AC 17: Trace & Reference slows tools to a crawl

[Dave Jochum]

If Trace & Reference is switched on in a plan view, tools behave extremely sluggishly, but only if I am using it in an area of the plan where the background drawing shows. Tool performance is normal if used in any other area of the plan. All tools seem to be compromised and only in plan views. Sections and elevations do not exhibit this problem. Are others experiencing this?

[Anonymous]

I have been having same issue, I thought it was intermittent, didn't realize it is linked to T&R usage. Thanks.

[Dave Jochum]

I'm baffled there apparently is only one other person experiencing this behavior?? This is not intermittent at all for me. 100%. This is a serious bug. It makes working with T&R virtually impossible.

[Marton Kiss]

Dave wrote:
I'm baffled there apparently is only one other person experiencing this behavior?? This is not intermittent at all for me. 100%. This is a serious bug. It makes working with T&R virtually impossible.

Dave,

first of all thank you for providing us with your file, that helped us a lot to see why such slowdown can happen.

Based on our tests this behavior is specific to Retina MacBook Pros. The display resolution to drive is too much for the video card and that is why it slows down when additional content is shown with trace and reference.

Our development is checking the possibilities what we can do to speed up such processes. What is clear at the moment, that any speed optimization on this field requires significant development.

A couple of questions to know more about your enironment where you use ArchiCAD:
- Based on your signature you have a Retina MBP and an external 30" display. What is your usual setup? You use both displays extending the desktop or mirror them? Which one has usually the floor plan, which one the 3D?
- In what resolution you use the MBP? Retina or one of the scaled options with more space. I am asking, because usually for example I prefer using the top high resolution. With that resolution simple task like exposé can be laggy and Apple even warns us that this can be source of speed problems. Technically when using the 'looks like 1920x1200' option the OS renders a retina version of this - which is 3840x2400 pixels and that is scaled down. This results an extreme high load on the video card.

Thanks,
Marton

[Dave Jochum]

Thanks, Marton. I'll respond by email and then let the folks here know the outcome when we have one.

[Dave Jochum]

MarkMoscrip wrote:
I have been having same issue, I thought it was intermittent, didn't realize it is linked to T&R usage. Thanks.

Mark--what hardware do you run AC17 on? (You should add that info to your signature.)

[Anonymous]

Dave,

My machine is middle of the road as is my display, can't imagine 1920x1080 taxes my system, but I will reduce resolution and see what happens. I included more detailed specs in sig line.

[EDIT] Well I researched my video card performance on http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html and found out the HD6450 rates a 292 vs. high end cards at 3000-8000, so maybe a new card is in my future...

Mark

[Marton Kiss]

I wanted to give you guys some updates on this. It looks like this slowdown that comes using trace and reference is specific to computers (Macs) with Retina displays. It is not even depending on the graphics card performance or the level of detail of the model. Generally drawing the trace is significantly slower on Retina displays.

Our development made some research and experiments to speed it up, but so far we haven't found an ideal way. This appears to be a general issue for any software that uses the same technology to display content.

In the following article we summarized the situation: http://www.archicadwiki.com/Troubleshooting/SlowMacBookProRetinaWithTrace

Marton

[Dave Jochum]

Marton wrote:
It looks like this slowdown that comes using trace and reference is specific to computers (Macs) with Retina displays. It is not even depending on the graphics card performance or the level of detail of the model. Generally drawing the trace is significantly slower on Retina displays.

Our development made some research and experiments to speed it up, but so far we haven't found an ideal way. This appears to be a general issue for any software that uses the same technology to display content.
Marton

This does not explain why the slowdown only occurs with AC 17. There is absolutely no slowdown whatsoever in 16 or any other software I run.

[Arcadia]

Trace & reference has always been a little of a drain on the system in all versions in my experience and I use windows. The problem is not as severe normally as what you have been experiencing though just a slight slow-down. It is graphics card related and the better cards run TR better.