Strange Solid Behavior

[jimspac]

Hi All,

I had a strange experience with a solid model in Mastercam this week. We had just installed Mastercam 9.1 SP2 with Solids licensing. I was working with a somewhat complicated Parasolid file shaded when the shading shut itself off and was unable to shade the model again. I started again with the original Parasolid and it happened again. What I found out blew my mind!! When the shading shut down I was left with wireframe geometry only. My workstation is a Dell P4 2.4 ghz with 256meg RAM and 64meg Intel graphics adapter. Has anyone had this happen before?

[cadcam]

quote:

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64meg Intel graphics adapter.

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If I am right this is a on board video that shares the 256 of ram you on the computer. this can be you problem.

[Rick Damiani]

More and more I'm seeing computers come with embedded graphics. I beleve that all of Dell's current Optiplex and Dimension lines are so afflicted. While it's a cost-effective solution for mainstream computers, it sucks for those of us who need good performance. As Tom put it in his recent overview of them, what do you expect for $5.00 (the cost of intergrated vs. non-intergrated chipsets).

 

Tom's take:

Tom's Hardware Guide on intergrated graphics

 

As for the loss of shading converting the model to wireframe: I've not seen that particualr problem before. I have seen a loss of shading make the model appear to be a wireframe model with the solid unselectable, but rebuilding the display after turing shading off 'recovered' the model. Did you perchance save the file so I could take a look at it?

[Fig sign]

Try to run Ramsaver

File ->next menu->Ramsaver .

I saw issues similar 2 this when it helped .

 

HtH

ITHH

[Zero]

I've seen this on ATI cards, 3D Labs cards and Nvidia cards. I do not belive this to be a graphics card problem, I think it's an MC problem (though I'm sure using an imbedded graphics controler on the motherboard isn't helping you any..). Do a search on it and you'll find several other threads about this very problem I know I for one have suffered from since the switch to v9. All these machines have had plenty of ram and processing power and the cards were not cheap or value by any means...all mid grade to high end.

 

It happens to me when toolpathing solids, this being one of the reasons I stay away from doing so. During toolpath calculation the solids will either disappear (the shading anayway, the solid wireframe is still there), or all other solids that I may have on other levels that are not visible show up, creating a big mess on screen, and when the toolpaths done they all disappear taking the shading of my solid with them.

 

There are 2 solutions to fix this after its happened. Either by turning the level that the solid is on, on and off 1 or 2 or severeal times (this only works sometimes). Or by shutting down MC and restarting and opening the file again.

 

[ 12-08-2003, 10:32 AM: Message edited by: Zero ]

[Midwest]

Try Screen, Next menu, Regenerate

 

[jimspac]

Some additional info for those responding about the solid converting to wireframe. The Parasolid file I started with has a file size of 1572KB. The MC9 file after adding a wireframe around the model and 3 tool contaiment boundaries brought the file size over 3200KB. The file was saved under another name after the shading went out. I had closed Mastercam, reopened it, and opened the file again. I ran Analyze on some entities, only showed lines, no solids or surfaces present. The file size is only 603KB.

 

I will be getting a better workstation in the future, some suggestions for RAM and graphics adapters would be appreciated. I have built my own computers and have always shied away from integrated components of any kind.

 

Thank you,

Jim

[Fig sign]

Y U don`t use Ramsaver ?!?

 

 

Iskander teh ?!?

[heeler]

We have foung that if you will go to screen, surface display, toggle the show back off and on a couple of times that it usually comes back.

 

HTH

 

Glenn