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Thread: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

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    Question ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    I am in the upgrade search and was hoping to get some real world input on the difference/ benefits between ACA 2015 and Revit LT.
    Yes I know they are different "platforms", but I wondered anyone had done a good side by side comparison of the two programs.
    I work in a primarily production based residential building company and greatly need help with direction in decision.

    thank you for any help.

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    Default Re: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    I've been meaning to get back to this all day, but somehow my afternoon got away from me. And one minor disclaimer: I have not used the 2015 versions ACA or Revit (LT or full), so this will be just comparing the two programs in general.

    ACA: To get the full benefit of the BIM side of ACA, you need to use the Project Navigator (PN) system, which allows you to set levels (and divisions) that are then used to compile the parts into a full building. Each level (i.e. floor) of the building is built in separate DWG files (Constructs) that are combined via x-ref'ing in other DWGs (Views) depending on your documentation needs. These combined x-refs are then x-ref'd into sheet DWGs for publication . The PN system allows for some correlation between the views and sheets so that your callouts can be somewhat "automated". We found that using the automated callouts bogged our network down so we abandoned that part, but still used the PN system for the benefits it offered in sheet management and scheduling. It's possible there have been hardware & network improvements that mitigate that ... plus if you're a single user, that might not be as much of an issue. It is possible to generate elevations (interior & exterior) and sections (building, wall & details) from the modeled building, but they are not live and you have to manually refresh them after reloading the updated Constructs. We did not use this feature either as it was more challenging to control the graphic results. Depending on the project, I sometimes used the generated sections/elevations as a starting point, but exploded and modified the linework. Not very "BIM", really. :s If you didn't care about the automated tags, it would be possible to model and document all in one DWG, but that would most likely mean doing all your annotation in paperspace on your layouts and your DWG would get quite large. Worth noting: while you can save back to a previous version of DWG, that file may lose some capabilities. One last thought: ACA is largely a complex drafting program that has some database capabilities to enhance what it does.

    Revit (LT or full): Moving backward from my last ACA comment, Revit is a database program that generates "drafted" images for production (and so much more). Because the whole project is in one Revit file, that file is inherently larger than one individual DWG file, but if you compare the file sizes of all the DWGs in a project folder, I don't think there's ultimately that much difference. In Revit, you cannot save back to a previous version. This means that if you are working with consultants, it's very important to communicate about which version of Revit you will all use. Revit also uses views for modeling and documentation, but in this case, they're all in the same file, so any changes that are made are fully live. You can work in plan, elevation/section or 3D or even in a schedule and your other "drawings" will update as you go. That's not to say you won't have coordination issues - e.g. if you move a wall, the ceiling also will need to be adjusted. But if you change the height of your ceiling in the properties from the RCP, that will be reflected in your section as well. Revit natively coordinates detail callouts ... you have to work to use "dumb" annotations for that purpose, so why bother? Revit also does levels ... and much better than ACA - you can edit them graphically or numerically directly in your elevations and sections.

    Don't forget to also compare Revit LT and full Revit: http://www.autodesk.com/products/rev...revit-products. Mostly because it's worth being aware of what features you will not have if you get Revit LT. Key pieces I miss are the ability to use worksharing, 3rd party Add-Ins and the in-house rendering (cloud rendering is still available), but there are others too. For my personal use, right now, Revit LT was the best choice - I got the LT suite 'cause there are times when vanilla ACAD (LT) is useful. There are a few AEC Modify tools I miss from ACA, but not enough to spend that much $.

    I wish you luck on your decision!

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    Default Re: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    CatDiva,
    Thank you very much for that input. This will greatly help me with my decision going forward. I am not terribly worried about the rendering process, but more to the production and BIM side of the process. I am a little annoyed with the lack of saving back in Revit, but I can probably get around that with export to AutoCAD if needed.
    Also, since I am the only one in the office I am not to concerned with the work sharing part of Revit. I will look closer at the LT suite though.
    Thanks again.

