Other cam you used and why the upgrade to MC?

[Mick from CNC Software Inc.]

First NC I operated was a Warner Swayze tape lathe around 1983. First CAM I used was Geopath 1994 (PencilCAM until then) not used much though. Switched to Mastercam when switching jobs, came in and for the first two weeks ran in DOS before moving to Win 3.11 version (can't remember the exact MasterCAM version). Made a career change in 1998 and went into pc programming, worked for AlphaCAM 4 years then switched to Mastercam, been here almost two years.

[TS53]

I started with General Numereic system P model G. It was a proprietary system, 2 5 1/4 fd's, no hd, language driven as opposed to graphic driven. A real pain but powerfull for it's day.

In 1989 I switched to smart cam 4.51 & stayed with it (painfull death & all) through ideas 9.

Ideas was powerfull with full associativity, but a loooonnnnnggggg learning curve. also the maintanence is a killer. They have now adopted a policy that if you don't keep up maintanence, to get an update you have to pay ALL back maintance +25% penalty. After about 4-5 years it is literally cheaper to purchace a new seat.

I left that company (lay-off, some guy in china now doing my job) & am now using mc 9.1. I have to say that mc is a great product.

[Jcastle]

I remember a flex writer during my apprenticeship. Lots of pencilcam. First real cadcam was some crazy thing Cadkey put out around 1995/1996. Then Mastercam V6, upgraded to V8. Someone then had the bright idea to abandon Mastercam in favor of Camworks by Tek-soft. Changed jobs used Mastercam V7. Changed jobs once again, began using Tek-soft Pro-cam. Got fed up with the lack of support tek-soft.Got back to Mastercam V8 Level 1, Upgraded to 9.1 Level 3 with Solids. Just been offerd a job were they use Surfcam. Have an Interview tomorrow with a Company that has Mastercam ( Fingers crossed),

 

Overall, to pay the bills I will Learn Surfcam. If you know Solidworks, then Camworks is okay but its still a Tek-soft product that I find clumsy at best. People I talk to that don’t have Mastercam say, If They had the $$$ they would get Mastercam.

[Travis_Buchanan]

Oppiz, I used NC Polaris too. Sometimes I forget how good I have it now.

[jimspac]

I started out with pencilcam in 1991 before getting into EzCam 5 later that year.Did Ezcam for 7 years(same ver) and never got into EzCam 9(my recomended purchase in 1997)as it did not come with a printed manual. I took 2 Edgecam classes in college and hated the drawing editor. I started with Mastercam training when I got laid off in Oct 2002 and haven't looked back

[Oppiz]

Travis,

NC Polaris was a good idea but it seemed to me like it never was finished. It was nice to learn on because I already knew Autocad. What stunk was when you had to apply the machining.

 

Glad I made the switch to MC!!

[Quickmike]

What about Work NC or some system called Lemoine or something like that?