Thinking of moving from Eagle Point to Civil 3d?

[dstevens]

I am considering changing From Eagle Point to Civil 3d. Does anyone have any experience with this. Is it a good thing? Currently we have EP modules for COGO, Data Collection, Drafting, Intersection Design, Profiles, RoadCalc, Sanitary Sewers, Storm Sewers, Watershed Modeling (rarely used), Water Surface Profiling (rarely used). Will Civil 3d cover our needs? Most of what I am required to do is download info from the survey crew (via data collectors), place sanitary, storm and water lines. Create topo drawings (existing and proposed). Alot of curb and sidewalk projects and some new road projects. Thank you for any help.

[rkmcswain]

C3D should be able to do what you need, but don't worry about what you are using now. Regardless if you are using Land Desktop, Eagle Point, Carlson, or something else or nothing, C3D will require professional assistance in deployment, setup, and usage. Anything less will result in a lot of wasted time.

Above and beyond all that, why are you considering this change?

Have you been keeping up with the users on the C3D newsgroup? (http://discussion.autodesk.com/forum.jspa?forumID=66) - because there are still a lot of problems with this program, not to mention it's still not complete meaning that you may have to do some actual work in Land Desktop (which comes with C3D).

How many users do you have? If you have to share data, consider the problems introduced by the addition of using Vault to manage this data also.

[dstevens]

I have watched the forum off and on, but it's difficult to tell sometimes how bad the problems are due to the fact that all forums seem to have a multitude of problems listed. It is mainly just me working with CAD but there is one other person using it occasionally. We would still have access to Eagle Point while I teach myself Civil 3d. Unfortunately, we don't get much outside training as long as the work is getting out in some fashion, but that's another issue. Thank you for your response. I will watch the Civil 3d forum closer before making any decisions.

[rkmcswain]

We are in very different situations then. We have 60+ users of Land Desktop. Moving to C3D is a huge task, especially considering the use of Vault and all of it's associated problems, not to mention the extra hardware and software required to run it.

We officially upgraded to Civil 3D long ago, but I don't see us making the migration anytime in the near future. LDT almost does what we need and life is pretty good right now. We don't need to be beta testers for an unfinished product.

[Mike.Perry]

Hi "dstevens" ( Sorry, I do not know your real name )

Please note I have *moved* this thread from the AutoCAD 2007 3D forum to this one, as I feel this particular forum is a more appropriate place for such a topic.

Thanks, Mike

Forum Manager

[jpostlewait]

>>We officially upgraded to Civil 3D long ago, but I don't see us making the migration anytime in the near future. LDT almost does what we need and life is pretty good right now. We don't need to be beta testers for an unfinished product.<<

Ah come on R.K. take the plunge.
Seriously it's reached the cross-over point.
SP2 helped a bunch.
SP3 is rumored to help even more.
Vault, trying to think of a word that won't get blocked,can't.
Granted I'm covered by the dreaded NDA but I saying it's time to get into it.
And that's what my end users said.
I listened.

John Postlewait
IS Department
George Butler Associates, Inc.

[rkmcswain]

Ah come on R.K. take the plunge.

Come on over and get hired on here and make that recommendation, then implement it across 6 offices with 60+ users, without loss of production, and with minimal training, and with no extra hardware/software purchases (Vault).....

In other words... not happening.

[jpostlewait]

Come on over and get hired on here and make that recommendation, then implement it across 6 offices with 60+ users, without loss of production, and with minimal training, and with no extra hardware/software purchases (Vault).....

In other words... not happening.

Yikes!!!!

>>without loss of production,<<
>>and with minimal training<<
>>no extra hardware/software purchases (Vault).....<<

Three strikes you're out.
All three of those things have to happen.

Send your resume up here.
We invest in training, invest in infrastructure, and try too make up for short term loss of production with future efficiencies.

[melanie.santer]

One thing that I have come across in my Civil 3D Implementations is that if you are using the Eagle Point method of data collection for Auto Linework in the field that the Survey package built into Civil 3D does not accept this method of data collection. The survey functionality in Civil 3D supports the TDS method of data collection and use of Auto Linework in the field.

Just thought you might want to know this!

[MHultgren]

Vault comes with 3D now, what hardware\software would you need to update or purchase, SQL Server?

If I were to migrate in a situation such as yours, it would most likely be slowly, bringing your Powerusers on board one project at a time to allow for gradual style creation and modification. By the time you get your system all set up, C3D would probably really be ready for Feild to Finish project completion.

I still see a few areas that need to be improved before it is ready for complete CD plan creation. It IS a great tool for prelim work and 'what if' scenarios though. Super fast for analysis of site development options. Then, once you have the definition, Port the project over to LDT for final cleanup.