Hardware and software considerations

[Marton Kiss]

System requirements

Official system requirements on GRAPHISOFT home page:

• BIMcloud 20 and BIM Server 20
• BIMcloud 19 and BIM Server 19
• BIMcloud 18 and BIM Server 18

Recommended hardware for GRAPHISOFT products:

• Recommended hardware on Help Center

Operating systems

Server level operating systems are not required, though are recommended as those are fine-tuned for running background services like BIMcloud and the BIM Server. For detailed list of supported operating systems see the system requirements above.

Storage

BIM Server

BIM Server is a special bundle of a BIMcloud Manager and a BIMcloud Server that is installed on one computer. Practically follow the recommendations for BIMcloud Servers.

BIMcloud

BIMcloud Manager

BIMcloud Manager requires a relative low amount of disk space also speed-wise any current storage solution can provide enough performance for it. Make sure to maintain 10+ GB free space for the temporary files of the operating system and BIMcloud.

BIMcloud Server

In terms of BIMcloud Server the following locations need consideration:

• Installation folder
• Database folders (Projects, Attachments and BlobCache folders)

Installation folder

• The program files are stored here
• Temporary files, caches are stored here

Usually these are installed on the system drive. Make sure to chose a volume that has enough free space for these, at least 50+ GBs and monitor the available free space to maintain operation. Database folders

• Projects folder - Project databases
• Attachments folder - Library databases
• BlobCache folder

These databases are significantly larger than the original solo plans in .pln format as these are optimized for speed. Also note, that as the projects became more and more detailed, these databases are constantly growing. Make sure to prepare for these when choosing the storage. 1 TB and larger partitions are recommended and actively monitor the available free space. Common practice to host these drives on secondary drives or on external storage. When choosing external storage, make sure that it can provide the speed of internal alternatives (Fibre channel, Thunderbolt).

 It is important not to store these on network attached storages (NAS) or on network folders to maintain high performance. We do not recommend using NAS drives or network folders!

BIMcloud Delta Cache (BIMcloud Proxy)

During the installation you can specify the amount of disk space the Delta Cache is going to allocate for caching. The default value is 50 GB. Make sure that there is enough space for this. Later this value can be changed by running the 'BIMcloud Proxy Configurator' utility from the BIMcloud folder.

Performance of storage

As BIMcloud works with large database it is highly I/O intensive. Consider using the fastest possible storage. (SSD, RAID solutions, etc.)

Virtual computers

It is a common practice to run servers on virtual computers. When choosing the underlying storage consider the high I/O load of the BIMcloud. In many cases the physical storage hosts multiple virtual hard disks. Avoid having multiple storage intensive VMs reading and writing the same physical storage.

Virus checkers and Indexers

Virus checkers and Indexers have been known to interfere with BIMcloud and BIM Server installation (more often on Windows 7/8/8.1/10). If your server refuses to start after the installation, you should uninstall it and prior to re-installing disable the virus protection. If the problem continues disable virus checking in the BIMcloud, BIM Server folders and everything below it. If you have relocated your projects and libraries directories, make sure virus checking is disabled in these folders as well.