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Working with 2D or 3D in a CAD software are two different ball games. While 2d performance may be consistent and acceptable across a majority of display cards, 3D real-time visualization and photo-realistic rendering may offer different end-user experiences depending on your graphics card and hard-disk.
If you are an existing paid BricsCAD 3D user or doing an evaluation with intent to buy, I recommend that you use the most optimum graphics card & hard disk for that positive experience.
First, the graphics cards:
BricsCAD uses the Redway engine to deliver graphics capabilities. It is important you use hardware acceleration that is supported by the RedSDK drivers.
On Windows, Redsdk with hardware acceleration is supported on the following video chipsets:
- NVIDIA chipsets
- GeForce 8 Series
- GeForce 9 Series
- GeForce GTX Series
- AMD ATI chipsets
- R600 family
- R700 family
- INTEL chipsets
- GMA 4000 family
- See detailed GPUs list for the latest REDsdk release on the Redway3D site. The latest video drivers are typically required and can be found in the List of the latest available video drivers.
- On Linux, 3D graphics hardware acceleration in RedSDK is supported on the following video chipsets:
- NVIDIA cards. It is advised to use the latest recommended driver from NVIDIA.
- ATI cards. It is advised to use the latest recommended driver from ATI/AMD.
- 3D graphics hardware acceleration in RedSDK on Linux is NOT supported on:
- INTEL cards. As opposed to ATI and NVIDIA, 3D hardware acceleration in linux drivers for INTEL cards is relatively new. So far we do not yet officially support 3D hardware acceleration on INTEL cards, although we are working on it. Chances are good that hardware acceleration for a recent INTEL card works on BricsCAD (Linux) V15.
- Laptops with dual graphics, although it happens to work on some dual graphics systems using recent versions of proprietary NVIDIA drivers.
- INTEL cards. As opposed to ATI and NVIDIA, 3D hardware acceleration in linux drivers for INTEL cards is relatively new. So far we do not yet officially support 3D hardware acceleration on INTEL cards, although we are working on it. Chances are good that hardware acceleration for a recent INTEL card works on BricsCAD (Linux) V15.
The above list is taken from a knowledge-base article published by Bricsys.
We have interacted with a number of BricsCAD users here and our experience is that NVIDIA graphics cards are the number one choice for advanced BricsCAD 3D operations.
If you have to advise a new user about optimum graphics hardware configuration, use the above information and pass it on to your fellow users or clients.
If hardware is already in place, you can still hope to get the best performance from it by ensuring that the drivers are updated. Run the REDSDKINFO command in BricsCAD and it will generate a long report of diagnostics on the command line. If you look through the report carefully, you will notice that it provides suggestions to update your existing graphics card drivers where applicable. The link to download also is given in this diagnostic report. This can significantly improve performance in systems that may not already be configured optimally.
IMPORTANT: A graphics card/driver that is not best suited may spoil the user experience during evaluation phase. Please ensure you have the most optimal setup to trial BricsCAD.
And finally, your hard disk matters too. It is strongly recommended that you use an SSD hard disk rather than the older technology hard disks.
Going forward: From BricsCAD V16 onwards, Bricsys is migrating to GDI+ which supports better anti-aliasing and transparency, so graphics performance should improve further.
With inputs from Bricsys knowledge-base, Bricsys forum and Rodinel Tatru of Bricsys.
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Posted by: Graphics Card | November 04, 2020 at 23:15