Dermot

I'm not exactly sure what Bill is trying to say. You will be able to download any program updates, major releases, or new versions while your SSA membership is active. There is no guarantee that the next program upgrade will come out before your SSA expires though. This all depends on the timing of the releases and the timing of your membership. I think of SSA as a more long term commitment to staying current with the latest version of the software along with the added benefits of tech support, training videos, and library catalogs. Here is the full list of SSA benefits: Updates, Major Releases and New Versions Priority Technical Support Over 500 Online Training Videos Download Library Catalogs Discounted Training Seminars Discounts on Secondary Licenses More information about the SSA program can be found here: http://www.chiefarchitect.com/products/ssa/

Lew, Please re-read my prior post as it is obvious that you did not understand it. Chief does not force you to start your walls at the origin and it is highly unlikely that it ever will.

Joe, Glad you got your problem worked out. In general, changing the camera clipping distance will be the easiest way to solve this problem if it comes up again.

Lew's knowledge of Chief is somewhat obsolete. It is very rare to see plans that are far away from the origin these days. This used to be a bigger problem (many years ago) but that was mostly the result of people importing CAD data from other programs where the CAD was originally drawn far away from the origin. As a result, we added an option in the Import Drawing Assistant to automatically move the imported data to Chief's origin. You now have to do something pretty obviously wrong in order to get a plan where everything is very far from the origin. There is absolutely no good reason to force you first drawn wall to start at the origin. If you want your first wall to start at the origin, then you can place a CAD point at your origin and start drawing from there. As for the original poster's z-fighting problem. It is the result of a combination of factors including his video card and his model. Because his plan has a terrain model, it is very likely that his data extents are large which is the main cause. This is a common problem when people model the terrain surrounding the building. This is why I recommend that you keep the terrain size to a minimum and don't try to model a very large site just so that it looks like the terrain goes on to the horizon. The easiest way to solve this problem is to move the near clipping plane farther from the camera. You need to open up the Camera Specification dialog and adjust the "Clip Surfaces Within" value to a larger value. Most of the time, at least in the case of a large terrain model, this will completely solve the problem or at least improve it greatly. The other common reason for z-fighting is when you have any two surfaces that are occupying the same space or are very close to each other. The only solution for two surfaces occupying the same space is to adjust the model so that they don't overlap. The solution for two surfaces that are close to each other is to move them farther apart. A common example is that you can see the sheathing layer of your roofs fighting with the roof shingles. If you make your roof shingles thicker then this problem will often go away. In the poster's picture, it looks like the wall's outer layers are z-fighting with the interior layers. I am assuming that these walls were modeled using pony walls. If you are using wall coverings or something else sitting on top of the wall, I highly recommend using pony walls instead. An accurate model will go a long way to preventing z-fighting problems. If changing the near clipping plane does not solve the z-fighting problem, then you can probably solve the problem by making the outer wall layer thicker. If all else fails, then you should contact Technical Support for additional help.

Thanks for posting this Joe. This is a pretty good overview of the active defaults and annotation sets. I would like to add some more information that might help clarify some things for people that are not as familiar with them. First, annotation sets are not nearly as complicated as most people think. You don't even need to use annotation sets to use Chief. They can make your work much more efficient though which is why you will find most power users taking advantage of them. Whether or not you use annotation sets, Chief will always use a variety of defaults when you are annotating your plans. These defaults are used to control things like your current CAD layer, your dimensions, text, callouts, etc., as well as your layer set which controls your current display. So even if you don't use annotation sets, you are still using the current dimension default everytime you draw a dimension line. The Active Defaults dialog (shown in Joe's post above) is the best way to see what defaults you are currently using for any given view. Although all of the defaults shown in the Active Defaults dialog can also be modified in other places, the Active Defaults dialog is probably the easiest and most convenient way to see and manage all of them at once. If you need to change any of these defaults at any time, you can always do this through the Active Defaults dialog. Annotation sets give you a convenient way of saving and restoring your active defaults in a named group. So rather then go into the Active Defaults dialog and select all of the defaults one at a time, you can choose an annotation set instead and select all new active defaults in one step. This is how the power users are using Chief more efficiently. They first setup various defaults, layers, and layer sets for all of the things that they use frequently. They then setup annotation sets for the groups of defaults that they frequently use together. They can then use the annotation set toolbar drop-down to quickly change their defaults for the view they are working in. This setup can take a lot of work up front or it is something you can do over time as you work on your plans. I would encourage people that are not already familiar with annotation sets to set them up slowly over time. If you find that you are frequently going into the Active Defaults dialog to change to a specific set of defaults, then just setup an annotation set to do this in one step instead . I would also discourage anyone from trying to use someone else's annotation sets. Everyone works slightly different and depending on what defaults and layers you frequently use, your annotation sets will be specific to your needs.