July 2011 / deskeng.

com

A Robotics
Revolution P.26

Two-Step
Optimization P.38
TECHNOLOGY FOR DESIGN ENGINEERING

Creo 1.0
Revealed
Tearing into the
details of PTC’s
new
Creo apps. P.14

REVIEWS:
AutoCAD 2012 P.18
New NVIDIA Cards P.30
Luxology modo 501 P.34
Copyrighted Work. All Rights Reserved.

June 13. The day Creo lets you UNLOCK VALUE as never before. The day data
trapped in product development processes is set free to be used by everyone thanks to AnyData Adoption™ and
AnyMode Modeling™. New Creo technologies that unlock the potential of data in product development processes.

See the future of CAD by finding an event near you at ptc.com/go/creo-events.

Degrees of Freedom by Steve Robbins

Rapid 2011 Review

I
have just returned from this year’s SME Rapid event, lot of design engineers are not aware of the how 3D print-
which took place in Minneapolis. I have to say, the ing could benefit their design processes and their compa-
excitement level of this year’s show was much higher nies’ bottom lines. I have noticed this at every Rapid show
than the last couple of years. The attendance was I have attended. You see attendees who have just seen a
good and the attendees who stopped by to talk with us stereolithography (SLA) or selective laser sintering (SLS)
were excited about using rapid technologies to accomplish printer for the first time. They just stand there, looking in
their goals. the machine’s window, mesmerized. When I stop and talk
I found it interesting that many of the engineers we with them, they almost always say, “I’ve read about this,
talked with were just considering their first 3D printer but I just didn’t get it!”
after working with a rapid prototype service bureau. The AMBI wants to get the word out on the use of
3D printing by telling great stories about how additive
Outsource vs. in House manufacturing technology can make a difference in creat-
During a conversation with Bruce Bradshaw of Objet Ge- ing great designs. You will be hearing more on this from
ometries, we discussed how one of Objet’s clients, Trek Bi- DE as the initiative moves forward in the near future.
cycle Corporation, had added rapid prototyping technol-
ogy recently because its outsourced prototyping costs had Slicing up Micromolds
hit the ceiling. After the new system had been online and There were a lot of amazing technologies on display at
running for a while, the design team found they could ex- Rapid. One cool new technology at the show was CGI’s
new Pearl-700, which cuts ultrathin slices from a micro-
molded parts to create a 3D point cloud of the part’s shape.
Being able to access 3D This high-resolution measuring technology creates an
printing technology has proven accurate model of the molded part by encasing it in plastic
resin and then milling it and scanning it. Each 2D scan
to have unexpected benefits. is then processed into a representation of the 3D shape.
It is then imported into the inspection software to be
checked against the original molded parts design. When
periment and create new parts, then test them right away. I first saw the molded electronic component in its bed of
This was a great advantage that helped them create better resin, I thought, “Wow, someone sure screwed up on this
designs and build better bikes. If the engineers had to take part.” After the demo, I was impressed with the ability
their ideas to the weld shop and wait for an extended time for inspection as well as reverse engineering of very small
for the parts to be returned, creativity takes a hit. molded parts.
However, Trek hasn’t stopped using prototyping service Overall, the use of rapid technologies is becoming
bureaus altogether. It is allowing its designers to access 3D more prevalent in the day-to-day activities of design en-
printing technology in a way that brings products to market gineering. Being able to access 3D printing technology in
faster, giving the company a competitive advantage. the workplace has proven to have benefits that often are
not anticipated when the justification for the printer is
Rapid Initiative Comes Together presented to management.
During Rapid 2011, I also attended a meeting of a startup DE has committed to conducting a rapid technologies
initiative that looks like it’s on the path to becoming an survey in the near future and will share the results with
association. The Additive Manufacturing Branding Initia- our readers when it is finished. If you would like to share
tive (AMBI) is headed by Wilfried Vancraen, CEO of Ma- your experiences on how 3D printing and 3D scanning
terialize and Todd Grimm, an industry consultant who is has enabled your designs, please send your stories to de-
acting as project manager. The 12 companies that initially [email protected]. DE
provided funding for the project met at Euromold last De-
cember, and the AMBI has now grown to 18 companies. Steve Robbins is the CEO of Level 5 Communication and
At the Rapid 2011 AMBI meeting, Todd discussed the editorial director of DE. Send comments about this topic to
problem plaguing the additive manufacturing industry: A [email protected].

2 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

March 2011 July 2011 VOLUME 16/ISSUE 7 16/ISSUE 11
VOLUME

COMPUTER-AIDED DESIGN
18 Something for Everyone
AutoCAD 2012 provides a wealth of improvements.
By David Cohn

34 A Force to Reckon with in the 3D World

Luxology’s modo polygon and subdivision surface modeler,
continues to grow by leaps and bounds.
By Mark Clarkson

COVER STORY SIMULATION & ANALYSIS

22 A New Point of Origin
PTC Creo Revealed Help with drawing conclusions from seemingly
insurmountable volumes of data.
By Vince Adams

14 What started at the

announcement of Creo on
Oct. 28, 2010 as a company’s
38 Learn the Two-Step
Two-step optimization for product design takes
manufacturing variability into account.
vision for the future of product By Jerry Fireman
development has now become
the app-driven product line MECHATRONICS
claiming unparalleled direct
modeling capabilities and a 26 Mobilizing Toward a
level of interoperability among Robotics Revolution
Sensor developments are facilitating progress toward
programs the like of which has autonomous mobile robotics, but what’s holding us back?
never been seen. The products By Barbara G. Goode
are out. The promise is being
delivered. Creo is here. Josh HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMPUTING
Mings brings you all the details
of the apps available in Creo 1.0. 30 NVIDIA Raises the Bar
Reviewing the latest workstation-class Quadro
professional graphics accelerators.
By David Cohn

40 Finding the Speed for Multiple Designs

Correction: The July DE article “CFD in the Cloud” article How to simulate multiple design scenarios in high-
incorrectly stated that Intelligent Light’s FieldView software performance computing environments.
is priced to start at $25,000. The actual starting price of By Jason Ghidella
$2,500. DE regrets the error.

ON THE COVER: PTC’s first Creo apps were officially released

at this year’s PlanetPTC Live. Images courtesy of PTC and
iStockphoto.

4 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Join us for the
COMSOL Conference 2011
The premier event for
multiphysics simulation
GOLD SPONSORS

• Discover new multiphysics modeling strategies

• Connect with key industrial and academic contacts
• Sharpen your simulation skills in minicourses MEDIA SPONSORS

• Showcase your own modeling projects

DATE & LOCATION

October 13-15
Boston Marriott Newton, MA

Sign up today!
www.comsol.com/conference

© 2011 COMSOL. COMSOL and COMSOL Multiphysics are registered trademarks of COMSOL AB.
Other product or brand names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.
July 2011 VOLUME 16/ISSUE 11

DEPARTMENTS
2 Degrees of Freedom EDITORIAL
Rapid 2011 in review. Steve Robbins | Executive Editor
Jamie J. Gooch | Managing Editor
By Steve Robbins Anthony J. Lockwood | Editor at Large
44 Editor’s Picks Heather Pittinger | Copy Editor
Products that have grabbed CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
the editors’ attention. Mark Clarkson, David S. Cohn, Barbara Goode,
Mike Hudspeth, Susan Smith, Peter Varhol,
By Anthony J. Lockwood Pamela J. Waterman, Kenneth Wong

45 Commentary PUBLISHER
Thomas Conlon
The world as your workstation.
8 Kenneth Wong's By Bertrand Sicot ADVERTISING SALES

Virtual Desktop 603-563-1631 • Fax 603-563-8192

A Closer Look at Lifecycle Components 46 Tools of the Month Erich Herbert | Sales Executive (x263)
Justin Makris | Sales Executive (x239)
Autodesk 123D, Oracles’ AutoVue 20.1, New products for engineers. Jeanne DuVal | Account Manager (x274)
PLM Navigation with Windchill 10.0 and
Siemens PLM Connection. 47 Advertising Index ART & PRODUCTION
Darlene Sweeney | Director (x257)

