so isnt altering drivers breaking the software agreement with ati? you aren't essentialy altering the drivers but modifying registry entries and patching around limitations imposed by the drivers code. Since the drivers aren't modified in anyway you aren't essentially breaking ati's agreement. Bullines... I agree with you - most of what I posted only applies to the ati cards - nvidia has 'cleaned up' their act and actually made different cards in respect to the quadro and geforce. Although you can get the geforce to run the quadro driver - the performance gain isn't comparable.

My take on this is like anything you buy - its yours if you paid for it and if you want to change it or modify it -- its up to you - you take the responsibility if what you do screws up. Many people out there buy cars and replace parts with custom parts - you don't see GM or FORD running around calling them a bunch of hackers and pirates?? Also if you read the article about the ATI card - wouldn't you feel ripped off if you bought a workstation card only to find out its no different than a low-end gaming card. Do you buy Tylenol or Acetaminophen - they are functionaly the same but one is branded the other is generic. You can go on for ever like this - but ultimately the choice is yours - and you shhouldn't be critisized for it.

I have used MasterCAM for the last year and a half - we bought it in hand with a DMG 5-axis mill - a little different than the router, but the principle is the same. The post was developed by in-house ( the guys who run this forum ) it required some tweaking for simultaneous to run smoothly but all that was done very with a very quick turn around - hours instead of days or weeks! Now it works like a charm! I tried Powermill for 4-5 months - it does a good 3d toolpath - as good as mastercam - but the 5-axis routines are all new - maybe a year old for simultaneous. but powermill does not do 2d justice like mastercam and well as an overall package -- MasterCAM Rocks!

I find it ironic that ten years ago most of the big cad/cam companies (UG, Pro/e, Catia) were all on unix and worked hard to port everything over to windows. Now linux has become a viable alternative to MS and there are no mainstream cad apps. I think all it takes is one major cad/cam company to put out a linux version and that would cause a major shift. As far as IBM's advertising of linux - remember they are in the middle of a multi-billion dollar lawsuit with SCO over linux. Any exposure they can generate will help them out.

I'm 35 years old. Been around a machine shop all my life. My father started this fixture shop over 40 years ago doing patterns and models and then fixtures. I started sweeping the floors at 14. Started cnc programming almost 11 years ago. Man, time sure flies. Have a wife and two girls, an old grumpy cat and a psychotic dog!

Being a Canadian and reading both sides of the debate over the canadian mad-cow issue. I hope there is a quick ban on american beef too! From what I read up here most of the Canadian beef was still bought up by americans but at a very low price - they just wouldn't accept shipment of it until the contraversy died down. That's a low blow. I just hope it doesn't get covered up to save american business. At least we were honest about it. I know I'm going to get railed for these comments but oh well. flame away.

Damm, once again I forgot to search through teh backlog of messages. I didn't start checking this forum regularly until september! You miss a day around here and the topics move off the first page! I read all the past threads - some great questions from cnc and even better input from all of you! Still waiting impatiently!!!

quote: I will Tell you for sure this is not Vaper ware. I have seen tidbites and that is all that can be stated. Thanks for the replies. I don't understand why this is being kept so secret. You would think that with the size of the installed user base they would want some input from the people that use it? That you would want people trying it and making sure that the shock of a complete change in interface goes smoothly. Were some of you not quoting about how bad cimatron's changeover went? How about a screenshot - some eye candy - a hint at what it will be like!?!?! I'll be waiting impatiently

Just out of curiosity - they have been working on X for over 2 years - has anyone seen or tried (beta) this software?? Or is it simply vaporware?? I know that I won't find out any details but I wanted to know if anyone has at least looked at it.

An interesting read. The author comes across as a BSD fanatic, and jealous of Linus' career. He tries to dismiss all of linux's advances and popularity as trivial and downplays its whole drive and existence by making it sound inferior and unorganized. I give credit where credit is due - whatever happened to make Linux what it is has a lot to do with Linus and if he is rich from it now - hey , that's great - it only took 10 years of hard work to get paid!!!!

