HumbleChief

Hey Alan, here's what I did when I installed a new hard drive and it worked to copy old hot keys and tool bars and templates from the previous install to the new install. Go to Documents/Chief Architect Premier X13 Data/ (or wherever your Chief Data is stored) and you'll see all of your current Hotkeys, Templates, Tool Bars etc. If you are happyy with your current tool bar(s) just copy the contents of the tool bar folder (or the folder itself) to a safe location. If (when?) your tool bars blow up you can restore using that older tool bar setting by deleting the current tool bars and copying the old files into that folder. I had backed up that older data folder and reset everything this way when I installed a new version of Chief.

...or not, and it's not worth the risk to me to rely on Chief to have a back up that 'restores' the old tool bars as it's just as likely that .bak back up tool bar could be a back up of the tool bar that's gone astray.

I've read a couple of threads here about disappearing tool bars and/or quirky tool bar changes and didn't really understand the pain that can cause to one's work flow. I recently experimented with some tool palette tool bars and other way to get my tool bars a bit more functional and before I knew it ALL of the tool bars were messed up. Nothing where it was before. Nothing looked the same in any view. Tools missing. Tools gone. Loaded my custom tool bar, nothing changed. So very disturbing and I finally got all the hub bub around tool bars going missing. It was awful. I was at a complete loss then I remembered that since I just installed a new hard drive that I had saved my old tool bar data from the previous install to a new directory on an old hard drive for backup. Went to the current Chief X13 data folder, deleted all the toolbar data, and copied the old tool bar data in to the new X13 data folder. Tool bars are back to normal and a huge sigh of relief. I no longer trust Chief to not destroy my tool bars and have a back up tool bar file specifically set up in case that happens again. Might be good practice in general. Hope that helps.

WOW, thanks so much, never would have found it there as it has been in the Core Catalog for many, many years. Thank you again!! And...that's a really nice collection and well organized too.

Minor issue but I have been using the Bryant Sconce in plans for years and just went to use it and it's gone from the (my) current Chief Core Catalog. I did just reload Chief and the catalogs so it's the latest version but am wondering if anyone else still has it in their catalog? Am I missing something? Can I download the catalog again? Or is that particular sconce simply not available any longer? Thanks

+++ Thanks

Another update for those interested. If you've ever done a new install of Windows to a new hard drive you understand the pain that's coming. Loading all programs anew, managing files, locating textures and libraries and hot keys and tool bars and whew. Finally got all that taken care of and the computer was singing along and overall very happy with the upgraded M.2 drive. While working in a not too complex Chief file the computer hit that same old Chief performance wall where it starts to balk between refreshes and plan changes and gets just plain slow with no real improvement over the old SSD drive which is actually expected. Was just going to post how cool this new drive was and that Chief was performing much better but it's pretty much the same. Awesome until it hits that invisible wall where Chief starts to slow down, probably due to file and plan size, but actually unknown to me. Still happy with the upgrade but no real discernable performance gains.

Been there done that. I think it's new for X13? and a great feature. Also it looks like the setting is floor structure/room specific so maybe check/change the defaults for the entire floor?

It's a bit of new feature in Chief that I've been trapped by. Select the subfloor and uncheck framing I-Joist in the dbx shown.

For those who may be interested, never got a clone to complete and the Tech support from Macrium, which was excellent, suggested through error reports that the existing SSD 850 PRO had some read errors and to try a couple things like a new SATA cable or different mother board port but I ran out of time and talent. I loaded Windows on to the new HD and am going through the pain that clean installs present pretty much every time but it feels good to have that clean install. DropBox has been a bit of a nightmare synching thousands of files etc. but it looks like everything will function OK when all is said and done. The computer does indeed feel a bit snappier but I don't have any empirical evidence to show same. Also I had no idea how much data I really had and regret not getting the 2TB instead of the 1TB which requires much more file management.

Did not try that Mick and may be a bit over my pay grade. I did create a MR Rescue Disk/USB but not sure how to use it. I'll explore. Am dealing with DropBox currently, trying to get the files out of the cloud, on to the hard disk, maybe disable DropBox and try again. Didn't understand how much DropBox I had in the cloud or on the disk or if even makes any difference. Either way THANK YOU very much for the help!!