12 What’s New 48 Cool Tool

A LEVEL 5 COMMUNICATIONS PUBLICATION
Steve Robbins | Chief Executive Officer
Avoiding 100,000 errors. Tebis version Thomas Conlon | President
By Jim Romeo 3.5 CAD/CAM ADVERTISING, BUSINESS, & EDITORIAL OFFICES
system. Desktop Engineering® magazine

37 Spotlight Level 5 Communications, Inc.

1283D Main St., PO Box 1039 • Dublin, NH 03444
Directing your search to the companies 603-563-1631 • Fax 603-563-8192
E-mail: [email protected]
that have what you need. www.deskeng.com

43 Fast Apps SUBSCRIBER CUSTOMER SERVICE

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monthly by Level 5 Communications, Inc., 1283D Main
Street, P.O. Box 1039, Dublin, NH 03444, 603-563-1631.
Periodicals postage paid at Dublin, NH, and at additional
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Special Offer for Analysis & Simulation Users
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Product Development with
Realistic Simulation Software on
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Virtual Desktop by Kenneth Wong

Autodesk 123D: a Fusion-Spawn

T
he dam broke when Google
unleashed SketchUp, a free
software program that makes
modeling as easy as pushing
and pulling on faces. By its success, In May, Autodesk launched
SketchUp forces CAD software gi- 123D, a 3D modeler aimed
ants—and many CAD users—to aban- at those with little or no
don the conventional wisdom that 3D CAD experience. With this
modeling has to be difficult. new Inventor Fusion-spawn,
Following SketchUp’s emergence, Autodesk hopes to woo
Dassault Systèmes released 3DVIA hobbyists, enthusiasts,
Shape, a 3D modeler that lets you cre- craft-makers, and garage-
ate fairly detailed objects without a lot bound inventors.
of effort. Aimed at attracting people
with little or no experience in mechan-
ical modeling or industrial design, the The same command gives you Sym- and tubes) and popular objects (such
software is a dramatic departure from metry, which lets your geometry edits as vehicles, electronic devices and
Dassault’s professional products, like from one side reflect on the other side. spacecraft).
SolidWorks and CATIA. But there are a few peculiar interface The 123D initiative also involves
behaviors, too. In creating solids using 3D Systems, a rapid-prototyping ma-
More Simple 3D Modeling the Sweep command, for example, you’d chine maker; TechShop, a series of
In May, Autodesk launched its own have to select the profile, select the member-accessible workshops; and
easy 3D modeler, dubbed Autodesk sweep path (so far, so good), then select Ponoko, a service bureau that helps
123D. The software, currently a free the Boolean glyph and set it to New you turn your digital model into a
Beta download, is described as “a free Component. Until you execute the two physical one for a fee. These partner-
solid modeling software program latter steps, you won’t be able to see a ships advance 123D from a simple dig-
based on the same Autodesk technol- preview of your sweep profile or com- ital modeler to a physical part-making
ogy used by millions of designers and plete the operation. tool. It also brings Autodesk closer to
engineers worldwide. Not an engi- The current version is a Beta re- a new market, comprised of amateurs,
neer? No problem: With Autodesk lease, so we can expect Autodesk to hobbyists, 3D enthusiasts, craft-fair
123D, you can design precise and refine 123D’s interface in later ver- participants, garage-bound tinkerers
makeable objects using smart tools sions. The new software is technically and homegrown inventors.
that let you start with simple shapes, a history-free CAD program, so it It’s a market also courted by Solid-
and then edit and tweak them into may not be that easy for those unfa- Works, a Dassault subsidiary, and
more complex shapes.” miliar with CAD protocols to figure Alibre Design, a Texas-based CAD
The software looks and feels like a out on their own (that is, compared developer with a $199 CAD option for
limited version of Autodesk Inventor to a package like SketchUp). That’s personal use. Autodesk and SolidWorks
Fusion. Current export/import options where the vast collection of multime- both lobbied to place their software
are limited to the software’s native .123d, dia tutorials Autodesk has created will into the hands of TechShop members,
DWG, STEP and STL—not an exten- come in handy. through CAD classes offered at the
sive list, but enough to create something workshop locations.
for a rapid prototyping machine or a ser- Content Sharing Though Autodesk and its major
vice bureau. It offers the same push-pull Autodesk 123D’s launch is accompa- competitors currently cater to the
geometry editing and face rotation that nied by the debut of a new content- professional market, they’re evidently
Autodesk introduced in Inventor Fusion. sharing portal, similar to Dassault’s keeping an eye on the horizon beyond,
The software comes with a Free- 3DVIA.com and 3DContentCentral. where many younger consumers, nur-
form command, which lets you pick a com. The searchable content database tured by Google SketchUp, may be
spline or an edge and reshape its profile includes certain standard mechanical ready for their first taste of an intro-
by manipulating the control points. parts (such as fasteners, shafts, pipes ductory CAD program. DE

8 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

Oracles’ AutoVue 20.1:
Viewing and Markup Integral to PLM
B
efore the product was to test out different placement options lated actions—like adding comments
known as Oracle AutoVue, it and potential clashes. The applica- and notes—automatically creates a
was Cimmetry AutoVue. It tion also comes with a general Clash trail in the PLM module, giving you
was a no-nonsense, no-frill Detection command so you can run a way to keep track of the changes re-
application for viewing and marking it to identify all contacts and clashes, quested and executed on your design.
up 3D CAD files. then review the results one at a time to In 2D drawings, such as electronic
After Cimmetry Systems was ac- decide how to resolve them. routing systems and piping diagrams,
quired by product lifecycle manage- You may also use the Sectioning you may link each joint, connection,
ment (PLM) software supplier Agile, command in AutoVue to virtually slice or intersection to meta data fields in
Agile itself was acquired by Oracle. through your part or assembly. Mea- an ERP, supply chain, or inventory
This landed Cimmetry AutoVue in surement tools in AutoVue let you pick system. This gives you the ability to
Oracle’s lap. Under Oracle’s steward- specific components on features (verti- quickly obtain critical data about your
ship, AutoVue returns as a viewer ces, faces, edges, centers, and so on) and design (the last time a valve was ex-
embedded within Oracle Agile, a suite obtain the distance between them. The amined by a crew, for example) right
of Oracle-branded PLM applica- same granular approach can be used from AutoVue with a simple mouse
tions. AutoVue can still be deployed for your comments and notes, so you click, without launching the enter-
as a desktop application, but Oracle can associate a certain comment to a prise system itself.
points out that you won’t get its full vertice, face or feature. The annotation There’s still a market for inde-
value if you choose that option. dialog box gives you the option to at- pendent viewing and markup tools,
Released in May, Oracle AutoVue tach a file or insert a URL as well. because many engineers and design-
20.1 reflects the product’s origin as a ers still have to juggle numerous file
simple, straightforward viewer. Basic Well-Integrated Viewer formats. Oracle’s approach—a viewer
zoom, pan, and rotate functions are Perhaps the strength of AutoVue embedded inside an ERP or PLM sys-
consistent with how you’d expect them is how well it fits into the rest of tem—turns the viewer into something
to work in CAD programs. Explode Oracle’s Agile PLM modules. With else. Inside Agile, AutoVue is not just
gives you a slider bar you can use AutoVue as the de facto viewer, you a desktop application to look at 3D
to view, in animation, how different can set up items in your BOM so models without a CAD program but
parts come together in your assembly. that, whenever you double-click on a a visual interface to manage design
Transform gives you the option to product thumbnail, it automatically changes, keep track of assignments,
rotate a part by its center or move it launches AutoVue. If fully integrated and monitor associated activities from
along a selected axis — a handy tool with the PLM system, AutoVue-re- the rest of the supply chain. DE

Oracle AutoVue 20.1 works not only as a lightweight CAD AutoVue 20.1 gives you a way to slice through your
file viewer, but also as a PLM-integrated collaboration assembly for a cross-sectional view.
and workflow management tool.

