Lag and locking up

[Chud]

Anyone experiencing unnecessary lag or lockups when in using Civil 3D 2014? I am having frustrating periods of lag and lockups generated by almost any command randomly. I could press M for move and wait 30 secs... I could click save and wait 2mins... I could end up waiting ALL day for Hatch. We just got a new server, fast drives, Windows server 2012, 16Gb RAM, its just a billion times faster than our old p.o.s. in addition we also got a new gig switch. I really want to rule out equipment for the lag, curious if there are any settings in C3D's options that cause delay issues that anyone has found? Or support programs like Autodesk Apps?


Dell work station
Windows 7 Pro
Dell Precision T3500
Intel Xeon 3.0GHz processor
12 GB RAM
64-bit operating systems
ATI Firepro 5800 (FireGL) graphics card

[BlackBox]

Sounds like your gear is more than enough... How bloated are your templates / drawings? Do you have a lot of unused Styles (Manage Ribbon Tab, Styles Ribbon Panel, Purge Ribbon Button), or lots of Tool Palettes open?

In my limited experience with Civil 3D, I've found it invaluable to run near empty drawings for all of our projects, only importing what is needed for that particular sheet... WBLOCK out for 'dumb' line work, and LandXML export/import the AECC* content.

HTH

[Chud]

Yes our main template is bloated, the project I am on now though I am starting with a blank template with nothing but layer 0 in it. Bringing in only essential layers thru Design Center. I am guilty of an extensive tool palette for all the blocks I might have to insert. And yes my ribbon is pretty loaded. Hmm strange, I still have a tab for Autodesk 360, i uninstalled that. I'll start with my ribbon and probably close all my other windows... i have xref, layer manager, design center, prospector, properties and tool palette all open, but minimized.

Thanks for the ideas.

[BlackBox]

Remember, to remove Styles you don't need in every-single-drawing.

Also, just because a Tool Palette is minimized does not mean that the code-behind is not evaluating data, and updating said palette each time a related action raises an event that is being monitored. For example, ToolSpace being updated each time you switch a drawing, even if to another drawing associated with the same Civil 3D Project, etc..

Cheers

[MHultgren]

Layer manager has been a cause for lags for the past few releases along with the Hardware Accelerator turned on. The new version of the layer manager can be changed back to the 'legacy' style by using the LAYERDLGMODE variable (1=new). And don't forget to close your Properties Palette whenever you are not using it. Another thing to watch out for is using running Osnaps and moving your mouse across a surface or alignment/corridor will cause a lag while C3D tries to find the various Osnaps for the entities.
Just a few tips from personal use for the past eight years.

[Chud]

I'll try both, thanks for the suggestions. Properties will be a tough one, I live with that one open!

[MHultgren]

May want to give Quick Properties a try. You can configure the options for each type of entity in the CUI editor to customize what you see in QP.

[Opie]

Layer manager has been a cause for lags for the past few releases along with the Hardware Accelerator turned on. The new version of the layer manager can be changed back to the 'legacy' style by using the LAYERDLGMODE variable (1=new). And don't forget to close your Properties Palette whenever you are not using it. Another thing to watch out for is using running Osnaps and moving your mouse across a surface or alignment/corridor will cause a lag while C3D tries to find the various Osnaps for the entities.
Just a few tips from personal use for the past eight years.

I prefer the classic or 'legacy' style of the layer manager dialog. The speed of AutoCAD is increased dramatically with the layer palette not on.

[dgorsman]

Civil3D pushes around a *lot* of data in the background so its important that your work processes are clean and straightforward. Some of our designers were still trying to do everything in a single file on very similar hardware and had similar lags. Mostly gone away now that they have a better understanding of the expected organization and flow of data.

Mind the annotation scales if you don't already do so. A few thousand accumulating through XREFs can make life difficult, more so if you are set to automatically add scales to everything.