Rich_Winsor

I can't believe that rig doesn't have a SSD. If you have the bucks spring for the SSD. You won't be sorry. All you will get is noticeably faster boots and program launches, absolutely quiet operation and a "Windows Experience Index" that is pegged at the top of the charts at 7.9. By way of reference my Western Digital Velociraptor HDD which at the time of purchase held the speed crown for spinning media only garners a WEI of 5.9.

What is a "shadow board" exactly? I'd have to say that it is very aptly named for something that's definition is so hard to nail down.

Wow! Thanks for all the great info guys. Personally I find these kinds of threads that deal with methods of work much more instructive than posts that deal with individual problems or bugs. The old teach a man to fish deal. Not saying that there isn't valuable info to be gained in seeing solutions to someone's individual specific problems, but if I'm not having that problem it doesn't really affect me and I'll leave the bug chasing to the entomologists in the crowd. Glenn: Thanks so much for sharing your hot key list. As Bill mentioned it is a bit daunting but as you said your hot keys are way more intuitive than CA's default choices. If I am going to embark on learning a system of hot keys yours looks like a much better system to start with. The good thing is that it won't take me any time to un-learn CA's system as I was only using about a half a dozen of their hot keys. The notion of turning off the display of the toolbars made me think of a time when I inadvertently switched my video card resolution to a value that wasn't supported by my monitor. My screen became an unintelligible jumble. Somehow I was actually able to navigate out of the situation by clicking my mouse in the general area on the screen where I thought the appropriate command buttons would be. Bill: I'm with you in that the sheer size of the hot key list is rather overwhelming. Hopefully over time I can adapt to it. BTW, your dog apparently is smarter than mine. My little guy only has 2 modes; total relaxation or full blown enthusiasm. There is no graduated scale so no numbers are needed. Electromen: Very cool website. I should have known that they would have come up with something like that. Am I understanding the concept? You just plug the thing into any usb port and then you have an auxiliary programmable keypad? Lew: Now with the advent of the cell phone it is much more acceptable to be seen mumbling in public. Finally, I didn't realize what D.Scott was doing in his videos was calling out hot keys. I thought he was invoking some sort of mystical incantations. Thanks again guys

The answer is: Ctrl+Alt+S It took me a while but I finally got around to creating a Hot Key List. Holy Cow! 130 default Hot Keys? And I can’t even remember to tie my shoes in the morning. I was going to print out a cheat sheet but the html file converts into 3 printed pages. Am I supposed to just man up and commit all 130 (+ any additional customizations) to memory? At some point doesn’t it become a tossup between finding the Hot Key and just executing the command? Back in the day of Lotus 123 and the like they used to have keyboard templates (probably still have them for all I know) that showed Hot Key locations. Does anybody use something like that? How do y’all handle the myriad of Hot Keys? The question is: What is the Hot Key for "Start Camera Spin"?

You're preaching to the choir here, Geir. From the basic layout of the lot terrain to the final aesthetic of the building façade, gutters and downspouts play an integral part in how a design unfolds. Hard to believe they are given such short shrift here.

Uh.... yeah, sure Vinnie that 286 rig will do the job.... ...if the job you have in mind is a new door stop. That reminds me just last year I finally threw out an old 386 machine that had IBM's OS/2 WARP installed. Man, installing that OS was a trip. You had to feed 36 3 1/2" floppy discs in the proper sequence and pray to God that none of them hung up during the process. Actually the OS worked pretty well.... at least for playing the installed version of Mahjong which was about as far as I got with it.

Hell KB, "allude" doesn't do them justice. They practically try to cram it down your throat. Funny thing is it is almost impossible to find out just how much I would have to StepUp. I didn't see a price anywhere. I think for now and for what I am trying to accomplish a measly 3GB of GDDR5 will have to suffice. You know, when all these decisions are weighing on my mind I like to find my way to the observation deck on my garage roof and kick back in the chaise with a tall cool one. For some reason it always makes all my problems seem insignificant.

Hi Ho Geir, I'm going to tell you everything I know about gutters and downspouts in Chief Architect. I too searched the sample drawings in vain looking for just one example where downspouts were used. I even started a thread in the HomeTalk forum before I upgraded to Chief. Here is that link: http://hometalk.homedesignersoftware.com/showthread.php?18992-The-Great-Missing-Downspout-Conspiracy&highlight=downspout Chief does have an assortment of gutter styles in the Core Catalogs under the Architectural/Exteriors/Exterior Attachments section. As for downspouts the only ones I have found are located in the Chief Architect 3D library under the "Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing" section. You will have to download the "Water Supply and Drainage" package. This package contains some very rudimentary bent and straight sections of downspout. Be forewarned that getting these parts to line up to form a decent representation of a downspout is an exercise in aggravation. Just to show you it can be done I have attached the image of the one and up to this point only downspout I ever created with HDP'14. As for your roof tile you will probably want to explore the various manufacturers offerings in the "Materials and Surfaces" section of the 3D Library.

