Autodesk acquires Ecotect!

[Anonymous]

Hi All!

Now Autodesk acquires Ecotect too!

visit www.squ1.com for more!

[Anonymous]

First of all i would say you are a little biased (as a reseller)

Mats_Knutsson wrote:
Architects here say that ArchiCAD has an interface that is very appealing to them and that it is easy and intuitive to learn.

Agreed

Concerning modeling I guess all the softwares have their ups and downs but when it comes to "from idea to documentation" ArchiCAD is on the top. Lot's of space for development though!

This is not true. Try comparing with Revit and Bentley. Both are at least equal and at certain aspects better. Ofcourse in 3D all of them are just plain bad. 3D should be like SketchUp.

Large projects... A very large project can be slow in ArchiCAD but at least it can be done which obviously isn't the case with some other BIM packages. Check out the VICO projects for size!!! Speed and size is important and will become even more so the more...

Simply wrong. Revit is much faster than Archicad in creating sections and elevations in normal sized projects. On very large i dont have any experience. And VICO is GS's constructor, a missed importunity to bring AC to a whole new level with addon modules (like Revit structure.. etc)

I rather see large scale BIM driven from the construction side of the business and the architects will then have two choices: conform or step even closer to pure design.

EXACTLY!. If you want to do BIM you have to look at it from construction point of view, where Architecture is one piece of the puzzle.

The tremendous power of VICO shows ..

Does anyone know why Constructor (which was sold to VICO) was not broken to addon modules to extend archicad?

Simply Archicad Structural module, Archicad HVAC module... and so on binding the pieces of the BIM puzzle.

Its impossible to do BIM with archicad right now. Just a small part of the picture

[Thomas Holm]

oreopoulos wrote:

Concerning modeling I guess all the softwares have their ups and downs but when it comes to "from idea to documentation" ArchiCAD is on the top. Lot's of space for development though!

This is not true. Try comparing with Revit and Bentley. Both are at least equal and at certain aspects better. Of course in 3D all of them are just plain bad. 3D should be like SketchUp.

oreopoulos, I'm sorry but I get so fed up with your whining... I used Microstation (Bentley) for a long time..
Archicad is (maybe not for long, but still) unbeaten when it comes to workflow from scratch to document - the way you can define, pre-set and utilize the Model>View>Layout>Publish system is still superior in Archicad. Too many underestimate it. Too many don't use it to its full potential. But if you're so sure of your own rightfulness, why don't you draw the consequence of it and change camps and use Sketchup or Revit from now on and spare us all your negativism?

[Anonymous]

Now now Tom. Let him speak. After all we should have freedom of speech. But I agree that oreo is wrong in some respects.

Revit being faster at creating section don't mean "is faster in large projects". As I use both (and some experience with quite large projects) I can tell you that memory utilization in Revit is plain horrible. At some level it just crash. And no speed of regenerating elevation will change that (even though I like that speed ;D). On the other hand OpenGL driver in AC is way faster than in Revit. It is not Navisworks, but very close.

VICO did not bought Constructor, they split from Graphisoft. The reason GS was concentrated on architects so much that there was not enough attention on Constructor. I agree though that I would rather see is as a modules around AC. It would allow for faster adoption of new versions of AC.

[Anonymous]

You can spare us your blindness if you like.
If you cannot understand what i write its ok. I dont expect you to do so.

1) Can you do BIM in Archicad? No you cannot
2) Is Archicad Ahead of competition. No itsnot. It was. It is not.
3) Write a list of feature that AC has and competitors dont have.
and write that one 5 years ago and then think.

If you think otherwise show me ONE of your work that is a complete BIM. If you dont know what that is, please spare me of your presence.

Now the serious part.

A) for speed. You are probably right about large project, but i said "normal"
having in mind the memory issues. In normal projects, archicad is much slower.

Archicad is paying the price of being the older product in the market. Its harder to maintain the code, and bring it up to current standards.

B) I thought vico bought it, but more or less its the same.

