Why is MCX unstable ???

[Thad]

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Master Fresh Java Engineer

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Dave teh joker

[Guest]

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I hate to blow his cover, but he's really quite pleasant to work with.

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Dave teh BIG joker

 

[?Mark]

John, you've got to admit Randle is a good sport.

He dished out a lot of "..." considering MC, but also took a lot of the same from fellow forum members and whats more important never went back personally after anyone...

Seems the medication is working as long as he stays on it

[Bruce Gibson]

Master Fresh Java Engineer,

I'll bring some by soon.

http://www.emastercam.com/cgi-bin/ultimate...c;f=11;t=004629

[Allan Brown]

Bruce, you're welcome at the "House" any time, particularly with fresh roast in hand.

[mowens]

I use the wireframe toolpaths quite a bit. They can be pretty temperamental(sp?), especially if you have to move the geometry and regenerate.

[bellyup]

randle,

 

i had some time to look at your file and while i didn't have any crashing problems, i did notice that your 3d wireframe path for a swept rad was quite slow on regen time. as an alternate method, i used the same wireframe (except exchanging a radius for the profile spline.)and swept a surface. using a flowline path, and posting both for comparison, the 3d was

2,552 kb, and the flowline was 690 kb. quite a difference and it showed in the verification time as well.

 

imho, a longer and/or more stubborn calculation is asking for trouble, and both the 3d, and highspeed paths you have seem to 'grind' more than they should have to.

 

that being said, i totally agree with thad regarding seemingly unneccesary workarounds, but as long as these things create problems (for me and my current hardware/abilities/whatever), i will try to figure out what works better for the time being.

 

hth

[Bruce Caulley]

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BTW, I've had some 1-on-1 dealings with Randle. I hate to blow his cover, but he's really quite pleasant to work with. Furthermore, if we can work with him to satify his Mastercam needs, the product will be better off in the end.

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You've hit it in one Dave. This isn't a gamers forum. Money, reputations, and livelihoods are on the line when using this software so Randle's ranting are IMO understandable and justified given that his productivity must be suffering. I use every swear word under the sun every time one of our DMU 5 axis machine is playing up, but that doesn't mean that once the problem is fixed I calm down. If the problems continue AND I getting hosed by someone that tells me that I am doing something wrong because their HAAS is working that day, I would flip.

 

If someone is having problems it is not in the long term interest of this forum to look down their nose at these people as if they are in some way inferior to the rest of us as programmers. Worse still is the gloating that goes with it from people not having similar problems.

 

As a group we must temper our response to what we may consider inapropriate attacks on our software of choice, by reflecting on those work related frustrations that stop us from getting jobs out the door and cause us to look like muppets in front of higher powers. In Randles case that is the software.

 

I understand the process of elimination necessary to fix these problems, so turning down this, or turning off that is a pain, and I am willing to persevere until fixed. This understanding is not a pre-condition of Mcam's purchase though.

 

Bruce

[bellyup]

well put bruce.

[RandleXX]

I may have fixed my crashing problems by updating to the very latest Nvidia drivers.

I thought I had the latest version but apparently there is a brand new version which I downloaded and installed.

I have not been able to crash since.

 

So you guys that were claiming it may be the video card may be correct.

 

I will let you know if this fixed the problem.

[Kannon]

[Mike Gates from Barefoot CNC]

Hopefully you'll be running smooth now. Good to hear.

[Allan Brown]

Randle - Drivers right from the NVIDIA web site? As in, not vendor specific drivers?

[gcode]

As a rule the NVIDia drivers that ship with

Dell workstations suck.

I always uninstall them and download drivers straight from Nvidia.

I'm currently running v77.56 on a Quadro FX-1400.

They are not the latest greatest, but they are

the newest SolidWorks certified and I'm having issues with SolidWorks on this box.

[Watcher]

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You've hit it in one Dave. This isn't a gamers forum. Money, reputations, and livelihoods are on the line when using this software so Randle's ranting are IMO understandable and justified given that his productivity must be suffering. I use every swear word under the sun every time one of our DMU 5 axis machine is playing up, but that doesn't mean that once the problem is fixed I calm down. If the problems continue AND I getting hosed by someone that tells me that I am doing something wrong because their HAAS is working that day, I would flip.

 

If someone is having problems it is not in the long term interest of this forum to look down their nose at these people as if they are in some way inferior to the rest of us as programmers. Worse still is the gloating that goes with it from people not having similar problems.

 

As a group we must temper our response to what we may consider inapropriate attacks on our software of choice, by reflecting on those work related frustrations that stop us from getting jobs out the door and cause us to look like muppets in front of higher powers. In Randles case that is the software.

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IMO, it was the best moment of this party so far.

 

+10000 to Bruce

[Storkman]

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In Randles case that is the software.

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But it wasn't the software. It was a hardware issue and rather than look for an appropriate answer he lashed out at not only the software but the people who developed it. Don't tell me you guys don't go off when an operator picks up zero's wrong then tries to blame your program for the machine crashing. Same scenario.

[RandleXX]

Yes, the latest drivers from the Nvidia web site.

 

No crashes yet so far....knock on wood...

 

A BIG THANK YOU to all of you who actually helped. I apologize if I pi$$ed of any of you guys, especially Pete.

 

For the rest of you scum sucking trolls who wasted posting space with your insults, why don't you kindly STFU!!!!

