Starting up AutoCAD

Been a MicroStation user for 12 years while working for 3 other firms. Starting my own firm in 3 weeks and thinking of finally making the move to AutoCAD. The drawing portion of AutoCAD does not scare me that much, but the output portion does as I know little about it. Pen Tables is my main concern and setting up a standard that works.

Does AutoCAD have any good pen tables that are good to start with? Should I create my own? Print by color, print my line weights? I am open to anything, just need to know where to start with all of this. I need to be able to print nicely to 8 1/2" x 11", 11"x17" & 24"x36" in PDF format and .PLT format.

Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated!

Might I suggest that you consider the use of Layouts? I believe they make printing much easier. Have you looked at the Plot Styles available for both CTB (color based) and STB (named-style based) plots?

I have not yet gotten far enough to look into the plot styles. Not sure what I would be looking for yet. And based on the fact I have a lot of MS files I would like to convert over, I am not sure if it makes sense to try to plot with line weights like I did in MS or just start over and try to do it from color (which I did in MS at a previous job).

One can plot based on lineweights that are assigned to individual layers with the drawing itself via the Layer Properties Manager.

If you, like many AutoCAD old timers, assign lineweight based on color (lighter color lines are thinner and darker colored lines are thicker) than you would probably find a CTB plot style to your liking.

There was a recent thread about CTB vs STB plot styles you might want to check out however before making a firm decision about how you want to go about printing/plotting your drawings.

Also check out the Publish command as well to see how it may benefit you when it comes to PDFs.