I started in '93 with Solution3000 - it was bought by autocad - they renamed it to ADX. ADX was bought by CAMAX - and killed. Was forced to upgrade to CAMAND. CAMAX was bought out by SDRC and painfully integrated into IDEAS - never tried it. SDRC killed CAMAND. Tried just about everything out there except UG / CATIA (don't have that kind of money ) Bought mastercam for its strong 5axis support and no maintenance fees.

We have been using MasterCAM for 5-axis work for almost a year now. We bought a DMG 200P - we do mostly positional machining but we are venturing further into simultaneous 5-axis - works great. The post is definitly the key. Took a while to tweak our for simultaneous work. If you look at other programs - HyperMill, UG the price for 5-axis goes through the roof.

We started shopping around 2 years ago -- we were running CAMAND (SDRC) at that time - and we thought we everything was good! I looked at just about every CAM program out there - WorkNC, PowerMill, HyperMill, EdgeCAM and MasterCAM. We needed simultaneous 5-axis support - and MasterCAM was the best suited - in that it didn't require paying 5 times over again for 5-axis!!!!! (just talk to a HyperMill dealer!) I have been running MasterCAM for a year now and it works great. There are pluses and minuses copmared to other programs -- but it has an active development rate featurewise and a VERY strong user community. I would have said something about no licensing fees but that isn't true anymore So - here my two cents: Price - is inline or way better than most Usability - an easy learning curve - really Support - awesomwe - the resellers are great and community is better! Training - they have great programs - in my area anyway Toolpaths - some of the best out there Flexibility - it covers lathe/mill/router/wire edm/cmm/engraving all from the same base and common interface - there isn't another program out there that can match that! And Finally - its NOT A DEAD Product - Its alive and kickin'!!!

quote: I'm using a AMD 2600+ Athalon, 512 MB RAM, and a 32MB NVIDIA VIDEO CARD. When Mastercam is crunching the toolpath it is virtually impossible to do anything else with the machine. Is there anything I should do? Is part of my system weak? Lee - do you know what kind of motherboard you have and/or the chipset that is used. I had and AMD system with a sis chipset - it uses an integrated north and south bridge for all i/o routines. And when I ran large toolpaths or tried to burn a CD - my machine was locked up until it was done - sound like the same problem you are having. I got a new motherboard -- nforce2 chipset and no longer have that problem. Its worth a look. I recently updated that machine with the sis board to with a different board - and it seems a lot better.

Peter - I emailed you all I have and will put the files on the ftp here as well Most of these come from guitar building sites - like I said I want to build a guitar sometime soon - and hey why not program it!! anyone know how to make a truss rod from a hagstrom!?

Just buit a new system - used an albatron geforce fx 5900 - 128mb version - was $500 CDN ( so whats that 250 US ) Works great with MasterCAM and Rhino - does a sweet job with BMRT rendering tools too! just my 2 cents worth

You guys just have way too much fun with this!!!! Brings tears to the eyes!

+10000000 MayDay quote: dejavue...call the wcs the real Matrix you never know if your really there or not ... been there many times! don't know wich pill to take to get me there though! [ 11-05-2003, 01:15 PM: Message edited by: pimij ]

Congrats Dave, I'm long way off!!! Thanks for all your help!

quote: So I will watch them all from 1 to 3 in a single weekend after they release the third episode. that's over ten hours! talk about couch potato - you'll be fused to the fabric!!

Looking at your file - are the ribs supposed to be up or down in relation to the WCS? Just making sure i see this right - i have had the wcs do some strange things too.

quote: Just promoted Rekd to Agent Smith status. Does this mean we get an army of Rekd's!?!?!

I have a couple of 2d dxf file that you could extrude into a guitar body - real quick! telecaster double cut-away les paul and a custom design -- have dreams of building my own guitar one day soon! Peter -- let me know if you want them

Thanks Mick, I'll send an email vbs-help. As I said - I am looking for a way to create an image of a toolpath when you post - and just the selected toolpath.

Are there more commands than what is listed in the help file - at least for mastercam end of things?