Working constantly in support for Intercad I have a few tips that may help if your system is unstable. These are things to look at and good practices that will keep your system healthy.
1. The video card maybe having trouble.
Go the SolidWorks video card testing site https://www.solidworks.com/sw/support/videocardtesting.html This site not only has video cards but systems that have been tested with that card and the video card driver used. The video driver may not be the latest but it has been certified and tested by SolidWorks.
2. Brand named computers are not much more expensive but the time lost when there is a conflict between computer drivers is well worth the extra money compare to white box or DIY machine. Similarly building your own computer to a specification can also have pitfalls. One client found this out when he purchased a cheap power supply which although specified correctly was not up to the job.
3. Use Rx. This tool is definetly underused and has a lot of helpful features.
Two are circled above;
a) Click here to launch SolidWorks in Software OpenGL mode. This lets you start SolidWorks and bypass your graphics cards using the computer processor to produce the image. Very helpful if you suspect crashing due to your graphics card as it will be stable.
b) Click here to launch SolidWorks while bypassing the Tools Options settings. If you have exited the program illegally you may have some corruption of your registry settings. This bypasses your computers registry and uses “Out of the Box” settings. If your instability is resolved using this contact Intercad or your local VAR and they can edit your registry to fix this.
4. Maintenance of your system.
Rx is again the tool you should make use of.
The system maintenance tab.
Notice above that it will clean out not only temporary SolidWorks files but normal temp and internet temp files. You can also see at the bottom circled two really neat features that allow you to select your computer drives and do a check disk and run defragmenter.
Lastly how often and when do I have time you ask?
When selecting Start Maintenance it will ask you whether you want to do this
Now
Daily
Weekly
Monthly
and at what time.
All you need to do is set it and it will do as often as you want when you want even if you aren’t there as long as your machine is on. Rx is the easy way to keep your machine clean and the hard drive clear. Go To Start>All Programs>SolidWorks xxx>SolidWorks Tools> SolidWorks Rx.
More tips later …
Mark Duggan
Intercad Technical Support Mgr