[Thomas Holm]

Just to clarify:
- AC12 is a lot faster than AC11. And Revit, AFAIK.
- Vico was spun off by Graphisoft with GS's support. Their system is still built on Archicad. They pay license fees to GS of some kind (conditions secret).

[Anonymous]

Thomas wrote:
Just to clarify:
And Revit, AFAIK.

Revit has LIVE sections and elevations. Nothing close for AC. But this is not so important if it was a few seconds. Other stuff are more important.

[Anonymous]

Miki wrote:
Revit being faster at creating section don't mean "is faster in large projects". As I use both (and some experience with quite large projects) I can tell you that memory utilization in Revit is plain horrible. At some level it just crash. And no speed of regenerating elevation will change that (even though I like that speed ;D). On the other hand OpenGL driver in AC is way faster than in Revit.

Revit's rule of thumb is that you need 20 times the size of the file in total memory; so if your file is 50Mb, you need a Gb of RAM to deal with that file. This is of course very rough, but our 200Mb files tend to need workstations with 4Gb of RAM. Something about how Revit works is memory intensive -- can we say that instead of "horrible memory utilization"? So we always boot with the Windows 3Gb boot switch. I have always said that Revit could afford to be less automatic -- I think that's part of the price we pay for automation. Reviteers can loosen the model by disabling connections between walls, etc. to compensate.

With respect to OpenGL acceleration, that is a very sore point as a number of users have had troubles getting Revit's OGL system to work well. Plus, Revit 2009's display is slower than 2008, though the developers are working on a fix presently. I would be very interested to see the same model in Revit 2009 and AC12 to see how they perform on this topic.

[Anonymous]

laszlonagy wrote:
ArchiCAD is the market leader among architectural BIM softwares or among the firsts in many European countries, a far as I know.

If this is the fact so AC is here to stay in US also, maybe an under dog but still a good horse!
Joseph

[Anonymous]

I spoke with one of the Green Building Studio partners today after noting that the graphisoft plug-in is no longer available. This is third hand but evidently there is an intellectual property concern from whoever wrote the plug-in (Graphisoft or 3rd party?). There is possibly a work around that I have yet to attempt, but if you save AC as an xml file. There is another download, GBS Client, that can upload an xml file and I assume convert into a gbxml file. He also mentioned that they had been trying for some time to unload gbxml on a government lab or non profit. They'd rather be adding features.

I believe the two GBS owners consider the AutoDesk purchase an opportunity to advance the software faster (more resources). Equally disapointing is what ADesk is charging. Not a big deal for a large firm, but I suggested a monthly fee makes it more accessible to small firms. I can go six months without needing an energy analysis.

I've found EcoTect hard to use though graphically impressive. Its a two person firm on the Isle of Wight. Who knows where it could go with more folks.

After an amazingly dry period in enrgy analysis software development we are finally seeing some real movement. In my humble opinion we can't develop these tools fast enough. Its of critical importance to the planet. I purchased AC10 because I saw BIM as the future of green design, plus...

If ArchiCad doesn't keep up, at some point I'll switch. It may already be too late. If I was buying my first BIM tool today all things point to Revit.

CB

[Rob]

In my opinion GBS or Ecotec use is fairly limited in regards to very complex or big projects. The complexity of such an
assessment even for a family house project size (use, reticulation and
recycling of grey water, rain water harvesting, heating options based
on solar and solar/gas boosted technologies, insulation properties,
ventilation, light and low voltage options, photovoltaics and option
of feeding excess electricity back to the national grid) is very
great, however it may be relevant just to the local standards and
client's expectations in AU. Over here the state governments provide
financial incentives for eco implementations and currently we are in
the process of establishing the 'carbon-trading' scheme after we have
(finally!) signed on Kyoto protocols. BTW a promise of signing on this
protocol significantly helped new federal labor government to win over
the liberals in a big landslide some year ago.
The point is that if you want to do this properly you need to have
serious professionals on board and I do not think that those products would qualify for this purpose anyway.