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 9

Virtual Desktop by Kenneth Wong

PLM Navigation with Windchill 10.0

L
ast month, as PTC rolled check in or check out certain de-
out a new version of its sign-related documents right from
PLM software, Windchill Microsoft Office applications
10.0, the company also like Word or Excel.
resurrected a dying name from the Just as PTC’s rival
browser history. Navigator, the Siemens PLM
moniker that once belonged to Software and
Netscape’s browser, has been picked Autodesk
up by Windchill. The 10th release have been
of PTC’s Windchill comes with its experiment-
own PLM Navigator. ing with
As the name suggests, Windchill’s different ways
Navigator looks—and behaves—a lot to display product
more like Windows Explorer and a and project data in CAD
Windchill Cost, a module from
standard browser than a PLM applica- models, PTC is incorporating similar
PTC’s Windchill 10.1 suite, gives
tion. The search window and browse display functions. In Windchill Cost,
you a way to visually display cost
function are never far from your the PLM module for cost analysis,
issues in your assembly.
fingertips. Navigator also remembers you’ll have the option to display cost
your browsing history, just like your overruns and budget issues in the as-
favorite web browser, so you can al- sembly model itself.
ways trace your steps back to a certain from within their authoring environ-
part’s requirements or a supplier’s Lifecycle Assessment Available ment, such as Creo Elements/Pro and
compliance history with a few clicks. Responding to rising demands for Mathcad.
You can save your search results, nar- sustainable design development tools, SocialLink is currently designed to
row them down with additional filters, PTC now offers Windchill LCA, a deploy internally (within a company’s
or export them as Excel spreadsheets. module for manufacturers who’re firewall or enterprise IT network),
If your work happens to revolve interested in lifecycle assessment, but PTC may explore cloud-hosted
around a certain project, you can sustainability and compliance. Wind- deployment scenarios if its customers
make that your home page in Wind- chill LCA ships with several material show interest. Currently, SocialLink is
chill. So you’ll always be starting data sets, such as Carnegie Mellon designed to facilitate communication
your PLM session with a full report Economic Input-Output Life Cycle with only internal sources (internal
on your outstanding change or- Assessment database, and also interacts communities that focus on medical
ders, files you’ve checked out, and with the International Material Data equipment or heavy machinery, for ex-
files you’ve assigned to others. At System (IMDS), a standard in the au- ample), but the SocialLink R&D team
the part level, most files you see in tomotive industry. is also looking to enable subscription
Windchill’s Navigator give you ac- PTC has also revamped the in- to public, online communities that
cess to tabs with critical attributes: terface of Windchill SocialLink, the offer RSS feeds in the future.
change history, structure, related company’s social media-inspired mod- With visual data display, Windows
objects, where used, etc. ule for community management and integration, and social media func-
collaboration. In the latest version, tions, PTC joins its rivals to dramati-
Desktop Integration the desktop client gives you access to cally overhaul product data manage-
There’s also a Windows integration both communities and collaborators ment. Dassault Systèmes, PTC and
plug-in, called Windows Desktop in a single pane, making it easier to Siemens PLM Software may disagree
Integration. With this plug-in in- interact with group members as well on what PLM should look like, but
stalled, you can access Windchill- as groups. Over time, PTC may allow they do seem to agree that traditional
indexed documents right from users to post questions and comments data management interfaces just
Windows Explorer. You may also to SocialLink communities right won’t cut it anymore. DE

10 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

Siemens PLM Connection:
Clues to Active Workspace
D
uring the PLM Connec- Bruce Feldt, Siemens PLM Soft- the PLM environment.
tion 2011 Conference ware’s VP of Open Tools, “is to The only image of Active Work-
that took place in Las provide access to information, that space I’ve seen online was a snap-
Vegas April 29-May 4, complex PLM information, though shot taken by the quick-handed tech
Siemens PLM Software was not a transcendent user interface.” blogger and tweeter Rick Stavanja
quite ready to discuss a new of- (@stavanja on Twitter), which shows
fering called Active Workspace in Getting Visual what appears to be an NX model
depth. Nevertheless, the curtain The end product, revealed Feldt, surrounded by floating instant
had already been lifted—by none “is intended to be a new client messenger windows. Siemens has
other than the company’s president, [with which] PLM workers of all not released any images of Active
Chuck Grindstaff. classes will start their workday. Ac- Workspace to the press yet, as it’s
During his keynote address on tive Workspace will know who the an R&D project with an uncertain
the first day of the conference, workers are, what’s on their work launch date.
Grindstaff give attendees a brief list, what kind of things they’re
glimpse of Active Workspace. He working on. It’s all centered around PLM Evolves
also shared a few details about the the notion of improved decision- Search-based PLM application
same thing at PLM Connection Eu- making … It is a search-based ap- is also pursued by Siemens PLM
rope in Linz, Austria, last October: plication. Do not consider it as a Software’s rival Dassault Systèmes,
“A single entry point into a variety search engine. which owns the enterprise search
of data sources, with an always-on “The user interface has to be engine Exalead. For more informa-
search [feature], and the ability to very simple to use,” he continued. tion, read “Dassault Plays Semantic
collaborate,” as he put it. “It’s a highly visual environment. with Exalead Acquisition,” June
“What we’re trying to do,” said Going through lists of texts, prod- 2010, Virtual Desktop blog.
uct structures and information pre- Another rival, PTC, has been
sented in hierarchical ways is useful, focusing its efforts on integrating
but we think if we present them in social media-like functions into its
a more visual way, it would be more Windchill PLM Software. In time,
useful and easier to understand.” PLM software may become an in-
The search capability, Feldt tegration of product data manage-
said, would be “very high speed, ment tools (for CAD files, bills of
very rapid return.” It would also materials, suppliers, compliance
include “shape-based search.” Dis- histories, etc.) and community man-
tinctly different from Siemens PLM agement tools (social media-style
Software’s CAD packages, Active collaboration tools), with robust
Workspace is not meant to be an text- and shape-based search. DE
authoring application (but you may
conveniently launch an authoring Kenneth Wong writes about technol-
application from Active Workspace). ogy, its innovative use, and its impli-
cations. One of DE’s MCAD/PLM
Navigating PLM experts, he has written for numerous
Active Workspace will also come technology magazines and writes DE’s
Siemens PLM Software presi- with a new technology, currently in Virtual Desktop blog at deskeng.com/
dent, Chuck Grindstaff delivers the works, dubbed “Network Navi- virtual_desktop. You can follow him on
the keynote. gator.” It’s meant for navigating Twitter at KennethwongSF, or email
through complex relationships in him via [email protected].

