Chief x10 very slow, file quadrupled in size

[heidistokoe]

Hello! I tried to "convert to symbol" an electrical outlet so i could place it in my kitchen island. However it didn't work. BUT now my program is going alarmingly slow and the size of the file is 460mb instead of what it used to be which is about 80mb. Any ideas? I have already tried to purge unused CAD blocks. Just feel like I'm missing something here.

 

Thank you for any help! 

Heidi Chief architect x10

[DRAWZILLA]

outlets should attach to every side of a cabinet using a surface mount outlet or you can place a railing wall behind the cabinet.

sorry I just noticed you are using X10, I don't think they had surface mount elect yet, If I remember correctly there was a cabinet mount section. Back then I would just insert a cad block for that.

 

[DBCooper]

If you used the "convert t symbol" from the tools menu (not the edit toolbar), this takes the whole 3d model and makes it into a symbol.  This could be a very large symbol which could cause the plan bloat.  You need to delete the symbol, save the plan, reopen it, and save it again to get rid of the extra data.  Something silly about how the program can only find unused symbols when it opens the plan so the file size won't change until you save it.

 

On a side note, in newer versions of chief you can place an outlet directly on cabinets.  In older versions, you could convert a wall outlet to be floor mounted and then bump it up against a cabinet.

[rgardner]

1 hour ago, DBCooper said:

Something silly about how the program can only find unused symbols when it opens the plan so the file size won't change until you save it.

It is the fact that Chief locks the file and so until you close it out and release it then it is not gone it is still in the undo memory.

[heidistokoe]

@DBCooper thank you, this sounds like exactly what I need to do, however I can’t find where it placed the symbol. Do you know where I can find all used symbols on my plan? Thank you!

[DBCooper]

If it's not used, it should go away on it's own, but you will have to do the save, close, reopen, save again trick.

 

If it's being used it should show up in a camera view when the layer is on.  If it's an exact copy of the whole house, it might be hard to tell it's there if it is overlapping the house.  You could try moving things around or turning on layers one at a time until you find it.

 

This is all just a guess and it could be something completely different.  There are other things that can make a plan really big like imbedded pictures or pdfs.

 

The best thing would be to post the plan but since it's so large you would have to post a link to it.

 

[heidistokoe]

Thank you everyone! It seemed to work once I saved, went out and went back in as I had previously deleted the unused CAD blocks. Thank you for your help!

[Joe_Carrick]

Heidi,

FWIW, it wasn't the unused CAD Blocks.  It was the Symbol itself.  CAD Blocks generally don't take much space but 3D Symbols can because they have so many faces.