W7 XP Emulator?

[James Eggert]

Does anyone have a success story about the XP Emulator in W7?? Chief 10 doesn't work, but I wondered about other programs??

I still have an XP Sager laptop and a newer dual boot laptop, but I am working on a serious desktop update which in this case means Chief 10 will be strickly limited to one of the smaller machines. Frustrating to plan ahead knowing a $200 video card in an I5 setup with W7 which would help immensely with rendering and such can't be used with a program without paying maybe a grand to update, just so it runs under W7!

NOT!

[GregBradley]

I upgraded some design units to Win 7 x64 about a year ago. We really needed to get certain programs to run that would only run on XP. We did get most to run in XP emulation mode but the one unit that we used for AutoCAD LT 2009 made me think you would NOT want to run any CAD program in XP Emulation. It ran as well, maybe better, in a 7 year-old HP XW4300 with XP than in a new HP z400.

FWIW, Chief 2012 works great on my older HP z400 with a Xeon W3520, 8Gb, and ATI FirePro V5900.

I'm just guessing that the upgrade to Chief 2012 64 bit might be worth the price.

[Alaskan Son]

I upgraded some design units to Win 7 x64 about a year ago. We really needed to get certain programs to run that would only run on XP. We did get most to run in XP emulation mode but the one unit that we used for AutoCAD LT 2009 made me think you would NOT want to run any CAD program in XP Emulation. It ran as well, maybe better, in a 7 year-old HP XW4300 with XP than in a new HP z400.

FWIW, Chief 2012 works great on my older HP z400 with a Xeon W3520, 8Gb, and ATI FirePro V5900.

I'm just guessing that the upgrade to Chief 2012 64 bit might be worth the price.

Chief 2012? Do you mean X4?

In any case, I agree that upgraded the design program would be a much better option. I have heard zero success stories of people trying to run CA version 10 on a new computer. Some of the limitations may be within the program itself anyway and may not even be positively affected by a better computer.

[James Eggert]

I have already accepted the fact that Chief 10 won't run under W7, but I have additional computers it does run under.

I have no desire to upgrade a program I now use only for a project a year just so it runs under W7. I don't need a few more thousand symbols, and I'm fine with the capabilities of the program as it is. The only issue is current operating systems are W7, and XP is pretty long in the tooth.

[DonMirabito]

Jim,
I'm wondering if you might be able to take advantage of some of the newer hardware you have by using Ubuntu? If I recall correctly it has a windows emulator. You might be able to run CA on that emulator. Just thinking out loud....YMMV

Don

[James Eggert]

Don
I'm not that familiar with Ubuntu, but once a program is running you really don't know what the background driver, so to speak, is.

I realize Chief is now up to X4, but I cannot justify an expensive upgrade, even one notch, just to run under W7! Having used Chief since I don't know V2, V4, I guess it's just a sign of the times that I'm behind!

I think I'm picking up my new board, chip and memory this weekend, at the latest the following weekend.

If I understand computer connections correctly, I can't tie in the Sager with the 9700 Nvidia to the new desktop with the killer card? Damn 17" Sager is a boat anchor at 13#, so I wasn't paying attention when I bought it 5 years ago. Carrying it through an airport is no mean feat!

But I wouldn't buy a Corvette either if I didn't have a driver's license!

[GregBradley]

Yes, I meant Chief X4 when I wrote "Chief 2012". I bought Home Designer Professional 2012 and am running a demo of Chief X4. The intention is to probably buy Chief, but the demo wouldn't let me save drawings so I bought HDP 2012 so I could get a more useful demo and get full credit toward Chief if/when I buy it.

So my question is: If you don't need a new more powerful computer for Chief, WHAT do you need it for? Especially if you can't run Chief on it.

And what do you need a "killer video card" for if it isn't a 3D cad application?

Only half of our "CAD" stations, running Agtek Sitework, Materials 3D, and AutoCAD are Windows 7. The rest are still running XP.

If Chief is your most demanding application, perhaps it is best to optimize your unit and stay with XP.

Am I missing something?

[TWhite]

I have asked the folks at Chief to develop an Apple version but have not been encouraged.
Maybe they will get on the ball for all of us soon.

[Alaskan Son]

I have asked the folks at Chief to develop an Apple version but have not been encouraged.
Maybe they will get on the ball for all of us soon.

There are plenty of Chief users who have Apples. You just need to run through bootcamp.