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 11

What’s New Q&A

Avoid 100,000 Errors

BY JIM ROMEO
The wrong part. The wrong number. The eral parts side by side.
wrong component. If these happen to Once they have chosen or “built” a
you, the consequences can be devastat- part that they are considering for pur-
ing to an engineering business model. chase, they select their CAD system—
Avoiding 100,000 errors means using the AutoCAD, SolidWorks, Inventor, etc.—
right tools in the right place, in conjunc- from a drop-down menu, and hit “go” to
PETER MOONEY
tion with engineering software. download and then insert a 3D model
But using engineering software in of the part directly into their design.
today’s global marketplace demands Q. What would you point to as the most
many attributes of the underlying tech- Q. What types of problems does this important features of this product?
nology. Such software often relies on software help solve for design engi- A. Among the most important features
ancillary products—many of which are neers and drawing developers? is its compatibility with all 2D and 3D
Web-based and can add value to engi- A. It improves design productivity and CAD systems. Much of the bill of mate-
neering software, as well as to the job of precision, reduces costs, increases effi- rial information is passed into the CAD
the design engineer in general. ciency, minimizes the risk of “100,000 system with the CAD drawing itself, and
Peter Mooney is Thomas Industrial errors,” and speeds time to market. one-button-click direct enables insert
Network’s product director for enter- A design engineer may be working of the drawings.
prise solutions, based in New York. His on an assembly that includes thou-
WebCAD Publishing Technology is one sands of components, such as motors, Q. In your view, what are the key eco-
such product used by design engineers actuators, gears and rods. In today’s nomic and functional benefits that
without a standalone product installed increasingly demanding market for your software provides as a solution to
on their own servers. Recently, DE spoke improving productivity and reducing existing problems?
with Mooney to understand his product costs, finding specific parts within a A. The main benefits are tremendous
and how it can benefit today’s engineer. few minutes makes engineers’ jobs time savings and accuracy. These are
much easier, lets them work more effi- especially important as manufactur-
Q. How does your WebCAD Publishing ciently and collaboratively with their ing and industrial companies continue
Technology work? suppliers, and enables them to com- growing, helping to lead the recovery
A. Thomas Industrial Network’s plete designs and go to market faster. from the recession. Our semi-annual
WebCAD Publishing Technology, built In addition, engineers need to work Industry Market Barometer, tracking
on our proprietary Navigator Platform with extreme accuracy—but traditional the growth of and outlook for this sec-
to help industrial suppliers improve processes for sharing drawings have tor, shows that companies are expand-
their websites, enables design engi- the potential for significant errors. As ing at a fast clip in comparison to other
neers to find and download the exact suppliers share drawings with design economic sectors. They’re increasing
parts they need from those suppliers engineers, and then refine them at hiring and making investments in
who publish 2D and 3D CAD drawings engineers’ requests, unclear faxes and areas such as technology and capital
online, insert them into their designs, multiple iterations of drawings can lead equipment. Tools such as the WebCAD
and immediately assess their fit. to the wrong part being designed and Publishing Technology help them
Engineers go to the industrial desti- purchased. respond to growing demand for new
nation ThomasNet.com, select the top Another source of errors in the past products and services—and at the same
CAD drawings tab to search among mil- was the potential for specifying the wrong time, work more productively, efficiently
lions of available drawings, enter the part number. The WebCAD Publishing and with greater accuracy. DE
keywords for the parts they need, and Technology also delivers the bill of mate-
pull up a list of companies that offer rials for each inserted part, from the Jim Romeo is a freelance writer based in
them. From there, they can go into manufacturer’s name to detailed speci- Chesapeake, VA.
specific suppliers’ sites, conduct para- fications. This makes it easier to com-
metric searches to find or configure municate with those in purchasing, and
products that will meet their detailed ensures that everyone involved is able to INFO ➜ Thomas Industrial Network:
specifications, and even compare sev- place the correct order. ThomasNet.com

12 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Design Optimization Sponsored Report /// Intel® Corporation

Product Design is Getting Faster

It is rare that a perfect storm forms, but when they do, they can propel great energies.
BY PETER VARHOL

/ Intel®
W
Design Optimization Sponsored Report
e may be in a perfect storm now — not a devas-
tating storm, but a storm that helps companies
Corporation
accelerate their innovation cycle. There are two
distinct trends occurring, and they both benefit the speed
and efficiency of product design.
Traditional CAD vendors like Autodesk, SolidWorks,
Siemens PLM and others are all adopting software product
design suites. These suites integrate CAD and simulation, so
users can now quickly and efficiently create, test and modify
product ideas in a faster loop. With these advancements and
integrations, digital prototyping or simulation-based design
is no longer restricted to the domain of large companies and
experts — it is available to all. they found that top performing manufacturing companies are
What is digital prototyping or simulation-based design? It using simulation-based design concepts to build half the num-
is an approach to product development that helps your orga- ber of physical prototypes and get products to market faster
nization design, visualize, and simulate products rapidly and with a 48% reduction in physical prototyping costs.
cost-effectively. It is a suite of solutions that is designed to help The workhorses of digital prototyping and simulation-based
you grow your revenue, spur innovation, and deliver higher design are dual processor workstations. These dual processor
quality products faster than ever before. It can also help your Intel Xeon 5600 based workstations are changing the game, and
organization to create and test more innovative concepts and as a result they help you get more results back in less time and
verify that these new ideas are meeting the product require- increase the value of your software and engineering investments.
ments before you build a single physical model. Let’s assume you are doing simulation-based design and
Today’s workstation offered by vendors like BOXX, Dell, your model sizes are taxing your dual processor Intel Xeon
Fujitsu, HP and Lenovo support up to two Intel Xeon proces- 5600 series based workstation. Using four dual processor
sors with a total of 12 computational cores and 24 threads. workstations from LENOVO, BOXX, Fujitsu, Dell or HP
They also support immense amounts of I/O bandwidth that along with Parallels PWE software, Windows 7 and a single
help to insure that data gets to where it needs to be, when it license Windows HPC server, you can quickly gang these
needs to be in order to change data into actionable informa- workstations in a fashion to appear as small HPC cluster.
tion. Not too long ago we thought speed was governed by pro- Now you have a carpet cluster that combines up to 48 cores
cessor speed. Today it is governed by the rate at how fast you and 500GB of memory to employ on larger scale models.
can move the data to a processing element. These technolo- Simulation-based design has never been so accessible.
gies include important items like the size of last level cache, It can help organizations quickly and efficiently create, test
integrated memory controllers and quick path interconnect and modify product ideas in a faster loop. Software provid-
technologies that connect multiple processors and cores. ers like Autodesk, SolidWorks, Siemens PLM and others are
all adopting software product design suites. Workstations
Get more value from your workstations and software from BOXX, Dell, Fujitsu, HP and LENOVO support up to
It is no secret that CAD applications are single threaded. Parts of two Intel Xeon processors and provide you the opportunity
them benefit from more cores and threads, but much of the time to extract greater value from your simulation-based design
they remain single threaded. So why do you need more cores? software suites. Clustered workstation give even small and
You do not if you continue to do only CAD at your workstation. medium business affordable access to HPC resources they
However, many organizations — your peers and competi- need to be engineering leaders in their industries. DE
tors — are looking at ways to accelerate how quickly and cost
efficiently they can create, test, modify and bring new products
to market. In a recent Aberdeen 2010 Manufacturing Survey, INFO ➜ Intel Corp: intel.com/go/workstation

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 13

Computer-Aided Design /// Creo Overview

PTC Creo Revealed

App-driven product line released, promising a multi-paradigm design platform.
BY JOSH MINGS

I
n 2010 PTC shook up
the CAD industry with
the announcement that
its flagship product, Pro/
ENGINEER, and its whole
product line was changing:
changing names, changing
features, changing possibili-
ties. It was a vision then, lack-
ing any defined product or
pricing. Now, PTC is ready
to deliver what they’ve prom-
ised, Creo, and what it says is
the industry’s only true multi-
paradigm design platform.
The dust has settled. What
started at the announcement
of Creo on Oct. 28, 2010 as a
company’s vision for the future
of product development has
now become the app-driven
product line claiming unparal-
leled direct modeling capabili-
ties and a level of interoperability among programs the CREO Direct allows features to blend with the adjustments
like of which has never been seen. The products are out. in geometry.
The promise is being delivered. Creo is here.
The idea sprouted from the concept of a single program since the reformation was announced. At the annual Plan-
being able to do anything. Previously, the PTC family of design etPTC Live event in June, the company revealed the first
software was a divergent mix of modeling, viewing and drawing batch of products that would be delivered under the Creo
programs with little to no connectedness, pushing the user to name, all of which are being referred to as ‘apps.’ Now, re-
decide between using one modeling process or the other. PTC ferring to a 3D modeling application as an app may be con-
knew it, and even more importantly, the users knew it. It was fusing, but PTC’s reasoning lies in how it plans to present
time for a change. With the vision for Creo firmly planted and and deliver the products. There are nine apps slated to be
Jim Heppelmann taking the reigns of CEO in early October of launched in the Creo 1.0 timeframe, seven of which are cur-
2010, PTC was—in essence—a new company, rebranded with rently available.
a new roadmap for a product line that would, at the very least,
change its position in the CAD industry, and ultimately deliver 1. Creo Parametric for “history-based” parametric model-
a new model of how to cross-pollinate modeling methodologies ing. PTC says it will have “all the capabilities of Creo Ele-
within an interoperable set of products. ments/Pro, aka Pro/ENGINEER.”

Releasing the Products 2. Creo Direct for “history-free” direct modeling. “When
If you’ve wondered what products actually comprise the you want to interact directly with the 3D geometry.”
Creo name or where your existing PTC products will fit in,
you’re not alone. This has been one of the biggest questions 3. Creo Simulate for structural and thermal simulation.

14 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

4. Creo Illustrate, a technical illustration app for com-
municating complex service information concepts graphi-
cally in 3D.

5. Creo Schematics, an app for creating 2D routed systems

diagrams, like cabling and piping.

