Welcome to this new edition of the SOLIDWORKS Support Monthly News, coauthored by members of the SOLIDWORKS Technical Support teams worldwide.
SOLIDWORKS 2016 Beta
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Spotlight on Features: Why can I not edit linked to file blocks?
You edit a block and get the following message:
So, why can I not edit linked to file blocks?
Hardware recommendations for SOLIDWORKS Simulation
By Jay Seaglar
From time to time, the Simulation Technical Support team receives a request to help with system specifications for a machine specifically intended for heavy SOLIDWORKS Simulation use. The goal is usually to find the optimal balance between initial monetary investment and subsequent return on investment (ideally due to faster performance when using better hardware). Of course, we cannot guarantee that our suggestions will always meet this goal. Furthermore, it’s not part of Technical Support’s role to officially recommend a specific system manufacturer & model, so we typically mention this as a disclaimer.
However, based on many years of collective team experience, benchmark testing, and information from both Development and Quality Assurance (QA) teams, we do have some general guidelines to share.
As a starting point, it’s worth mentioning that officially, all of the system requirements that are needed for SOLIDWORKS also apply to SOLIDWORKS Simulation. The most up-to-date information regarding SOLIDWORKS system requirements can be found here:
http://www.solidworks.com/sw/support/SystemRequirements.html
Due to how resource-intensive Finite Element Analysis (FEA) can be, however, more powerful systems can be quite beneficial. It should be noted that obtaining a very powerful system does not guarantee a drastic improvement in performance for every analysis. There are many factors that affect Simulation performance, and certain analyses may be inherently time consuming regardless of system resources. The following generic system specifications represent a typical computer configured specifically for optimized SOLIDWORKS Simulation performance:
RAM
16-32 GB
Note: More than 32 GB is rarely beneficial
CPU
≥ 3.0 GHz with 4-12 physical cores
Note: Prioritize CPU clock speed over number of cores and disable hyperthreading through the BIOS
Graphics
Mid-range SOLIDWORKS certified graphics card
Note: Overall improvement in Simulation performance with high-end vs. mid-range graphics card is not as significant as investing in a high-end CPU with fast clock speed vs. a mid-range CPU with mediocre clock speed
Storage
≥ 500 GB total disk space with a Solid State Drive (SSD) for the primary (OS) drive
Note: Invest in a secondary drive for additional storage as needed (be sure to keep active SOLIDWORKS documents and Simulation Result Folder locations on an SSD)
Noteworthy Solutions from the SOLIDWORKS Knowledge Base
When performing a ‘Save’ or ‘Save As’ of a SOLIDWORKS® file, why is the evaluated value for the ‘description’ custom property lost?
One possible cause of this problem is an unproperly registered sldpropertyhandler.dll. It could be that the dll failed to be correctly registered during installation, due to insufficient permissions.
A possible solution is to register the dll.
See the procedure in Solution Id: S-068688.
In SOLIDWORKS® Inspection Standalone software, why are custom properties not kept?
When a file vault is upgraded to a new version, the transaction log file (.ldf) for the vault database and the TempDb database will need a lot of free disk space to grow in size. The reason for the increased growth is that the upgrade process will create a lot of temporary tables in order to perform the various upgrade steps. The database will be upgraded from one service pack to another, each service pack or version treated as a separate step. In order to be able to roll back all upgrade steps if something should fail, the complete upgrade procedure will be executed as one large SQL transaction. This transaction will cause the transaction log to grow.
When upgrading several major versions at the same time, for example from 2013 SP1 to 2015 SP3 a lot more free disk space is required than for example upgrading from one service pack to the next.
If the hard drive that is storing the transaction logs or TempDb runs out of disk space, the whole upgrade process will fail. An example was an upgrade from 2013 to 2015 that had over 300Gb free space before the upgrade. The upgrade failed when the disk ran out of space. To reduce the amount of temporary disk space needed it is suggested to do the upgrade in two separate phases. First upgrade the database from 2013 to 2014. Then upgrade from 2014 to 2015.
It is also recommended that the transaction log is configured for ‘Simple Recovery Model’. See more details in KB solution S-07794.
From Solution Id: S-068707.
What could cause the hard drive that is hosting the ‘TempDb’ SQL database to run out of disk space when upgrading a really old vault database to SOLIDWORKS® Enterprise PDM 2015 or newer?
One of the common causes of this issue is that ‘OK’ button is not pressed.
1. Open SOLIDWORKS® Inspection Standalone.
2. Create a new project.
3. Choose Project Properties > Custom Properties.
4. Add a new name at the bottom.
At this point, the ‘OK’ button is hidden from the interface. You must scroll up the bar and select it to be sure that all data are correctly saved in the project.From Solution Id: S-068694.
In the SOLIDWORKS® Enterprise PDM administration tool, how can I speed up a slow Windows® account login validation that occurs when I expand the ‘Users’ node?
When you expand the ‘Users’ node in a file vault, the software validates all user login names against the login type defined on the archive server that the vault is hosted on. If there is a problem with the validation of a particular user login, the user name will show a red plus (‘+’) icon next to the name. This icon indicates that the login may fail authentication for vault access. Workarounds can be found in Solution Id: S-068787.
Can the Axial Fan option cause the flow downstream of the fan flow in the radial direction?
Yes the fan direction can turn in the radial direction due to the unstable nature of the jet after the fan. This is not a defect of Flow Simulation. This is a real physical feature of the flow. If the swirl speed exceeds some critical value for given configuration, the flow really turns in radial direction. See the full explanation in Solution Id: S-068799.
Why is the ‘Material Web Portal’ option not available in the material dialog box?
This is the expected behavior if you are working with ‘SOLIDWORKS Premium’. Customers who have a license of ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Standard’ or ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Professional’ or ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Premium’ have access to the SOLIDWORKS Materials Web Portal hosted by Matereality. In case of standalone license, you should use the serial number from ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Standard’ or ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Professional’ or ‘SOLIDWORKS Simulation Premium’. In case of Solid Network License (SNL), you may need to reorder licenses in the SNL Manager. See how in Solution Id: S-068819.
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That’s it for this month. Thanks for reading this edition of SOLIDWORKS Support News.
Originally posted by Julien Boissat in the SOLIDWORKS Tech Blog.