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    Default Re: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    Bill, I use ACA mostly for grouped dwelling development projects and custom homes. Building on what CatDiva has said (but conversely) I developed my own system for doing levels in one file (using layers) rather than spreading across multiple files. I render everything and the PN is counter productive to this process. As with Revit, having everything (most) in the one file makes management much easier. The PN is a great tool though but really only necessary for large commercial projects and is overkill and adds unnecessary complications for residential work. I got the idea from seeing VisionRez's BIM implimentation of ACA and they are worth you checking out. They are a production company who customized ACA for resi work and then went on to package their tools and become an authorised reseller. It appears they now also do the same with Revit (now that it's 3rd party tools have grown up). VR is very custom american and whereas either ACA or Revit are very open, VR is targeted at resi work and has lots of tools etc targeted for that work. I enjoy using ACA and easily rendering each project but Adesk have crippled the product somewhat to not compete with MAX rendering. VR also created their own custom roof tool complete with auto framing, along with wall / floor framing and lots of work already done for quantities etc that you will have to do manually in OOTB ACA. I think I've seen add-ons that do it in Revit although if you can't add 3rd party in the lite version ....! In VR you could buy ACA+addon or they had their own scaled down version of ACA with VR that like any other version was missing components of big brother but they are certainly worth checking out. http://www.visionrez.com/

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    Default Re: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    hi Bill,

    I tried to provoke the reaction of the defenders of ACA but only Neje answered. I think he's the only one in the world smart enough to use it (as ACA requires very high tecnological capacity, near to aerospatial engineers), but somehow he still hasn't discovered any other simpler and more powerful tools. I also wonder how does he deal with all those dysfunctional tools like 2D auto-sections or similar fakes. As he says, it's better not to use the Project Navigator, a core ACA tool. I know, it involves a bewildering complexity. Hopefully you can concentrate all the work of the Style Manager in one single team member's hands. You won't never waste a small part of that time in no one else. Only if that team member leaves. Maybe its better to do it yourself so that you will prevent a critical dependency for the basic control of your projects.

    I have a question for you: do you have to pay for using ACA? can you buy it alone or it comes free with Autocad?

    Anyway, don't waste your time in ACA, go to Revit or Sketchup. It's even better staying in Autocad.
    Good luck if you decide to try it!!

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    Default Re: ACA 2015 vs Revit LT

    Quote Originally Posted by RogerRebbit View Post
    hi Bill,

    I tried to provoke the reaction of the defenders of ACA but only Neje answered. I think he's the only one in the world smart enough to use it (as ACA requires very high tecnological capacity, near to aerospatial engineers), but somehow he still hasn't discovered any other simpler and more powerful tools. I also wonder how does he deal with all those dysfunctional tools like 2D auto-sections or similar fakes. As he says, it's better not to use the Project Navigator, a core ACA tool. I know, it involves a bewildering complexity. Hopefully you can concentrate all the work of the Style Manager in one single team member's hands. You won't never waste a small part of that time in no one else. Only if that team member leaves. Maybe its better to do it yourself so that you will prevent a critical dependency for the basic control of your projects.

    I have a question for you: do you have to pay for using ACA? can you buy it alone or it comes free with Autocad?

    Anyway, don't waste your time in ACA, go to Revit or Sketchup. It's even better staying in Autocad.
    Good luck if you decide to try it!!
    Since you've stumbled upon (and resurrected this thread ... after 1.5 years since the last response), you've seen my analysis. I will add that since my previous post, I bit the bullet and got the Building Design Premium Suite because I wanted full Revit for several reasons.

    I've also seen your other thread and chose not to respond as I didn't see it as a request for reasonable input, but just seeking an opportunity to bash ACA. If I have to work in AutoCAD (which I do occasionally), I prefer ACA as it has useful tools that ACAD does not have (and I now can since I have BDSP). The fact is that I prefer to work in Revit, but that doesn't mean I don't see a place for ACA in some cases.

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