6. Creo View MCAD, which PTC says is a “lighter weight

app for those who want to view, interrogate, and mark up
MCAD geometry.”
THE CREO Simulate app can be used for
7. Creo View ECAD, a viewer tailored for electronics. both structural and thermal simulations.

8. Creo Sketch, an industrial design app to capture design

ideas in 2D (available July 2011). from any CAD system and providing the user more options
for modeling.
9. Creo Layout, an app for early concept layout work in 2D, With Creo Parametric, the Flexible Modeling Extension
with the intention of ultimately evolving the design to 3D (FMX) is a plugin that will be available as a tab on the Creo Para-
(available November 2011). metric UI. FMX allows a user to stay in the same environment
and edit models as they would in Creo Direct. Any feature cre-
With Creo 2.0 launching March of 2012, you’ll see two ated with FMX in Parametric can also be edited in Creo Direct.
more (yet to be announced) apps and, more than likely, an Another extension coming to Creo Parametric is the
iPad app. After this, the Creo apps will slip into an annual Legacy Migration Extension (LMX). This extension allows
release schedule. user to bring in legacy CAD data from other modeling pro-
grams and have the model, view, and annotations completely
Features Explained associated with each other. It identifies what models belong
There are some important features being delivered with to which drawings, what views belong to which models and
Creo Parametric that you’ll want to know about. With this which dimensions belong to which views.
becoming what was Pro/ENGINEER, it will likely become The newest and most anticipated feature for some is the
the most common app used across the PTC customer base, inclusion of Sub-Division (subD) modeling within Creo
so special attention has been given to bringing in legacy data Parametric. PTC is also introducing what they call Free-
style, a fluid modeling tool to shape the geom-
etry as you wish. This comes included as a part
of the Creo Parametric package.
To provide some technical details for con-
text, it should be explained that all the apps to-
gether rest upon the backbone of a “Common
Data Model.” Instead of a single modeling ker-
nel, you can think of this Common Data Model
as a book of kernels, which allows interoper-
ability between each of the Creo apps. The
idea here is that each user (or company) has a
suite of “purpose built” apps that support the
data between each app and delivers that data to
consistent user interfaces within each program.
Currently the apps are separate executables,
different interfaces with their own file formats,
but similar in look, feel and functionality. This
is then able to bridge with Windchill process
FEATURES created in Creo Direct come into Creo
management software to put a streamlined set
Parametric as fully defined features in the Model Tree. of interoperable apps into the hands of the user
who can use the data created in each. However,
it is important to note that Creo does not re-

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 15

Computer-Aided Design /// Creo Overview
quire a Windchill implemen-
tation to function. Windchill
will simply add bill of mate-
rial (BOM) driven assemblies
slated for Creo 2.0.
Now, if you’re wondering
where your existing prod-
uct falls into this arrange-
ment, here’s how it lines up.
Creo Parametric would be
Creo Elements/Pro or Pro/
ENGINEER. Creo Direct
would be Creo Elements/
Direct or CoCreate. Creo
Simulate would be Mechan-
ica. Creo Illustrate would
be along the lines of Arbor-
text. Schematic would be the
Routed System Designer. COMMUNICATING complex service information concepts
Creo View MCAD and Creo View ECAD would be Creo El- with other departments and partners can be accomplished
ements/View or ProductView. The correlation between each graphically in 3D.
is simply for ease of transition. The Creo product line is very
much a new set of programs with more functionality that for updates. All of this works together as to how the apps are
you’ll see in the previous product lines. For example, Creo being licensed and delivered.
Direct is not Creo Elements/Direct (CoCreate) with a new
interface. Creo Direct is a separately developed product, and Delivering Creo
where the former and the new product have similar func- Since the announcement of Creo, PTC has been promis-
tionality, over time you will see these converge to the point ing a smooth transition for all users of PTC products. The
where Creo is the only offering. For the time being, Creo company’s strategy all along is not to make people buy what
Elements/Direct will continue to be developed and available they already own. Ideally, the transition is seamless with no
regression, no data loss and all data and configuration detail
upwardly compatible to Creo. For those on maintenance, the
Behind the Names

C
same support and version updates remain as they have previ-
onsolidating a product line behind the name ously. Above all, no extra cost will be incurred for moving to
Creo is certainly interesting, but where dis- Creo. For a concurrent use license, a similar licensing struc-
cussion has focused for many in the CAD ture is available for each individual app. For network license
community is around the product names Creo use, FlexLM will be used as it has been in the past.
Parametric and Creo Direct. Packages or suites of apps have yet to be announced, but
Creo Parametric creates and maintains a fea- will become available, the first of which being Creo Engi-
ture-dependent history. Creo Direct has solid bodies neer Pack 1, set to retail for $6,000. Each separate app will
that are related, but independent of each other. be priced according to its capability, tailored for the features
Where the rub comes in, is how parametric model- needed and scalable for the functionality between each. This is
ing and direct modeling can happen in both history- PTC’s way of saying, “We can provide exactly what you need.”
based and history-free programs. For Creo, it’s just As the company develops more products in the Creo
as true. You’ll find parametric relations in both Creo line, you’ll see packages in the $10,000+ range as well as
Parametric and Creo Direct. The names simply imply some apps available for free and still others that will be
that the process behind each program. delivered online. With that said, there’s no talk of a web-
Creo Parametric is used to create parametric based version of Creo Direct or Parametric being devel-
features, whereas Creo Direct is used to interact oped. iPad apps, yes. Cloud apps, no. They’re not inter-
with those features. Models can float back and forth ested in it … at least on the surface. To PTC, modeling
between the programs with no loss of history on on the cloud is a solution looking for a problem to solve.
the Parametric side and no need for history on the The company says it already has a problem to solve with
Direct side. model data and how it’s used in the design process. That’s

16 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

The Creo View MCAD app can be used by departments that PTC plans to release Creo Layout in November. The app
need to view, interrogate and mark up MCAD geometry, can be used for early concept layout work in 2D before
but don’t need full modeling. taking the design to 3D.

what each part of Creo is aimed at doing. So, (for now) within each if intended.
you won’t hear much about delivering Creo over the web When Creo was simply a vision, no one thought users
or harnessing off-site computing power from PTC. would want to leave their beloved Pro/ENGINEER.
If you’re wondering about Mac OS X support that is Now, with what PTC is delivering, users may very well
down the line in PTC plans as part of Creo 2.0. The first want to dump that legacy in the drawer and enjoy all that
app you’ll see here is Creo Sketch, an industrial design tool Creo is beginning to offer. DE
for 2D and 3D sketching that will be the first of the apps
seen on the Mac and iOS devices. Josh Mings is an engineer with Cabin Innovations, and specializes
in 3D modeling and visualization for aircraft interiors. He is editor
Bold Move at SolidSmack.com, covering 3D design, product development and
It’s something nearly unfathomable: A company with an estab- related technology. Contact him at [email protected].
lished product name that changes it, rebrands it, consolidates
it and now has a new set of products to deliver. All of this
within the past eight months. PTC has obviously put a lot of INFO ➜ PTC: ptc.com
thought (and money) into developing a strategy and a product
Pricing:
to address its customer base and the trend toward solid model-
One of the questions surrounding the move to Creo is
ing software bringing in a more fluid design workflow. whether the same functionality design engineers had with
The company has focused on a core group of problems pre-Creo software would be available for a comparable price.
and have applied a core group of technologies against them, As of DE’s June 16 printer deadline, the following prices had
namely specific roles having options for modeling modes been announced:
with the flip of a switch of an app. There’s a simplicity in all
• Creo Direct - $4,995 US (Entry)
that, which makes the design process seem cleaner. That’s
good, really good for PTC whose command-to-click ratio • Creo Parametric - $3,500 US
had, in the past, been a process to fear. The interface now • Creo Sketch ( July 2011) - Free
is cleaner, simpler with just the right amount of similarity According to the Creo website, “There is a no cost upgrade
needed between apps that had been missing. for existing maintenance customers to each target Creo
The strategy is particularly evident within Creo Para- app, extension, or package. There are no increases in annual
metric and Creo Direct. PTC has brought over the best bits maintenance fees when the customer selects the no cost upgrade.”
from CoCreate and made it easier to use. It has added fea- “PTC is no longer automatically shipping CDs for new product
tures to Creo Parametric that will make Pro/ENGINEER releases to maintenance customers,” according to a Creo 1.0 FAQ
seem archaic. And within both, the company is showing document. Active maintenance cstomers can download Creo
how a feature can live in a history-based and a history-free 1.0 or order a free CD from the PTC support site. If you’re not a
environment, retaining the parametric relation to features maintenance customer, stay tuned to deskeng.com for updates.

