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Network affecting AutoCAD


pixel8er

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Hi all

 

I've got an issue at work with general AutoCAD slowness for users. I'm working through trying to resolve it. One of the things I'm wondering about is our network. Our IT folk have identified some issues with our network. I'm wondering what affect it might have on AutoCAD.

 

I've run the CADalyst benchmark test on my computer both connected to the network (9 mins) and disconnected from the network (6 mins). Is this normal? Seems a big difference to me. Naturally I assume that the network would be slower than working locally but not that much.

 

I'm going to use the Process Monitor to check what's happening but not really sure how to troubleshoot what affect the network is having on the AutoCAD performance??

 

Any suggestions welcome

Thanks

Paul

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Did you have IT temporarily disable the anti-virus program that is being used to see if that had any affect on performance? Some programs scan very aggressively even when there is no reason to.

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Hi ReMark

iT determined that the anti-virus was causing a general slowdown to everything so they have actually just installed a new anti-virus software over the weekend so will see this week if it helps.

The slowdown started about 3 or 4 months ago but the anti-virus has been the same for about 4 years. So not sure how the new anti-virus will affect AutoCAD

 

Thanks

Paul

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It could be a problem with the paths AutoCAD is forced to follow in order to find the support files that it needs. Or there are too many temp files on the network drive.

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What type of problem could there be with the paths? You mean paths to folders that don't exist? The support file search paths are all valid.

There are 4Gb of .bak files on the network and there is 1.8Tb of free space.

Also the network is 30mbps.

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You have not revisited the issues IT discovered with the network. Once these are resolved, or proven to not be a cause of AutoCad slowing down, then, and only then move on to something else.

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We've found Autocad performance is related to network load and speed as well. If one of us is here during the weekend, with an empty office, Autocad performance is much better (30-50% faster I'd guess).

 

I wish Autodesk would publish some information on it. It might be worth isolating our file network from the rest of the office.

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We have around 1000 pc users yes that big, we have a fibre optic backbone multiple sites even real remote ones and run in my area 8 Autocads simultaneously, loading drawing is almost instant even down to being faster of the network than local. It really does sound like a network problem and out side advice may be needed. I have used a remote connection to open autocad drawings at home via my internet connection to our company server and they opened real fast none of this minutes stuff.

 

As an ex Autocad dealer and setting up networks never really had any problems with speed, but and a big but there is so much tuning you can do behind the scenes to make one user better than another.

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The paths may be too long.

 

.BAK files are not the same as .TMP files.

 

The longest SFSP is 120 characters. There are 2.5 Gb .tmp files

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You have not revisited the issues IT discovered with the network. Once these are resolved, or proven to not be a cause of AutoCad slowing down, then, and only then move on to something else.

 

IT has removed the old anti-virus and are in the process of implementing the new one. I'm not going to do anything until then. Just researching at the moment.

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We've found Autocad performance is related to network load and speed as well. If one of us is here during the weekend, with an empty office, Autocad performance is much better (30-50% faster I'd guess).

 

I wish Autodesk would publish some information on it. It might be worth isolating our file network from the rest of the office.

 

I'll ask our IT about this. Our network is 30 mbps

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It really does sound like a network problem and out side advice may be needed.

 

I've run the CADalyst benchmark and I got 9 mins from the network and 6 mins from my local drive. I'm not sure other than that how to test it. Can I run a ping test? Hard to get IT to tell me that there's a network bottleneck.

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6 mins to load a dwg how big ?

 

We had stuff like this and tracked it down to a linetype found a dot linetype that was producing dots at a miniscule spacing changed it and dwg load almost instantly compared to 3 mins.

 

As a test make everything continuous and no linetypes, purge, audit etc save as test and reload. Replace 1 linetype, 1 by 1 to find culprit.

 

If the dwg is mega big, wblock a bit reload post it here, tell us the time to load and we can compare load time and snoop inside.

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Again if ok post a real drawing as big as cad tutor allows and like me we try loading it local and network. Can then post some answers. 30mbs why not 100 that's pretty well the norm.

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Again if ok post a real drawing as big as cad tutor allows and like me we try loading it local and network. Can then post some answers. 30mbs why not 100 that's pretty well the norm.

 

I'm not sure I'll be able to upload a work drawing. I'll try to find something big online...maybe an AutoDesk example dwg. The issue is not really about drawing open speed but general day to day useage.

 

I'll ask IT about the 100mbps network and what would it take to change over.

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  • 1 month later...

I've noticed in the past that a lot of network slow downs can also be attributed to how users log on to the server. I'm assuming your on a windows server?

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I've noticed in the past that a lot of network slow downs can also be attributed to how users log on to the server. I'm assuming your on a windows server?

 

Yes it's a windows server. The fibre is gigabit - refer attached image. I did some testing of the upload/download speeds between computers on the network - refer attached images.

photo.JPG

BM_Server_PS_Client.png

MH_Server_PS_Client.png

PS_Server_BM_Client.png

PS_Server_MH_Client.png

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