 

Now I can go back to enjoying Mastercam X

 

[Bruce Caulley]

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But it wasn't the software.

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Ahh, but it is. If the software requires you to jump through hoops hardware wise to operate it, then the software is the root cause of the problem.

 

Case in point: I am having a lot of regen/crash issues at the moment on a very large file. My work PC is a twin Xeon with speced out everything. Pretty much top of the line with recommended video cards and drivers etc. I have tried everything listed as a solution/work around for my problem with no luck. This morning I am working from home on a clunky P4 and everything is fine.

 

If there is a problem with the hardware on my work PC it is not affecting either Catia, Solidworks, or vericut. The listed "solutions" to the hardware "problems" are just workarounds while the real reason is found. Not a fix for an actual hardware glitch.

 

Bruce

[Storkman]

Ok Bruce. Then why do they make hardware specific drivers for almost every type of software available. That would mean every piece of software ever invented is inadaquate. Nvidia has specific drivers for everything.

[Bruce Caulley]

Specific as in tweaked or optimised, not specific as in it will only work for that app. Changing settings, turning features down or off, disabling bios settings... this is not tweaking. This is a workaround for as yet discovered software glitch/s.

 

Bruce

[Watcher]

Mastercam has been more fragile in video card issues than the most of softwares in the same arena. This is a fact. The old issue with ATI cards is one of the worsts things related with hardware troubles. The most of users are not Hardware gurus. This is another fact as well.

IMHO, one of the most important steps toward a more consistent software was suggested by John a couple of days ago. Is about driver and graphics cards certifications to work with MC. I´ve no doubt that CNC has people skilled more than enough to do that, as well as prestige and physical resources too. The full compatibility and certification with decent ATI cards is IMO another important step.

 

I heard some people here saying that is possible MR2 have Machine Simulation. This is a big step in Mastercam history, but to be honest, I think that is coming late, very welcome, but frankly, late. Another softwares in the Market as Esprit, Powermill, Gibbs, UG, are doing this for a couple of years. I honestly don´t believe that Mastercam is inferior than none software that I mentioned. That´s the reason why I think that based on the Mastercam reputation to be up to date with the latest trends in CAD/CAM arena, is coming late. But the great tools on the software has balancing the equation. But this is not my point. My point now is: with the new graphical resources and tools, machine simulation (If is really true), how does Mastercam will deal with these new tools, in terms of hardware demands and compatibility? Will these angry users have the same problems with these new features?

 

Below the link for a discussion of MC Graphic Cards/Drivers certification:

 

John´s suggestion

 

I guess that the graphics card certification is an important step to save a lot of problems like these in the future.

 

Just my 2 cents....

 

[ 05-11-2006, 06:08 PM: Message edited by: Watcher ]

[Roger Peterson]

Ideally many would like to run Mastercam with on board graphics cards because they are cheap. Would it be Mastercams fault that it did not work well with onboard graphics? A driver is just software, what if THAT software has a bug? Microsoft is the largest software company in the world, I'm sure glad at least they can release software that is bug free. To be honest, from my experience Mastercam is more stable than most softwares, definately most CAM softwares. I'm not going to get into it but using "A" cad softwares "recommended" everything lead to loosing 150 hours worth of desiging, it had to be re-done in a different CAD package. only to find out later that it was simply a check box set incorectly on a certain rev of a driver.

 

I also think tested/recommended card/driver combinations would be very useful.

 

As far as the machine simulation, I am looking forward to it. But the reality is it actually helps a very small segment of programmers. Regardless of which CAM package many would still use an offline 5 axis verification/simulation so as to check the actual Gcode. I would still rather have actual tools instead of something that looks pretty.

 

I hope randall's problem is fixed. Many, many people did try to help him and most indicated graphics card were the root of his problem. We'll see, keep us posted.

 

As far as Dave's comments, people are rarely the same in person as they are via email, phone, forum, etc... I'm not sure why?

 

 

It's beer thirty

[Guest]

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I'm not sure why?

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I am.

 

It's the anonymity. People feel safe behind it. They will say and do things they would never consider in real life.

[Storkman]

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Specific as in tweaked or optimised, not specific as in it will only work for that app. Changing settings, turning features down or off, disabling bios settings... this is not tweaking. This is a workaround for as yet discovered software glitch/s.

 

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Sorry Bruce but as I stated before. I downloaded Randle's file did everything he requested with a Dell workstation below the standards of his and had no problems. As for these stated work arounds I have never had to resort to these either. I have system restore on. Hyperthreading on. All I did when I got my computer was download a cad suggested driver for my video card which should be standard practice for any computer oriented person.

[Bruce Caulley]

Thats my point Terry, it worked for YOU. It isn't working for everyone, and it isn't uncommon. I said myself that I have no problem with a certain file at home on a low spec PC, but no matter what I do on a high spec PC at work I get no joy. If I have to lower the spec on my PC to get MC to work but not other software, then there is a problem with MC. I have no problem making the changes if they work (which they don't appear to be) because it means that a process of elimination is going on and eventually CNC will be able to say "Hey, guess what. Problem fixed"

 

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All I did when I got my computer was download a cad suggested driver for my video card which should be standard practice for any computer oriented person.

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And here it goes again, another reply that suggests, intentionally I hope in this case, that the person with the problem is ...like, well, duuuhhh! Not only does this fuel further dummy spits, but it does not help with the fault finding process at all.

 

Bruce