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 17

CAD /// AutoCAD Review

Something for Everyone

AutoCAD 2012 provides a wealth of improvements.
BY DAVID COHN

A
utodesk recently began shipping AutoCAD 2012,
the 26th major release of the world’s most popular
CAD program. For more than a dozen years now,
AutoCAD has had a three-year development cycle. Every
three years, Autodesk makes changes to its DWG drawing
file format, which then supports the next round of additions
to its venerable flagship product. The file format changed
last with the release of AutoCAD 2010. If the cycle contin-
ues, AutoCAD 2012 marks the last version to use the 2010
file format.
In the past, that might have meant a release relatively
light on new features, much as AutoCAD 2009 offered few
surprises beyond the now-familiar ribbon interface. But
while really big enhancements may have to wait until next
year, AutoCAD 2012 provides a wealth of welcome changes.

Borrowing from the Mac

Last fall, Autodesk quelled rumors when it released the first The in-canvas viewport controls that originally appeared
native Macintosh version of AutoCAD in nearly 20 years (see in the Macintosh version of AutoCAD 2011 have been
deskeng.com/articles/aabamx.htm). In addition to a totally added to AutoCAD 2012.
Mac interface, AutoCAD 2011 for the Mac featured new in-
canvas viewport controls. These same tools have now been blending or patching surfaces and solids, and there are new chain
added to AutoCAD 2012, enabling users to change viewport and loop selection options when modifying 3D models. The pre-
settings, views and visual styles by using tools that always ap- view works when creating 2D fillets and chamfers, as well.
pear in the upper-left corner of each viewport. Another interface change is the new auto-complete func-
In-canvas control is further exploited in AutoCAD 2012 by tion. In spite of improvements to its ribbon interface, many
the addition of new user coordinate system (UCS) icon func- longtime AutoCAD users simply type to start commands.
tions. The UCS icon can now be selected and manipulated by But as the software has evolved over more than 25 years, the
using grips to quickly align the UCS with existing objects, in- number of commands and system variables has grown, mak-
cluding curved surfaces and solids. You can also right-click on the ing it difficult to remember them all. With auto-complete,
UCS icon to access additional UCS controls from a new short- as you type at the program’s command prompt or dynamic
cut menu, making it much easier to manipulate the coordinate input field, AutoCAD 2012 displays a list of commands
system—particularly when working in three-dimensional space. matching what you’ve typed thus far. You can then quickly
There are actually all sorts of subtle 3D changes. For example, select the command or system variable from the list.
a new Offset Edge tool lets you create an offset curve from a
planar 3D face or surface. You can then use the Presspull tool to Creating Associative Arrays
quickly add or remove the bounded area from a solid, and Press- One particular addition to AutoCAD 2012 stands out as one
pull now repeats until you exit the command. In addition, when of the biggest productivity improvement in years: AutoCAD
creating or modifying surfaces or solids, the software displays a can now create associative arrays.
preview of the resulting model, and how it will change before you Rather than simply making duplicate copies of selected ob-
commit to the change. So now, when you select a profile to create jects, arranged in a rectangular or circular pattern, the old Array
a lofted solid or surface, for example, an updated preview of the tool in AutoCAD has been replaced by three new commands
resulting object is displayed with each selection. for creating rectangular arrays, polar arrays or evenly distribut-
The new preview also works when filleting, chamfering, ing objects along a path formed by objects such as lines, arcs,

18 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

You can now create associative rectangular, polar or path The new drawing views capability lets you quickly create
arrays in 2D or 3D, change the number of objects or array orthographic and projected views of 3D models, and
relationships, and even replace arrayed objects. control their view style and scale.

polylines or helixes. Once the objects are positioned, you can solid objects. But in AutoCAD 2012, Solid History is toggled
modify them by changing the array relationships, such as in- off by default. That means that users can no longer press the
creasing the number of rows or columns, changing the distance CTRL key to select and modify the properties of sub-objects
or angle between the copies, or modifying the individual items that had been combined to form more complex solids. While
in the array. You can even change the source object and apply users can certainly turn Solid History back on before creat-
the changes to the rest of the items in the array. ing 3D models, Autodesk’s intention is to move customers
The new array functionality isn’t limited to 2D, however. All toward direct manipulation of non-history-based solids.
three types of arrays can include multiple levels, and path arrays To accomplish that, AutoCAD 2012 automatically installs
can follow 3D paths. Nor are associative arrays the only big 2D Autodesk Inventor Fusion, a plug-in that lets you edit 3D
improvement. Multi-functional grips have been extended to models using intuitive direct manipulation. When working
more AutoCAD objects, such as lines, arcs and dimensions, as on a 3D model, a single click opens the current drawing in
well as 3D faces, edges and vertices. When you hover the cursor Fusion. There’s no need to save and export the file. Once
over a grip, you now see a list of available options—and with dy- in Fusion, you can edit faces, edges and vertices, modify
namic input enabled, you can enter dimensional values. sub-objects, and add new features. After making the desired
AutoCAD 2012 also includes improved tangent and perpen- changes, a single click returns the updated model directly to
dicular object snap functionality. When grip editing, AutoCAD AutoCAD—again without having to first save any files.
now finds osnap points to make objects tangent or perpendicu- AutoCAD 2012 also includes the ability to import 3D mod-
lar, and if AutoCAD’s inferred constraint function is toggled on, els in a wide variety of formats, including CATIA, NX, Para-
a corresponding geometric constraint is automatically applied. solid, Creo Elements/Pro, Rhino and SolidWorks. Depending
There’s also a new array option when using the Copy tool on the size and complexity of the model, this can take quite
to make multiple separate copies of objects at once, and Au- some time. An Import icon displays on the status bar tray, and
toCAD can now create a fillet between splines. In fact, there a notification bubble appears once the import is complete so
are a number of enhancements to splines. For example, a new that you can place the 3D model into your AutoCAD drawing.
Blend tool creates a spline object between lines, arcs, poly- The imported data is translated into native AutoCAD ge-
lines, splines and helixes, and includes an option to control ometry, and inserted into the drawing as a block. Parts and
the continuity between the two curves—very important if assemblies in the original model are preserved and replicated
the resulting curve will be used as the basis for a 3D surface. as nested blocks. After importing, the model can be modified
using standard AutoCAD tools.
Manipulating 3D Models
AutoCAD 2012 represents some significant changes in the Documenting Models with Drawing Views
way users interact with three-dimensional models. In past re- In spite of its advances in 3D, AutoCAD is still used most
leases, AutoCAD remembered the operations performed on often to produce 2D documentation. But those 2D drawings

