GroupWise (an older e-mail program)
Lotus Notes
MS Project
PowerCADD - I downloaded the demo and hated it. Way too much clicking on buttons for me. You can have my AutoCAD when you pry it from my cold dead fingers
OpenOffice - bloatware
Blender - awful GUI

Good ones:
AutoCAD 2007/2008. I honestly don't see why people have so much trouble with it
AbiWord - Great MS Word replacement
Macromedia FireWorks
Lexisoft HighDesign - great start for an OSX 2D cad program.

Not real happy with OSX. My #1 gripe so far, I can't rename/delete a file from a "File - Open" dialog box. Real nice feature to have. I use it a lot in Windows.

Wow, great work! I really liked that show. Thanks for sharing

@kwistenbiebel said:

Nowadays I have the same feeling with Sketchup I had in the nineties with the Commodore Amiga.
The Amiga was wonderful hardware back then (definitely compared to the PC's )...but that wasn't enough to keep development going.
I would hate seeing Sketchup die a slow death like that.

I hope this doesn't happen either but as long as my copy keeps working
I would hope that if Google did let it die that they would at least take offers to buy it and keep it going.

Wow, such hate for AutoDesk Why? They are no different from MS, Adobe or even Apple! They ALL buy up the little guys!

As for the lack of updates and growth of SU I seem to recall the joy of when it was announced on the old forum that Google was buying and there was an almost unanimous cheer that "at least it wasn't autodesk". I myself wondered what Google would bring to the table and path did they intend for SU. At least if a CAD company bought SU that it might continue to grow in that field. I feel freer to voice this now that the forums are not run by Google. I guess we'll see what comes of SU7. Perhaps if I don't expect much we'll get a surprise

Nice as always Eric (Boofredlay)

Nice Eric

Got a little mix right now going on in WinAmp....

Edson, can I ask what do you do while kerky is rendering a scene? How long does this take? Since you obviously already own a copy of WindowsXP to run under Boot Camp while not just have a PC for your Site Builder and Kerky? I did this for a while when I was using the POVRay plugin with SU. I had a spare PC just to use with POVRay. I would export the files to a shared drive and then let the POVRay box render while I did other things. No sense waiting and tying up my main box for a rendering application. Just my $.02

Well if you are running Kerky to render then just buy a cheap PC to use as a render box. This way you can render on the PC and then do other things on your Mac at the same time. Just a thought

Well Tom, two years I worked for a builder/developer and that is exactly how I would do it. The plans and elevations would get developed and finished and then I would build a 3D model for use as marketing material. Sure with SU you can do the model 1st or the other way around. It just depends on which way you want to go. No right or wrong, just find the way that works best for you.

Wow, so simple that I did not see it. I looked and tried everything BUT that
Thanks so much

Glenn

Your card cannot work with the widescreen, you will need a newer card. I had to do the same. I had a FX5200 and had to buy a GF6600 GT to use my 22" widepanel. The amount of ram has nothing to do with it but more will be better. I will assume that you are one an AGP slot like my home unit has since you have a 5700 card. Yes get a newer card. This should solve the problem.

Is there a way to do this? I have a model that I downloaded from the warehouse and I want to edit a texture used in a material but I cannot figure out how to extract the texture from the material. Any one have an idea on this? TIA

Glenn (at home)

I have bought both a GameCube and a GBA for my 7 year old. They are great systems and have a good selection of kid friendly games. I felt the GC had a larger selection than the PS2 (at the time) or the XBox. I am planning on getting the adapter that will allow him to play GBA games on the GC.

@unknownuser said:

Well after much harrasment I've got SU and a few other programs working on Vista. ACAD is a non starter though. I have to say though there are a few useful tools in Vista but not many.

I had to right click the ACAD icon and set it to run in compatibility mode (WinXP) and with Admin. rights to get Acad-07 to run in Vista. It really only took a few minutes on the AutoCAD site to find out how. What version are you running?

@unknownuser said:

I have been reading this thread with interest as my loyal five year old Sony Vaio laptop died running XP died last week. It cannot be upgraded as it is physically impossible to fit any more stuff inside. It has served me well, handling 3d apps, graphics, CAD etc. So I need a new machine.
I have always had PCs but I will probably buy a mac.

Well, you will not be able to upgrade hardly "any" laptops Mac or PC. Kind of a null point to me. There are PC laptops that can be upgraded. Dell precision laptops have upgradable video cards as do a few other high end models from other brands. Still expensive and not as easy as a desktop.

@unknownuser said:

The reasons being;

Mac users never look stressed, PC users often look very ill.

In the eye of the beholder I guess. My PC gives me no trouble so "your milage my vary" I guess

@unknownuser said:

Viruses are virtually unheard of for the mac. PC Virus protection is a license to print money for the likes of Norton, McAfee etc.

Norton and McAfee are virusus in my opinion. There are freeware virus programs that work better and use WAY less resources.

@unknownuser said:

Vista is just pretty, underneath it is still basically the same operating system that gave us Windows 95. Also I have yet to meet anybody who likes it.

