New in Revit 2013 - Gauntlet thrown or playing catch up?

[Bricklyne Clarence]

http://autodesk-revit.blogspot.com.au/2012/03/what-new-in-autodesk-revit-2013.html



For those of you who may be interested an Autodesk blogger just posted the new features in the latest version of Revit and you'll be glad to know that most of the "new features" seem to be the Autodesk developers merely catching up with ArchiCAD........of 2 or 3 versions ago.


A few of the "new features" in this regard are the view and view templates which seems to be a rudimentary version of what we've had in ArchiCAD for the longest time in Model view options and the ability to save a view as is and place on layout and have it remember the layer and layer combination settings, scale settings and text/annotation settings

Another of their "new features" are the DWG/DGN(Microstation) and IFC import export improvements.
For anyone who knows just how crappy the above features are in the current versions of Revit.....Enough said.
"New" indeed!


Other 'intersting' "new" features are some worksharing improvements, which, sadly for Revit users, still lags in the Stone Age compared to TEamwork 2.0 and BIMserver in ArchiCAD.
And it's also nice, (I guess) that Revit users can now add gradient fills to their elevations and Sections - something we've had in ArchiCAD since they introduced gradient fills....oh, 3 versions ago. Or was it 4 versions ago.

It's also nice to see that they can now dimension circles and add a diameter dimension tool which oddly enough never existed in Revit prior to 2012. Yes, shocking, I know.

I will give them credit for a couple of the new improvements though, which would be nice to have a version of in ArchiCAD.

They have a 'Divide and distribute' function which seems very generative and allows the user to intelligently place or array objects along a spline or line (and it's parametric from the looks of it, which means as the line updates, the objects placed and associated with it, update too) - and this seems like it can also be really useful in tools like Rail tools, profiling and that sort of thing.

They also have a cool tool to divide elements (I guess in elevation or section) using a sketch line in what seems like it can be useful in creating panelled walls without having to rely on texture fills or vectorial hatching like we have to do in ArchiCAD outside of the complex profile which is only uni-directional.

And the last thing I really liked is the fact that they now have Progressive real-time ray-trace render which interactively updates the render view as you update the model view.
Think VrayRT, or Octane render.
But the fact that it uses the CPU as opposed to the Graphics card (GPU) to do this tells me that it essentially slows the program and grinds it to a halt to pretty much make it unasable as it's rendering - since Revit is not (as far as I'm aware) fully Multi-core aware like ArchiCAD is and it only uses one core for most functions.

Their stairs and railing have also gotten somewhat of a facelift - but from what I can tell it only brings it to the level of an ArchiCAD user who has access to Cadimage stair tool or ARchistair with a lot of those features already existing in the ArchiCAD environment.

For any of you who ever thought that ArchiCAD's stair tool was bad, you ain't seen nothing yet until you use Revit's atrocious version.
Even the 2D display features and options are so godawful , that I sometimes wonder how any Revit user is able to produce building code-compliant drawings of stairs with what they have available.
Revit 2013 seems to address this, but only somewhat.
If ever a Stair tool needed a complete revamp, Revit's stair tool is by far the leading candidate and even the guy doing the review admitted as much
But at least they are listening to their users, so let's just hope that GS are doind the same.

In my personal opinion, I don't think any of these new features are going to strike fear into the heart of GS developers since Revit is so far behind on the major features to ARchiCAD, but I would still hope it inspires them to still keep pushing on to keep ARchiCAD, 3-4 years ahead of the game (if not more) and address some of the long-standing issues and wishes of users.

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Revit MEP is not "all in one." MEP has an "Architecture" ribbon with very basic architectural walls, windows, doors, etc.; structure has an "architecture" ribbon as well but does not have access to anything MEP. Structure/MEP only have a fraction of what Revit Architecture has. MEP/Structure/Architecture do not have access to the all same families and tools as the standalone versions.

There is a new option, "Revit 2013" that combines them all in one...completely separate from MEP, Structure, and Architecture (4 different options).

And while everyone is bashing Revit, let us not forget that ArchiCAD's first version was in 1984 while Autodesk only acquired Revit 10 years ago. Before Autodesk bought Revit, it had only been on the market for 5 yrs. 29 yrs vs. 10 yrs (or 15 if you use previous developer)...I would think ArchiCAD would be more advanced than Revit by more than 3-4 years...but then again, Autodesk has some the best developers in the world.

[Bricklyne Clarence]

kdreed wrote:
Revit MEP is not "all in one." MEP has an "Architecture" ribbon with very basic architectural walls, windows, doors, etc.; structure has an "architecture" ribbon as well but does not have access to anything MEP. Structure/MEP only have a fraction of what Revit Architecture has. MEP/Structure/Architecture do not have access to the all same families and tools as the standalone versions.

There is a new option, "Revit 2013" that combines them all in one...completely separate from MEP, Structure, and Architecture (4 different options).

And while everyone is bashing Revit, let us not forget that ArchiCAD's first version was in 1984 while Autodesk only acquired Revit 10 years ago. Before Autodesk bought Revit, it had only been on the market for 5 yrs. 29 yrs vs. 10 yrs (or 15 if you use previous developer)...I would think ArchiCAD would be more advanced than Revit by more than 3-4 years...but then again, Autodesk has some the best developers in the world.

Considering Teamwork 2.0 and BIM server alone, ArchiCAD IS more advanced than Revit (by more than 3-4 years by my own estimation).

And that's not even considering other areas where ArchiCAD is definitely head and shoulders above Revit (Full multi-core awareness/Full 64-Bit capability leading to heavier data handling=> bigger models with less or no crashes).

Autodesk does have some of the best developers in the world as well as the biggest marketing budget of any CAD (or certainly BIM) software.
So that could easily beg the inevitable question as I turn it right back at you and ask, Shouldn't Autodesk have caught up by now? Or is 10 years not enough?

The whole 'ArchiCAD has been around for almost a decade longer than Revit and therefore should be further ahead' argument glibly glosses over the fact that computer (hardware) technology 15-20 years ago was nothing like what it is today thus offering Graphisoft no great advantages to get 'further ahead' in the game.
At the same time it also ignores the fact that Graphisoft nonetheless have integrated some tricks and gleaned knowledge from trying to make such an advanced piece of software and a radical design methodology (for its time) work with hardware that was considerably limited at the time, into making ArchiCAD smarter at how it handles more data, larger projects and essentially making the most of less resources, while juggling program stability and user fluidity and ease-of-use.
Something that Revit never really had to go through in its abbreviated developmental history and something which glaringly shows when you attempt Worksharing with multiple users of large complex projects in Revit, or when you realize your memory usage in Revit is 20 times your file size versus 5 times in ArchiCAD.

So when you hear someone like me saying ArchiCAD is easily half a decade ahead of Revit in terms of it's advancement - we're not just blowing smoke, since it comes from a place of having used both software and knowing a little bit about what goes on under the hood.

[Anonymous]

...but then again, Autodesk has some the best funded marketers in the world.

There, I've corrected that for you!!

[Graham Whipple]

Quote:
...but then again, Autodesk has some the best funded marketers in the world.


There, I've corrected that for you!! Wink

So True!
And I fully echo what Bricklyne mentioned. There are major things that ArchiCAD does so well that throw the advantage well beyond a few years. And yet as mentioned so many times there are things like the stair tool that are so frustratingly lacking. Still I will stick with AC!

G