Thanks again Mick but when I posted I spent the WHOLE weekend trying to clone the drives I mean the WHOLE weekend 10 - 12 hours a day, both days, searching every error message, trying Samsung Disk management, cloning, imaging, ran chkdsk c: /r many, many, times. Moved files, deleted files, changed disks but would always fail either immediately or about 15% of thy through. They offered me a support ticket so I filled one out but I've seen pretty much every error code and every possible solution on line and nuthin. I have a feeling that DropBox is the problem and if files are 'on line only' they only leave a very small footprint on the hard disk that maybe can't be copied? But I just used Reflect on my laptop a couple months ago with DropBox and it wet smooth. So I dunno. Maybe I'll get an ISO for Windows and a USB drive and load that on to the new drive and load programs slowly over time. Might be a cleaner route in the long run.

REALLY appreciate the help but am over it for now. I'll update as I get some more energy to attempt again. THANK YOU.

Spent the WHOLE weekend trying to clone the existing drive to the new and it failed probably 25 times in every conceivable way. Googled every scenario, tried imaging, and have given up with the cloning. Maybe I'll find a way to load windows and move some files but am pretty worn out from the experience. Always had great luck with Macruim Reflect but not this time.

Thanks Mick, pulled the trigger on the 1TB 980 Pro. Now I get to regret the BF deal I could have gotten lol... I'll update this thread after I install and test.

I think I'll get the 1TB M2 and see what that gets me in performance and will always have additional storage for years with the existing/additional SSD. Looking at the Samsung 980 Pro.

Thanks Mick, cloning the existing to the new would be the strategy. Did you mean move User Library Folders to the SSD new NVMe drive eg. My Documents, etc. Is that a typo or the best strategy with the SSD? Not sure the savings ($175) is worth the effort to manage files between 2 drives. BTW Macrium Reflect is simply the best software I've ever used for cloning etc. in case other users need to clone.

Currently have the setup below in my sig but seeing how getting new stuff is an irresistible force that I cannot seem to overcome I was thinking of getting a M.2 NVMe drive to speed things up. I currently have about 140 Gb free on my current 1 TB SSD drive and thought that a 2 TB M2 drive (which would replace my current SSD drive) would be the way to go . Then I got to thinking that A 1TB M2 drive along with the older SSD drive would give me plenty of space if the files were divided between the 2 drives in an appropriate manner. "Appropriate manner" being the key phrase. My question: is it worth it to spring for the 2TB M2 drive and put everything on that single drive? Or is it reasonable to save a few bucks and get the 1 TB M2 drive and split up files with the older SSD drive in the future when 1 TB is simply not enough storage? And/or with proper file management (i.e. DropBox) will the 1 TB be enough storage for the future? Costs are $350ish for the 2 TB and $175ish for a 1 TB. Looking at Western Digital, Seagate, or Samsung. Any help/suggestions greatly appreciated.

Ah, see it now, thanks again.

Yeah good catch Ed, missed it. I also have an AMD motherboard (X570) with an older SSD and an older video card. As much as I like new stuff my older system seems to be keeping up pretty well.

Thanks so much for the follow up, didn't notice the signature specs and agree the drive is small and slow and an upgrade is probably in order but would a new drive and a new video card satisfy the need for new stuff? Dunno...

That was great Rene but I'll be darned if I understood any part of the video. I did understand the polyline from the floor plan then choose an 'example' for a distributed path, which looked like the 'boards' of the B & B then select a bunch of icons that look unique to your work flow and voila, B & B siding? Not sure what happened while selecting the walls and other parts and pieces but the result looked great. I'll review a few more times and see if I can understand what exactly you did. Thanks

Curious, what "solid state drive" are you seeing and how can you know it's "way below standard?" Not to challenge your knowledge but curious to learn how you can make the diagnosis from the picture posted. Thanks

Let me translate - "I like new stuff." Close? Me too...

Curious Rob, what aspects of your computer do you perceive is giving you trouble/slow downs prompting the need to upgrade?