of roadmap. This is ridiculous. 

[stone.oven]

 

A4000 will eat you for breakfast! Spank the monkey wookie! Come to the dark side!

[brandonXNQ6E]

Oh Billy, you're so funny!  Now run on back to your room...the adults are trying to talk.

[maruska]

Apple is offering one-on-one sessions for devs to learn about integrating their latest tech into their apps. I hope Autodesk has signed-up for a session. 😜

https://developer.apple.com/events/ask-apple/

[TrippyLighting]

LOL. Good one 😉

[brandonXNQ6E]

The silence is deafening.  We were told to wait till AU, we did, no update.  I asked for an update 2 weeks ago, no response.  It's now been 3 months since the last word was said.

Fusion has issues on Rosetta 2, I keep get 2-3 random freezes a day and have to force quit the program to recover.  No rhyme or reason, and I lose all work since the last autosave.

This is getting frustrating on all fronts.

[ashton_osborne]

Frankly I've left fusion. I held out hope for so long but decided I better spend my time learning a new CAD software entirely. And what's worse yet, I'm a college student who fought so long to keep using Fusion in a world dominated by Solidworks, but now Autodesk has lost another potential young and long term customer. I'll keep following this thread, hoping Apple Silicon will receive the respect it does deserve, but until then, my time will be spent elsewhere. 

[ashton_osborne]

Frankly I've left fusion. I held out hope for so long but decided I better spend my time learning a new CAD software entirely. And what's worse yet, I'm a college student who fought so long to keep using Fusion in a world dominated by Solidworks, but now Autodesk has lost another potential young and long term customer. I'll keep following this thread, hoping Apple Silicon will receive the respect it does deserve, but until then, my time will be spent elsewhere. 

[TrippyLighting]

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@ashton_osborne wrote:

Frankly I've left fusion. I held out hope for so long but decided I better spend my time learning a new CAD software entirely. And what's worse yet, I'm a college student who fought so long to keep using Fusion in a world dominated by Solidworks, but now Autodesk has lost another potential young and long term customer. I'll keep following this thread, hoping Apple Silicon will receive the respect it does deserve, but until then, my time will be spent elsewhere. 

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Since when does SolidWorks run natively on macOS and Apple Silicon?