Jeez Jon, couldn't you let me bask in the moment for a while before pointing out my new card is already becoming obsolete? Seriously, I did see that when I was scoping out the EVGA website to be sure my system had enough grunt to handle the new card. Actually as Perry commented, I prefer to have a card that has been out for a while so driver compatability issues have been resolved.

My Chief Architect rig is up on jackstands right now so I can't test it out but I have a theory about the walls autofixing themselves. If the doorway is centered in the walls using the "Center Object" tool the walls will auto-connect properly, but if the door is not exactly centered then one side or the other may require some massaging with the "Connect Walls" tool. In the most recent attempt when I put the door in the straight wall segment and then moved that segment into the circular room I just eyeballed it. As a result both sides did not display the same way which resulted in the need for the "Connect Walls" correction. At least that's my theory. Never really took a stab at merging the curved and straight walls without a doorway involved as that wasn't a condition the OP was interested in. Maybe I'll give it a try when I have my CA rig up and running again.

I didn't realize what a slug my Quadro 4000 was for running Chief Architect until Doug Park posted this link. http://www.videocard...h_end_gpus.html When I built this rig as a SolidWorks workstation a couple of years ago it was one of the preferred cards to have for that application. Anyway this should take care of that problem. Looks like I will be going under the hood for an upgrade this weekend.

Dang it Scott, now you have me wondering if I can recreate the solution. Just so I know I'm not going crazy I did it over again. This time I placed the door in the straight wall before I moved it into the circular room just because it makes it easier to tell how far in to move the straight wall. Some steps had slight variations from my first attempt but the end result was the same.

Jason, you need to click on the "More Reply Options" button in the bottom right corner. From there you will be able to attach files.

Thanks for the vids Scott. Someday I'm gonna have to figure out how to do that but I have enough on my plate for now. Here is the elusive tool I used in step #6 above.

This would be better served by a video but since I don't do videos I'll take a stab at explaining the process. 1) Draw the circular room with the curved exterior wall tool and place a straight exterior wall just outside the circle. (thumbnail #1) 2) Select the straight wall and move it just inside the curved wall so that there is enough space to accommodate the door width. (tn #2) 3) Place the door in the straight wall. (tn #3) 4) Use the break wall tool to put a break in the curved wall on either side of the door opening. (tn #4) 5) Delete the curved portion of the wall in the doorway. (tn #5). 6) Select the straight wall, click on the "Connect Walls" tool and then click on the curved wall. The walls will merge. (tn #6) 7) Finally you can select the straight wall and drag it out closer to the edge of the curved wall. (tn #7) And that in a nutshell is how I did it. Of course this is just a proof of concept approach. To recreate all this to exact existing dimensions will probably pose additional problems. I wish you luck.

Interesting little problem. Here is what I was able to come up with. The walls have to "flatten out" for there to be enough room to fit a door. I used a 48" wide double door and a 30" wide single door.

Very nice indeed and far better than I am capable of at my present skill level. However I do have a slight criticism (for lack of a better term). It is something that I have experienced in my initial attempts at creating walkthrough videos in Chief. As the camera approaches the impressive front entry it would be so much more effective to have it pause in front of the entry doors and then have them swing open before entering the structure rather than just barging thru the closed doors. I don't know if it is even doable with the software. I always seem to end up opening the doors in 3D view before creating the walkthrough rather than moving thru the closed doors. Just one guy's humble opinion. BTW, the kitty licking it's paws is a very nice touch.

So that makes you a gun totin tree hugger. No conflict there as long as you ain't shootin the trees.

What Larry and Perry said and if you get some gaps between the roof planes use the "join roof planes" tool to clean them up.

I feel like a dog chasing it's tail,

Is this the video in question?

Not sure how I feel about this. Is there accountability involved? Does the person being rated (either positively or negatively) see who is rating them?

Well I guess one way to boost your post count is to reply to your own posts. Live and learn. You can now scroll thru multiple thumbnails by using the left and right arrow keys. Something that was not available in previous forums. However I still think the mouse navigation is ill conceived.

I'm not usually one who is resistant to change, but I'm finding lots of little things that seem less productive than the previous forum's tools. My latest gripe concerns the attached thumbnails and how they are navigated. Specifically I hate the new "flyout" tabs that take you to the previous and next images. "Prev" flies out in the upper left portion of the screen and "Next" flies out clear on the other side of the screen. Add to this that the close tab remains in the lower right hand corner and you have to wheel all over the screen. I've got a 30" monitor. That takes 24" to cross the screen and another 12" to 30" to get down to the close tab depending upon which side of the screen you start from. Do I qualify for frequent flier miles for my mouse travel? As I mentioned before I also really miss the simple "previous thread/next thread" links. I must be the only one who cares but the only way I've found to get back to the previous thread is to hit the "Back to General Q & A" link and then scroll around to find it again. Just my .02 worth.

You might get one of those New Guinea headhunters to do their shrunken head deal on you.