When does significant slowdown from CAD details start?

[Richard_Morrison]

I am trying to plan if (whether) I should be breaking down my office standard CAD Details into multiple separate .PLAN files, and if so, how many.

 

Does anyone have experience to know at what stage a significant slowdown from having a large number of CAD details starts? 100 CAD details? 500? There would be one CAD Detail per detail with roughly the same level of complexity as a Chief standard detail. Wondering if anyone has "hit the wall" with CAD data. (Note, this would not be combined with a model, too, so I'm not concerned about the effects on 3D performance.) 

[Alaskan_Son]

My experience with large numbers of CAD Details is fairly limited (I usually don’t have very many) but here’s what I can offer—for whatever it’s worth:

 

I’ve found that the most significant slow down occurs when loading the views themselves and not so much with the overall size of the file.  The single worst thing I’ve seen though as far as “hitting a wall” is with large numbers of CAD Blocks and opening up CAD Block Management (CBM).  It seems as if Chief draws every single CAD Block when opening CBM and I’ve had files that take 5 or 10 minutes just to open CBM.  I think those were situations where people used the SAM with Automatically Purge UNCHECKED.   If your CAD details contain a lot of CAD blocks though, this might be an issue you need to consider. 

[Richard_Morrison]

Michael,

I don't know that there would be that many CAD blocks. An anchor bolt or Simpson connector per detail, maybe. How do you know to wait for 10 minutes to let the CBM load? After a minute or two, I probably would just assume that something is seriously corrupted in the file and bail out.

[Alaskan_Son]

52 minutes ago, Richard_Morrison said:

How do you know to wait for 10 minutes to let the CBM load?

 

Yes.  That is correct.  

[AvoyeDesign]

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