Is Autodesk treating us right?
I have paid Autodesk thousands of dollars since version 2.? Granted, I stopped upgrading my Civil 3D in 2008, but I feel as though Autodesk has let me down. I use Carlson Civil Suite 2013 over the top of Civil 3D 2008 on a Win 7 laptop. Lately the program has started crashing… I mean crashing to the point that I can’t complete a drawing. I believe the crashing is due to some late changes in Windows 7 operating system. I called Carlson a couple times and they deduced it was an AutoCAD problem. I desperately had to get a plan out the door, so I completed it on a trial version of Carlson on Icad. The problem now is that when I open the drawing up in Civil 3D, which I paid thousands for, I get a message from Autodesk that since I used the drawing with “a newer version”, all of the Civil 3D entities and Civil 3D capabilities are suspended for this drawing. That means contours, points, line labels and many other drawing entities. The cost of upgrading Civil 3D is around $7000. I don’t agree with these tactics.
Kind of reminds me of this old ad.
[flash width=420 height=315] http://www.youtube.com/v/dODhLDUZEak?hl=en_US&version=3 [/flash]
How do you feel about Autodesk automatically upgrading customer's software packages to a more expensive version without their expressed consent? Then making the customer research the subscription contract# and the license#'s, their user name and password, ect. and spend the time to decline the "free upgrade"?
The contractual terms read like this... “Autodesk may offer, and Licensee may elect to acquire, Subscriptions for the Licensed Materials…”
It doesn't read “Autodesk may offer, and Licensee may elect to acquiredecline, Subscriptions for the Licensed Materials…”
They will not respond to inquiries regarding this apparent conflict with the contractual terms and their new business practices.
I haven't used Windows 7 yet, but I've heard you can fire it up in "XP" mode. The thought of re-installing Civil 3D probably doesn't appeal to you, but it might also be a consideration.
I'd love to have Civil 3D 2014, but the price is just too large. I have to wonder if Autodesk backed off on their price, if sales would go up and piracy down.
Dave
if you tell us what causes the crash, someone may be able to help
Dave, I did find an autodesk service pack 2 for C3D 2008 that supposedly addressed "certain issues", and I had high hopes, but no cigar. I may try your suggestion. Thanks.
I have witnessed the crash dozens of times, and send reports to Autodesk. Sometimes I would be just be sitting there for several minutes reading deeds, and then the Win 7 busy signal would come up and that would be it. Sometimes I would issue a command, one of several dozen, and that would be the end. I have an older version of Carlson on the machine, and that makes no difference. However, I have an older Win XP laptop that I don't use that has the same C3D and older version of Carlson that works fine.
I have tried removing other programs that run in the background, thinking that maybe one is causing the problem. For instance, I recently downloaded Evernote. I uninstalled that, but made no difference.
Might be time to turn back the clock to happier times and try a System Restore. That or a re-install
I have to run C3D/Carlson/win7 in xp mode to avoid crashes. I do have a rare hang up and funky messages occasionally.
That was a premonition. Thanks, Bow.
Evidently the problem is in the relationship between Windows 7 and AutoCAD. I have Carlson Survey with embedded AutoCAD on Windows 7 Ultimate, NOT running in XP mode and I am not having any issues at all.
Just another reason why I left AutoCAD and why loading Carlson on top of that costly junk never made any sense to me.
Another issue not really clear here is the version of Windows 7 everyone is using. From what I am hearing, many are trying to run on Windows 7 Home Edition and that does not work well many times.
We're switching to Bently Power Survey right now. Still going to keep c3d and Carlson but more and more of our clients want a .dgn deliverable. It can still read and write autocad files too.
I'm using Win 7 Pro. Service Pack 1, 32 bit. Lenovo ThinkPad, 4 megs ram, i5 processor, 2.53 Gh.
I think my lesson is. "If I don't plan to upgrade Civil 3D, then I should resist allowing automatic upgrades to the operating system, because lack of support from Autodesk will eventually shake you out of the tree."
I have found too that Win 7 is not so compatable with older software, I have installed Windows Virtual PC XP and run older software under that platform
Good Luck
I use Traverse PC for my boundary, topo, and construction. And we use Trimble Business Center HCE for machine automated control and Trimble RealWorks for scanning. And Global Mapper for GIS, I have a copy of Autodesk 2010 Student Addition and the TruViewer. But Autodesk products have never advocated me as a surveyor and their pricing is prohibitive. So, the good news is there are several standalones out there that work better. And we let our clients do the upgrading of Civil3d on their dime.
Casey Cockrell
I may have to give that a try.
This morning I noticed that there was an error message among the startup dialogue.
"Error Loading Acsign Services"
I searched my computer and found no files named Acsign..
I did a Google search and found the recommendation that I uninstall and reinstall the C3D program. I just did that and thought I had it, because the error message was gone. I left the room for 15 minutes and came back to the same crash notification.
I am cautiously optimistic that the crash problem is fixed.
In a last effort I gave it a "hit it with all I've got" approach. I uninstalled Civil 3D and re-installed it. I went into msconfig and clicked "Normal start-up". I had previously kept a couple programs from loading on start-up, for instance "Garmin Lifetime update". I DIDN'T load Civil 3D Service Pack 2, so I'm using virgin Civil 3D 2008 as it comes off the disk, overtopped with Carlson Civil Suite 2013.
So far I have used the program several hours with no crash.