[jstoddard]

You're dreaming. Chief Architect (or SoftPlan... or Envisioneer...) native on the MacOS will never, ever happen. You'd think it would be a piece of cake because "Macs are good at graphics" - but that kind of port will not be trivial at all. And nobody in their right mind would spend the money to develop a native MacOS version at this point - now that they can satisfy the 2-3% of users who want to run it on a Mac by doing a dual-boot. It just ain't gonna happen. If you really want native Mac CAD you have a couple of pretty good alternatives -- both VectorWorks and ArchiCAD have MacOS native versions. Neither one of those is as easy to learn as Chief - but both are very capable.

What you MIGHT see from some of these companies is an iOS/Android companion app - a way to view, mark-up, and share designs after they're complete - maybe even do some minor editing, etc. I think you'll also see an Android companion for SketchUp at some point too.

JLS

[Alaskan Son]

Archicad for residential is probably also a bit overkill, and after considering the price you may be better off buying a PC just to run Chief.

[James Eggert]

Greg
I understand the conflict you're asking about. I started having harddrive issues on bootup, so I picked up a new drive, 1T seagate which has W7 installed as part of the deal. The video card shift is because the old one is 7 years old, and the newer cards have improved significantly so I'm working on it now for the next cable improvement. There is so much content now on websites that I desire to improve loading and viewing. The next comcast speed update is due this summer in CT.

I'm not complaining about Chief 10, just thinking forlornly about missing the improved video!

[jstoddard]

Totally agree. ArchiCAD for residential is probably overkill . That said I've had a dozen or more clients using it... and a ton of larger design-only shops (all mac) using it. If you're hell-bent on being All-Mac your options are kind of limited.

And totally agree you might better buy a separate Windows machine. Today when you can pick up a Windows machine for under $300 that will run Chief (or whatever) adequately- I don't think it makes sense to do anything else, or even to dual-boot. If you have desk-bound users, use a KVM switch and share their keyboard/monitor and possibly mouse. That way they're staying more or less in a familiar hardware environment.

For laptop users - dual-booting is strictly a convenience decision. It it was me - yes I'd want it, and I'd probably do it - but I have to advise clients that it often creates tech support issues that wouldn't exist in a pure Mac environment , and it costs just as much as the second computer- which is why we don't recommend it in multi-person shops where the boss is footing the bill.

I'm also now convinced after seeing dozens of premature drive failures in dual-booting Macbooks - that there's something about the HDD drivers (or something) that is creating a lot of extra heat and killing those hard drives early in dual-boot machines. The drives are being forced to run more, run hotter, run out-of-spec in some other way - something. I can't tell you exactly what happens - but we have data that proves they're failing prematurely.

So if you're gonna do it - make sure both the Win and Mac sides of your laptop stay backed up perpetually so you don't lose data. And if your HDD is approaching three years old - before setting it up I'd spend an extra $150 or whatever and replace the hard drive prior to setting it up.
JLS

[jstoddard]

Jim /Everyone
Jim - I'm going to give you a pass on not spending the money b/c I know you're not making your income 100% from building/remodeling.

For everyone else reading this -- the issue here is not whether or not to upgrade- it's whether or not you are budgeting for your IT operation and then spending that money as you should. As part of your business plans, you need to budget .5-1% of your sales to your IT operation. Read my business column on determining your break-even volume, your average contribution margin, and setting up a sales/starts/completions budget. Generally speaking - you don't need to buy every last upgrade, but it's not good business to allow your software to get behind whatever the current hardware/OS platforms. There are exceptions (I still have clients running DOS ERP software) , but if you've budgeted for your IT operation, and are meeting your sales goals, then there's no reason not to keep everything up-to-date. If your sales are $1M/yr that budget would be $5-10,000 to manage your IT operation, which includes all hardware/firmware/software...your web presence, your mobile hardware (not usage- that's gen. booked under utilities) and any cloud applications you're using. This should be a rolling average kind of budget account - so if you don't need to spend anything this year.. the money rolls forward so it's there when you have to replace 4 laptops in the same year.

The % is not carved in stone - take the sum total of your current IT operation, add in your "wish list" - then divide by 4 for a reasonably good starting point. That should budget enough to turn over all your hardware/software to current versions in a 4-yr cycle. If you're using more cloud services - then budget in for the inevitable price increases by figuring 110-120% of your actual current cost in your annual budget.

JLS