AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac • Hacker News Board

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#11

Post by wwortiz » Sun, May 23, 2010, 6:08 PM UTC

motters wrote: post #7

wwortiz wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much all engineering software tends to come out to about $2k-$6k a seat which may seem quite expensive but when you get to modeling systems with a huge number of parts and such this software is invaluable and these engineering companies know this and therefore can charge this price. These companies are more than just autodesk, there is PTC and solidworks and MSCsoftware, I've heard from my professors that MSC'…

It was a long time ago, but I remember having a conversation with the chief draughtsman at one company and him explaining with a tone of weary resignation how he needed to spend a large amount of money buying upgrades for AutoCAD even though his department didn't require any of the features it contained. The way that the software was being marketed was basically forcing him into paying Autodesk whether he wanted to o…

I'm guessing someone at the company he worked for deciding a reason for upgrading and whether or not it was a good reason I doubt it was completely forced, more probably the person who decided they needed to upgrade was found with a really good salesman or there was a legitimate reason for an upgrade.

Either way I can't see the difference between upgrading engineering software and say upgrading an entire point of sales system for some new features or because of a good salesman.

This kind of thing just seems to happen in business no matter the type, but a large portion of Autodesk software is sold through resellers and this is probably where the marketing issue comes into play.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#12

Post by nexneo » Sun, May 23, 2010, 6:10 PM UTC

That was only reason to keep windows partition on Mac. Good, I will get 15GB back.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#13

Post by sfall » Sun, May 23, 2010, 6:56 PM UTC

I have bought hardware just to run autocad, when i see that they make it to run autocad add-ons to run then this will work for me.

autocad $3k add-on software $5k laptop $2k

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#14

Post by lkjhgfghjkl » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:07 PM UTC

brudgers wrote: post #9

It's a nice thought, but it's hard to see the business case for Autodesk...support for two platfroms in order to cannibalize their own sales doesn't make a lot of sense.

It's about the market, We used to use Autocad on sun workstations because PCs couldn't compete. Then we switched to PCs and Autocad dropped the unix version. If they had kept a Unix+OpenGL version then a mac port would have been trivial.

Now if they want to get into architecture + interior design market where the users have macs they have to offer a mac version.

ps. This leaked product could just be a viewer, it doesn't mean the whole Autocad range is going mac.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#15

Post by jenhsun » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:12 PM UTC

weaksauce wrote: post #4

ComputerGuru wrote: post #2

For me, this is the last product for Mac that I need in order to convince a lot of people to make the switch. As an engineer (well, computer engineer), CAD programs are an absolute must for a lot of the people I know, and for better or for worse, AutoCAD is the golden standard. Most engineers I know just need web browsing + office + AutoCAD... and now they (hopefully!) have it.

What do you use autocad for? Electrical drawings or something else? I am very happy about this coming to the Mac as it might make the other engineering packages come to the Mac as well if it is a success. At my work we use solidworks for models and autocad for electrical drawings.

Most of the AutoDesk products tend to focus on 3D modeling design. You can do a research on products information. I bet this news will stimulate Apple's future Pro sales at least 10%. There are so many 3D designers (ex. Architect, Civil Eng..) can't switch from Microsoft to Apple because of that (my brother included).

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#16

Post by ComputerGuru » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:18 PM UTC

weaksauce wrote: post #4

ComputerGuru wrote: post #2

For me, this is the last product for Mac that I need in order to convince a lot of people to make the switch. As an engineer (well, computer engineer), CAD programs are an absolute must for a lot of the people I know, and for better or for worse, AutoCAD is the golden standard. Most engineers I know just need web browsing + office + AutoCAD... and now they (hopefully!) have it.

What do you use autocad for? Electrical drawings or something else? I am very happy about this coming to the Mac as it might make the other engineering packages come to the Mac as well if it is a success. At my work we use solidworks for models and autocad for electrical drawings.

Actually, I'm a AutoDesk Inventor addict. I design prototypes and sketch out ideas for testing on there - I just hope AutoCAD on Mac will open a doorway that lets them port their other tech over, too. After all, the technology powering all their software is practically identical, so far as I can tell.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#17

Post by dagw » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:21 PM UTC

brudgers wrote: post #9

It's a nice thought, but it's hard to see the business case for Autodesk...support for two platfroms in order to cannibalize their own sales doesn't make a lot of sense.

Also, in my experience, most engineers who use AutoCAD use at least on third party domain specific plugin. If those plugins aren't also ported then they still won't be able to move to Apple. In fact I know many people who would be happy to give up AutoCAD for something else, but can't because they need certain plugins.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#18

Post by krschultz » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:38 PM UTC

weaksauce wrote: post #4

ComputerGuru wrote: post #2

For me, this is the last product for Mac that I need in order to convince a lot of people to make the switch. As an engineer (well, computer engineer), CAD programs are an absolute must for a lot of the people I know, and for better or for worse, AutoCAD is the golden standard. Most engineers I know just need web browsing + office + AutoCAD... and now they (hopefully!) have it.

What do you use autocad for? Electrical drawings or something else? I am very happy about this coming to the Mac as it might make the other engineering packages come to the Mac as well if it is a success. At my work we use solidworks for models and autocad for electrical drawings.

I'm a mechanical engineer, my personal preference for 2D drawings is AutoCAD but 3D CAE is Solidworks. I'm not sure I could personally make the switch until Solidworks was availble because I spend about 90% of my time in Solidworks but only 10% in AutoCAD, but if Inventor went to Mac that's pretty close to Solidworks.

(Is Pro/E on Mac? I know it is available on Linux)

My brother is an architect and his primary tool is AutoCAD, he could absolutely make the switch to a mac if that were available, in fact having to boot into Windows most of the time anyway is the reason he did not spend extra and get a Macbook Pro last time he bought a laptop.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#19

Post by pclark » Sun, May 23, 2010, 7:45 PM UTC

Rhino is coming too.

Re: AutoCAD appears headed back to the Mac

#20

Post by krschultz » Sun, May 23, 2010, 10:53 PM UTC

gibsonf1 wrote: post #8

This is ironic as AutoCad is now a completely obsolete program based on decades old technology. The industry is moving to Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Autodesk was smart enough to see the writing on the wall, and bought Revit. What I would love is Revit on linux.

AutoCAD is used for more than just architecture.