rlackore Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 When I change a plan material definition, CA goes through an agonizingly slow process of "Building 3D Model." For instance, I just changed the fill color on a material. After clicking "OK" in the Define Material dbx CA pops up the "Building 3D Model" notification box a total of 10 times. Each time it tells me it is Merging, Generating Surfaces, and Finalizing for all the floor levels. I didn't change the model or any 3D data - just a color, not even a texture map, bump map, etc. And this is in vector view, no fancy settings. I had to wait 1 minute and 10 seconds until I regained control of the program. My computer isn't blazing fast, but it has 24gig of RAM and a 2gig of VRAM onboard the GPU. 3D operations in CA are dog slow. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dshall Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 Robert, not good, I would talk with support on that and find out the reason. You must go nuts waiting 70 seconds for that. Please let me know what support says, that should not be happening. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rlackore Posted July 16, 2014 Author Share Posted July 16, 2014 It also happens when I create a new material, even though I don't assign it to anything in the model. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KilgoreTrout Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 The simple answer is that your plan is too big for your machine. And by too big, I mean it has too many surfaces in the camera view. You could start by removing or changing things in your plan that are causing it to be bloated, like fixture and furniture symbols, detailed moldings/casings, etc. You could also try working with more layers turned off or working in floor cameras rather then full cameras to speed things up. I assume that you don't have multiple camera views open at the same time which might also slow things down. As for the best hardware to speed up building the 3D model, I think the number of cores your machine has can also make a big difference (not just CPU speed and amount of memory). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rlackore Posted July 16, 2014 Author Share Posted July 16, 2014 The simple answer is that your plan is too big for your machine. And by too big, I mean it has too many surfaces in the camera view. You could start by removing or changing things in your plan that are causing it to be bloated, like fixture and furniture symbols, detailed moldings/casings, etc. You could also try working with more layers turned off or working in floor cameras rather then full cameras to speed things up. I assume that you don't have multiple camera views open at the same time which might also slow things down. As for the best hardware to speed up building the 3D model, I think the number of cores your machine has can also make a big difference (not just CPU speed and amount of memory). I imagine bloat can certainly be an issue. However, why does CA Merge/Generate/Finalize every floor 10 times? All I'm changing is the display color of a material definition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lbuttery Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 why does CA Merge/Generate/Finalize every floor 10 times? All I'm changing is the display color of a material definition. Robert: probably best to discuss with CA's tech support Lew Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barton_Brown Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 As for the best hardware to speed up building the 3D model, I think the number of cores your machine has can also make a big difference (not just CPU speed and amount of memory). For now, CA does seem to rebuild the 3D model a number of times, as has been noted. I believe KT is correct about the impact the CPU technology will have on the rebuild time - your CPU has 2 cores and no advanced technologies (Intel's term) such as Turbo Boost or hyper-threading. OTOH, I too have seen multiple 3D model rebuilds but they take on the order of less than five seconds. My PC CPU has 6 cores with hyper-threading (effectively 12 cores). With almost twice the CPU frequency and a factor of 6 more cores, the rebuild time of 5 seconds vs. 70 seconds scales pretty closely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rlackore Posted July 16, 2014 Author Share Posted July 16, 2014 For now, CA does seem to rebuild the 3D model a number of times, as has been noted. I believe KT is correct about the impact the CPU technology will have on the rebuild time - your CPU has 2 cores and no advanced technologies (Intel's term) such as Turbo Boost or hyper-threading. OTOH, I too have seen multiple 3D model rebuilds but they take on the order of less than five seconds. My PC CPU has 6 cores with hyper-threading (effectively 12 cores). With almost twice the CPU frequency and a factor of 6 more cores, the rebuild time of 5 seconds vs. 70 seconds scales pretty closely. Thanks for the info. My box actually has two discreet 5150s, for a total of 4 cores - but I get what your saying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jcaffee Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 Watch for duplicate texture/color/material names attached to your model. X6 is not as forgiving of these as X5. jon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HumbleChief Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 Robert, IMO there's no way your box is too slow for Chief. I think there's something else going on and if you're current on your SSA give the tech guys a call they are very very helpful. I've called more and more lately and they always answer my questions and have solve some issues that I've needed answers to quickly. Very well worth the time and effort IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DRAWZILLA Posted July 16, 2014 Share Posted July 16, 2014 Lot of railings will also slow it down, especially if they have round balusters. if so just make them square until your ready for views or turn them off until you need them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Solution rlackore Posted July 17, 2014 Author Solution Share Posted July 17, 2014 Lot of railings will also slow it down, especially if they have round balusters. if so just make them square until your ready for views or turn them off until you need them Yes, lots of railings in the plan. This is good info. The simple answer is that your plan is too big for your machine. And by too big, I mean it has too many surfaces in the camera view. You could start by removing or changing things in your plan that are causing it to be bloated, like fixture and furniture symbols, detailed moldings/casings, etc. You could also try working with more layers turned off or working in floor cameras rather then full cameras to speed things up. I assume that you don't have multiple camera views open at the same time which might also slow things down. As for the best hardware to speed up building the 3D model, I think the number of cores your machine has can also make a big difference (not just CPU speed and amount of memory). Watch for duplicate texture/color/material names attached to your model. X6 is not as forgiving of these as X5. Okay, thanks. I cleaned and purged. And by too big, I mean it has too many surfaces in the camera view. You could start by removing or changing things in your plan that are causing it to be bloated, like fixture and furniture symbols, detailed moldings/casings, etc. Noted. My boss wants interior furniture, gadgets, etc shown in plan, so they are in the plan, but I turned off the layers for exterior views. I assume that you don't have multiple camera views open at the same time which might also slow things down. Nope. Since we recently upgraded to X6, I've been working with multiple windows open: plan, sections, details, 3D, etc. I'm starting to think this is my problem. I seems that CA is "Building 3D Model" for every 3D window I have open. I was expecting something quicker, such as 1 rebuild and then 5 screen refreshes (one refresh per open view). I'm not looking forward to having to scale back on the number of my open 3D views, but I guess I'll have to work within the system. Thanks to everyone for all the suggestions, and to Jim Lawes for offering to inspect the plan. I'm marking this as solved. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kbird1 Posted July 17, 2014 Share Posted July 17, 2014 Quote: Since we recently upgraded to X6, I've been working with multiple windows open: plan, sections, details, 3D, etc. I'm starting to think this is my problem. I seems that CA is "Building 3D Model" for every 3D window I have open I have 3 monitors and have noticed this as well when I break the tabbed windows away to my other screens , its as if there are now 3 instances of CA fighting for resources and things become very (very) slow.... multiple monitors was a feature I was waiting for but it appears as if that system isn't up to snuff yet.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doug_Park Posted July 23, 2014 Share Posted July 23, 2014 Depending on what layers you have displayed the 3D in different views may generate differently. This allows for a great deal of flexibility, but for a complex model it can take some time to regenerate. If you are pushing the memory usage of your computer into the range of needing virtual memory the performance of your fast machine can drop off and seem like an old 286 because of virtual memory thrashing. Regardless of how fast your computer, you can fairly easily push things to the point that things are very slow. Keeping the number of open 3D views to a minimum will help to reduce some of the demand. There are also many ways that your model can get so complex that it becomes a problem as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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