Ok 2 things, if you don't like Vista don't use it. You are not forced to use it. XP can still be bought. There is nothing and I mean nothing from Win95 in Vista. Vista is built on technology from XP which was built on Windows 2000 which was built on Windows NT. XP has nothing to do with Dos, Win95, 98 or WinMillieum. They shared a similar look way back when but they are as different as OSX and OS9.

@unknownuser said:

Virtual PC for the Mac will run virtually every windows app including AutoCAD.

Virtural PC is now owned by MS and in fact they give it away free (minus the second OS). BootCamp and Parallels are better solutions if you own an Intel Mac.

@unknownuser said:

Macs are more expensive but the main reason for this is a smaller market share and ethical manufacture. Bill Gates, IBM and the rest do very nicely out of third world low paid labour.

Umm most if not all Macs come off the vary same assembly lines as do other PCs, from 3rd world countries. Dell is the only company I know of with US based assembly lines.

@unknownuser said:

My main reason is Microsoft have too much money and I can't use Linux.

And you think Apple is poor??

@unknownuser said:

That said I may be a hypocrit and still buy a PC if I can't afford a Mac.

Well if you want one get one. The good news is you won't be stuck since you can boot up XP with BootCamp. For me, the cost of the system plus having to buy all new software even with a discount off with having the PC version it is just not worth it to me. Honestly if Jobs would take some medication for his "Megalomaniac" problem and just make a damn consumer tower for $1,000 I would probably get one but I doubt he will.
I also wonder why effects his release of Safari for windows will have on the Macs low/no virus status. I have a theory that the macs security comes from it's obscurity (low market share) but with this more he moves to become more of a mrket share on the web and by also letting people code for Safari will this increase the likelyhood of attacks to this browser? Time will tell.

My point exactly. I needed a newer video card last year so I bought one and switched it. Same to be said with NICs and sound cards. I do not want a machine with hard wired components.

I honeslty believe it is so Apple can try to force hardware updates. Say you need a newer version of X (whatever cat name it is this year) but your video card is not up to snuff. Well just buy a new iMac. No thanks. The $100 a year updates for OSX is bad enough to me. IMHO

I would think that the responce in the hacker community of installing X on non Apple hardware would open their eyes. They could be a software company, really they could. Sell software and iPods. I would bet on a market share jump from under 5% to 15% or so in one year of releasing OSX to the masses. Though they would have to step up to drivers issues and such. That would be a challenge.

@unknownuser said:

exactly. the high end macs are amazing machines. no wonder most advertising agencies (at least their image processing depts) and video production companies use mostly macs.

my question is: why do not apple allow us who are not such power users to have machines that could be upgradeable? i do not need a super machine like the 8-core mac pro but i do need more than my emacs with a meager video card (32 Mb).

my current machine is an imac intel with a 128 Mb video card. but what if i need more than that in the future?

cheers.

Exactly my point Edson. I have an older Mac and it works fine as does my 2 older PCs as well as my current PC. They all "just work". I can use both just fine but I just prefer the PC (I guess I just prefer AutoCAD). Yes, you are stuck with what Apple wants you to have unless you buy the highend tower, which I don't need. I would imagine that this helps get Apple products selling. Need a better graphics card in your iMac? Well pony up and buy a new model. Only the high-end iMac can upgrade graphics and still imagine that it is expensive. Atleast now with the Intel macs we can buy upgrades to the CPU without having to be restrcited to a hand ful of vendors.

@unknownuser said:

hi glenn, come to think of it, you are damned right.

i have been a mac user for 12 years but only recently it dawned on me that unless you own the top apple model (the cheese graters) you are stuck with what they but inside the box. sometime ago i wanted to get a faster graphic card for one of my emacs but could not as it comes soldered to the motherboard (which cannot be upgraded either, by the way).

so far i have been quite happy with the many macs i have owned but what you mention is indeed a limitation. one wonders why apple does not do the obvious thing. perhaps now that they moved to intel they will start thinking differently.

cheers,

I honestly don't see how mac users have all of these "problems". BSODs and crashes left me the day I left NT 4.0 and went with Windows 2000 and XP has been even better. I simply don't have any issues. In fact to me windows just seems to be in the background, I see my applications and what I am doing.
I do wonder why Apple (Jobs) won't make a consumer tower? Why should non pro users be restricted to minis and all-in-ones? Dell, HP and others can make a Core2Duo box w/ XP for under $700 why can Apple make one for under $1000? (that's including the OSX tax ) They would sell like hot-cakes! I would consider getting one but not a mini or all-in-one that is restricted to upgrades (limited ram slots, non upgradable graphics, built in monitors) no thanks. Come on Steve make a consumer tower.

@daniel said:

Your welcome. Glad I could b helpful. Maybe that should be a request for the next version - a "change insertion point" option.

I think so. As you way be can tell I have an extensive Acad background and I think that having the ability to set the insertion point at time of block/component creation would be a great asset. Thanks again for the assistance