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 19

CAD /// AutoCAD Review

AutoCAD LT 2012

W
ith each new release of its flagship,
Autodesk also adds new features to
AutoCAD LT, the lower-cost 2D alternative to
AutoCAD. Once again, AutoCAD LT 2012 benefits from
new features in AutoCAD 2012—and also gains some
functionality once reserved exclusively to AutoCAD.
For example, AutoCAD LT 2012 shares the same
Autodesk Exchange interface for help and what’s new,
improved performance, and migration tools. AutoCAD LT
2012 also benefits from the same new auto-complete
functionality and the new associative rectangular, polar
and path arrays. Users can even create three-dimensional
arrays by including multiple levels—in spite of the fact that
AutoCAD LT still lacks tools like the ViewCube for easily
viewing 3D models. The only practical way to reorient a 3D
AutoCAD LT 2012 now includes the Sheet Set
model in AutoCAD LT is by typing the Viewpoint command.
Manager, formerly only available in AutoCAD itself.
AutoCAD LT 2012 also gains the new Blend command,
The new release of LT also includes the same
the ability to nudge objects, the improved multi-functional
auto-complete functionality, an Autodesk Exchange
grip capabilities, and the double-click Properties palette
portal, and the Content Explorer plug-in.
functions added to AutoCAD 2012. The same new Groups
panel also appears in AutoCAD LT’s improved ribbon, and
LT 2012 incorporates similar fillet and chamfer previews and improvements to multi-leaders, splines and layers.
Perhaps the biggest function to finally migrate from AutoCAD to AutoCAD LT is the Sheet Set Manager. AutoCAD
users have long been able to create sheet sets to help organize sets of drawings, create layout views, and reduce the
steps needed to publish documents. That capability has finally made its way into AutoCAD LT 2012, making it a more
equal partner in the development of 2D documentation.
There also remains one other subtle difference between AutoCAD and AutoCAD LT: While AutoCAD still includes the
MLine command, which creates largely disfavored multi-line objects that require their own editing tools, AutoCAD LT has
a DLine command, which simply creates parallel line objects that can then be edited using standard commands.
With its two-dimensional functionality now nearly equal to AutoCAD itself, AutoCAD LT 2012 should meet
the needs of anyone looking to add adjacent seats, or as a low-cost 2D-only alternative to AutoCAD. It’s no
wonder AutoCAD LT remains the top-selling 2D drafting application.

are frequently derived directly from 3D models by creating space layout, they are not viewports but rather, a new Draw-
views of the model in separate paper space viewports. Di- ing View object. As a result, when you’re ready to add dimen-
mensions and annotations would be created in model space sions and notes, you do so in paper space rather than in model
on specific layers that were only visible in the appropriate space, eliminating the hassle of creating viewports, controlling
viewport. If the model changed, everything would update, layers, and so on. But dimensioning model space objects in
but users had to manage the individual viewports and layers, paper space can have unintended consequences. For example,
and set appropriate sizes for annotation objects. if you’ve dimensioned drawing views and then update the 3D
AutoCAD 2012 introduces a totally new set of tools for model, the dimensions will lose their associativity. You would
documenting 3D models. If a drawing file contains a 3D then need to manually re-associate each dimension. In com-
model, users can switch to paper space and quickly create a plex models, this could become quite tedious.
base 2D drawing view of the 3D model. Once a base view has
been placed, you can then create projected orthogonal and Some New Tools May Need Some Work
isometric views—and adjust the scale and appearance of those There are several other new tools that may have more limited
views. And if you make any changes to the original 3D model, appeal. For example, when you first start AutoCAD, rather than
AutoCAD displays a balloon notification: Clicking a link im- the traditional “What’s New” screen, the software displays the
mediately updates the drawing views to reflect those changes. Autodesk Exchange portal. Here you’ll find similar content,
Although drawing views can only be created in a paper describing features in the new release. Autodesk Exchange is

20 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Users can open 3D tended to ignore because it could be tedious. Groups are now
models in Inventor streamlined and have their own simplified panel on the ribbon.
Fusion, edit When selecting objects, many users forget that there are
models by directly selection modes other than window and crossing window.
manipulating faces, Now, when you pick an empty spot in a drawing, AutoCAD
edges, vertices and 2012 reminds you that you can also use a window polygon,
features, and return a crossing polygon or a fence. And when AutoCAD’s snap
the modified model mode is enabled, the cursor no longer jumps to snap points
back to AutoCAD when you’re simply selecting objects.
with a single click. AutoCAD 2012 includes a layer enhancement that lets
you freeze specified layers in all viewports except the current
viewport, improvements to multi-leaders, and the inclusion of
a Delete Duplicate command as a core function rather than
relying on an Express Tool. Other enhancements include:
also where the program now displays Help whenever you press • improved raster and DGN file support;
the F1 key. Autodesk Exchange is only available if you have a • improvements to AutoCAD’s installation process;
live Internet connection, although local help content can be dis- • improvements to the tools used to migrate customizations
played in a web browser when a web connection is unavailable. made to an older version to the new release; and
By default, Autodesk Exchange appears whenever you • improvements to AutoCAD’s point cloud capabilities.
start AutoCAD, although you can turn this off. In that case, We’ve got to hand it to Autodesk. Rather than simply
you can still access Autodesk Exchange by clicking an Ex- being a grab bag of functions that somehow didn’t make it
change button. In the future, Exchange may also host an on- into previous releases, AutoCAD 2012 offers a lot of truly
line resource for add-ons, similar to the iTunes App Store, useful new features. By combining these with improved per-
but this feature was not yet active at press time. formance, AutoCAD 2012 is another must-have release. DE
Autodesk Content Explorer is another new component
that receives mixed reviews. This new AutoCAD plug-in ap- David Cohn has been using AutoCAD for more than 25 years
pears to be a successor to DesignCenter, although both co- and is the author of more than a dozen books on AutoCAD. He’s
exist in this release. The first time you use Content Explorer, the technical publishing manager at 4D Technologies, a contrib-
the software generates a Google-like index of DWG files so uting editor to Desktop Engineering, and also does consulting
that you can locate and reuse blocks, layers, linetypes, styles, and technical writing from his home in Bellingham, WA. You can
etc. Once the index has been created, you can easily find and contact him at [email protected] or visit DSCohn.com.
filter content, then drag and drop results into the current
drawing or open drawings by simply double-clicking. Users INFO ➜ Autodesk, Inc.: Autodesk.com
can add specific watch folders and also search for content on AutoCAD 2012 pricing:
Autodesk Seek. You can also use Content Explorer to search • Full system: $3,995; annual subscription: $450
across a local area network, but to do so, you must install • Upgrade from AutoCAD 2011: $595; from AutoCAD 2010:
the Content Service on the networked machines—something $1,195; from AutoCAD 2009: $1,795
that may require the help of IT support staff. AutoCAD LT pricing: $1,200 MSRP

Other Subtle Changes System Requirements:

• Operating System: Windows 7, Windows Vista (SP2 or later),
As we’ve come to expect, the third release in a DWG series
or Windows XP (SP3 or later); 64-bit or 32-bit
also includes a host of small improvements, what Autodesk
often refers to as “fit and finish.” For example, there are small • CPU: Intel Pentium 4 or AMD Athlon dual-core 1.6GHz or
improvements to the ribbon that make it easier to define and greater (3.0GHz or greater recommended for Windows 7 or
Vista or 3D modeling; AMD64 or Intel EM64T processor for
insert blocks. AutoCAD 2012 also starts up faster and re-
64-bit version)
sponds more quickly when switching between ribbon tabs.
You can now select an object and nudge it a few pixels in or- • Memory: 2GB RAM (1GB for AutoCAD LT)
thogonal directions by pressing the CTRL key and the appropri- • Disk Space: 2GB free disk space for installation (1.4GB for
ate arrow key. In the past, the Quick Properties palette, if enabled, AutoCAD LT)
would appear when you selected an object, so many users turned • Video: 1024x768 VGA with true color minimum (for 3D
this off. Now, you can turn Quick Properties off and still display modeling: 1280x1024 with 128MB video RAM or greater,
this useful palette whenever you double-click on most objects. Pixel Shader 3.0 or greater, Microsoft Direct3D-capable
AutoCAD’s group functionality was another feature that users workstation-class graphics card)

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 21

Simulation & Analysis /// Data Analysis Review

A New Point of Origin

Help with drawing conclusions from seemingly insurmountable volumes of data.
BY VINCE ADAMS

I
n the data-driven worlds of research and engineering, stored in a single file, each user-created folder represents a
more truly is better. OriginPro 8.5.1, released in April, section of the data to make access more logical and orga-
“provides tools for serious data analysis, such as Peak Fit- nized. The list below the folder tree reflects the contents of
ting, Surface Fitting, Statistics, Signal Processing, and Image
Handling,” says Joe Przechocki, business development man-
ager of OriginLab Corp., Northampton, MA.
Origin began in the early 1990s as a utility for process-
ing data from microcalorimeters from MicroCal Corp. (now
part of GE Healthcare). Its beginnings focused the prod-
uct on publication-quality graphing and easy-to-use curve-
fitting for Windows users. MicroCal quickly recognized
its value and flexibility early on, and a new company called
MicroCal Software was developed for the sole purpose of
developing Origin for wider applications. In 2000, the com-
pany changed its name to be more in line with its popular
product name. OriginLab Corp. was born.
In a nutshell, Origin, the base version, and OriginPro,
with extended functionality, provide point-and-click con-
trol over every element of a plot. Additionally, users can
create multiple types of richly formatted plots, perform
data analysis and then embed both graphs and results into FIGURE 1: The OriginPro User Interface.
dynamically updated report templates for efficient re-use
of effort.
“At a conference, you can tell right away who’s using a
graphics program like OriginPro and who’s not,” notes Jeff
Thompson, a research scientist at the Energy & Environ-
mental Research Center in Fargo, ND. He frequently ac-
quires data in relatively short-duration projects that needs to
be analyzed, then published or presented. The “polish” and
personalization he can add to a report drew him to Origin
Pro, he says.
All data, plot types and settings are saved in a single
project file (called an OPJ file), so organizing, archiving
and sharing is practically painless. Furthermore, Origin-
Lab offers a free Origin Project Reader so that any col-
league—or customer—can access OriginPro data without
a copy of the software installed. This can be downloaded
from OriginLab.com.

