Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
(OP)
I'm running Solidworks on an older laptop with a ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4650 card. It has been running fine for my purpose, and performance has actually been surprisingly good running Solidworks 2012 on Vista. However, after upgrading to windows 8 and solidworks 2013 it has become useless.
It's running nice and smooth for a couple of seconds, but then the system just pauses for ~10 seconds - let's me spin or zoom again, and then back to 10 seconds pause. During the pauses nothing happens. No CPU or GPU activity. Everything just sleeps. It happens both with larger assemblies and small parts.
I think it might be the openGL support in windows 8 (AMD is not very active on supporting older cards), but I'm getting pretty much same result when switching to software openGL.
If the video card was just to old an weak I could accept it, but I'm sure the problem is somewhere else.
Any suggestions are welcome!
It's running nice and smooth for a couple of seconds, but then the system just pauses for ~10 seconds - let's me spin or zoom again, and then back to 10 seconds pause. During the pauses nothing happens. No CPU or GPU activity. Everything just sleeps. It happens both with larger assemblies and small parts.
I think it might be the openGL support in windows 8 (AMD is not very active on supporting older cards), but I'm getting pretty much same result when switching to software openGL.
If the video card was just to old an weak I could accept it, but I'm sure the problem is somewhere else.
Any suggestions are welcome!






RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
With SW launched, but no files open, uncheck that box.
Cheers,
Anna Wood
SW2012 SP4, Windows 7 x64
http://www.renderbay.com
http://www.solidmuse.com
http://www.phxswug.com
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
If SW will not run without re-checking the OpenGL box then the OP will be SOL.
Cheers,
Anna Wood
SW2012 SP4, Windows 7 x64
http://www.renderbay.com
http://www.solidmuse.com
http://www.phxswug.com
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
After some more testing, it seems to zoom and rotate smooth and without any problems, but when I'm done moving the model - it freezes for 5-10 seconds. Same thing happens when I for instance pick a surface. It works, but after the action I have to wait again?!?
I think I'll try and install SW2012 (which worked fine under Vista) to narrow down the unknown.
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
I'm a little puzzled about the hardware acceleration though. I installed AMD System Monitor which shows me the GPU load. In 2013 I discovered the GPU load was zero during zoom /spin etc., which made me think it was a problem with the hardware acceleration. But now I can see it is also zero under 2011 which runs perfectly??!?! Checking the "use software openGL" makes no difference!! Neither on the GPU-meter or on the perfomance??? But it runs smooth and nice, with even reasonably large assemblies?!?
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
Have you looked at the video card compatability list on the solidworks website? It's possible your card is usable, but you might need to use an older driver. What's more likely is your card is now obsolete for use with the Windows 8 and SW 2013 combination.
James Spisich
Design Engineer, CSWP
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
There may be some conflict with your new install of Win 8.
Chris
SolidWorks 11
ctopher's home
SolidWorks Legion
RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
Also make sure your PCs settings are for Best Performance and get rid of any checked settings for shadows or menu unfolding or even Gradients in your title bar. Making windows appear smooth and animated may just be a bit of Windows trickery to make you think you are using a way better OS.
Congrats Anna on running SW on a macbook. You should do a SolidWorksWorld presentation using one
SolidWorks may be able to ignore Mac for a long time but it probably won't last when Mac users switch to another software.
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Michael Cole
Boston, MA
CSWP, CSWI, CSWTS
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RE: Win 8 and Solidworks 2013
Kinda old news actually.... Have had mine setup that way for a couple years already. Have zero interest running SolidWorks in OSX.
FWIW,
Anna Wood
SW2012 SP4, Windows 7 x64
http://www.renderbay.com
http://www.solidmuse.com
http://www.phxswug.com