The User Interface

As shown in Figure 1, OriginPro is toolbar-driven with
two primary sections: the Project Explorer, on the left, and
the working or active window. The Project Explorer has
a familiar-looking folder structure. Because the project is FIGURE 2: The OriginPro Graph Gallery.

22 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

FIGURE 3: The return on investment selections in the
Quick Peaks Gadget. FIGURE 4: The Faxed Stress-Strain curve is digitized.

the selected folder, including data tables and plots.

To make changes in a graph, a user navigates to the
folder containing the graph, then double-clicks on any
part of the graph to get a dialog box. This is where the
years of product refinement show: Almost any conceiv-
able change to the graph is possible with the dialog boxes
provided—no special coding or programming knowledge
is required.
As with many full-featured software products, the num-
ber of options and controls can be daunting. To reduce the
learning curve, both after extended periods away or when
venturing into new graph or report types, OriginPro offers
a number of aids, both in the software and on its website.
The Help and Tutorials walk users through all the steps
and options. The sample project gallery within the software
offers prepared workbooks in a number of styles and formats,
which users can replicate or swap data into to create their
own graphs (see Figure 2).
Additionally, there is a Graph Gallery on OriginLab.com
with industry-specific examples and case studies that are up-
dated regularly to provide the most up-to-date samples. FIGURE 5: Standard color palettes in OriginPro 8.5.1.
Once a graph has been developed with exactly the
right settings for a particular type of project or dataset, the yellow rectangle in Figure 3. Gadgets, introduced in
users can either create Graph Templates for the creation OriginPro 8.5, are transient selections, using a rectangle,
of similar graphs, or Graph Themes to update the style circle or ellipse on an existing graph, that report back in-
and format of existing graphs to match a consistent look. formation. The results calculated within a Gadget are up-
Both tools help produce professional-grade reports and dated dynamically as the ROI is dragged within a graph.
publications. Version 8.5.1 added four additional Gadgets:
While OriginPro 8.5 was targeted and labeled a major • The Quick Peaks Gadget can identify both positive and
release from OriginLab, OriginPro 8.5.1 contains enough negative peaks within a given plot. Quantities such as
new functionality to be considered a major release unto itself. a Peak Area, Peak Height, Peak Center and full width at
half maximum (FWHM) are reported. Peaks can be tagged
New Gadgets and multiple peaks can be fitted, while baseline data can be
Gadgets in OriginPro are tools that perform quick analy- identified and subtracted.
ses on Regions of Interest (ROI) within a graph, shown by • The Cluster Manipulation Gadget performs basic statis-

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 23

Simulation & Analysis /// Data Analysis Review
tical calculations on a cluster of data or on the points out-
side the selected ROI. Data points can be edited, deleted
CASE IN POINT or temporarily masked. Data includes number of points,

J
sum, mean, median, standard deviation and min/max.
effrey Hurlbut is a research Fellow at Solutia, • The Statistics Gadget provides an added level of statistical
Inc., a developer of specialty products such output on the selected ROI.
as the material used to prevent shattering on • The Digitize Image Gadget allows users to import
most automobile windshields. He has been using scanned graphs from books, journals or faxes and convert
OriginPro for about 10 years, and says he was them into digitized tabular and graphical output. The
drawn to it as much for the data analysis tools as process has an intuitive, but manual graphical user inter-
the data formatting capabilities. face (GUI) for axis definition and point selection—but
“Regular tasks, such as finding the area under with the graphical feedback and subsequent data analysis,
a curve, are much easier than in common spread- the value of this work is readily apparent. The images in
sheet applications,” he says. “The Gadgets intro- Figure 4 show the key elements of this process. A faxed
duced in 8.5.1 are fantastic. I can quickly drag stress-strain curve was photographed with a cell phone
a selection around a curve with immediate feed- camera and digitized. OriginPro 8.5.1 allowed the image
back on the region of interest. I’m able to exam- to be rotated with reasonable precision and the axes were
ine data and trends that I might otherwise have defined. In this step, the strain axis was automatically
overlooked with more complicated methods.” converted from “percent strain” to actual strain, so that
Hurlbut also points to OriginLab’s strong sup- slope calculations would have the proper units.
port network: “OriginLab has even written custom Users can zoom in on the image while selecting points
applications for Solutia, and provided live update to improve precision. The overlay plot is visible upon point
training for the 10 or so users at our facility.” selection, which can help users can determine whether
more points are required to capture curvature. OriginPro
orders points as selected, so if a user backtracks to add

24 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

points, he or she must simply re-sort the data based on x- To that end, OriginPro provides access to the seem-
value. The plot updates automatically. ingly small details that can really make a difference. In
Multiple traces can be added to a single graph with cor- OriginPro 8.5.1, a number of enhancements have been
responding, independent columns. Once complete, the tab- made, including improvements to the plot color palette.
ular data can be exported to a text file or Microsoft Excel OriginPro has many built-in coordinated color palettes
for use in other calculations, such as finite element analysis that can be added to, modified and saved. Figure 5 shows
(FEA) material definition. some of the color palettes that can be applied to different
types of graphs.
Additional New Features The vast majority of improvements to OriginPro are
OriginPro’s non-linear curve fitter has been updated in driven by customer input collected by the manufacturer’s
version 8.5.1 to fit multiple 3D peaks in a dataset. Surface technical support team, according to the company. Users
fitting techniques are used in many scientific fields, such receive 90 days’ free support with each purchase and on-
as spectroscopy, mathematics, electrical engineering and going maintenance plans are available. Current mainte-
earth sciences. Nineteen different surface fitting models nance customers also receive upgrades during their main-
are available, including Gauss2D, DoseReponse2D, Ex- tenance period. DE
ponential2D and Polynomial2D. These calculations can
be automatically updated if the underlying data changes, Vince Adams , currently an account manager for LMS, is a
or the settings can be saved as an Analysis Theme to use longtime simulation educator, consultant and speaker. He has
later with similar data. authored three books on finite element analysis and numerous
One differentiator of OriginPro is the complete con- magazine articles. Contact him via [email protected].
trol a user has over the format of data for publication.
Most researchers and engineers understand that while INFO ➜ OriginLab Corp.: OriginLab.com
presentation can’t replace compelling data, it can open up
opportunities for more widespread and detailed review, ➜ Solutia, Inc.: Solutia.com
with a favorable attitude toward conclusions. For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com.

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deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 25

Mechatronics /// Robotics

Mobilizing Toward a
Robotics Revolution
Sensor developments are facilitating progress toward autonomous mobile
robotics, but what’s holding us back?
BY BARBARA G. GOODE

FIGURE 1: Just days after Microsoft

released Kinect, the sensor was hacked by
code developers wanting to enable control
through a PC rather than just the Xbox.

T
he most exciting development in sensing for autono- or fully autonomously to perform services useful to humans
mous service robots—which is arguably the most excit- and equipment, excluding manufacturing. It is also likely true
ing frontier in robotics—is a sensor that has only begun for other fields, as well.
to be used in robotics and, in fact, was developed for a com-
pletely unrelated application. It is Microsoft’s Kinect for Xbox Getting ‘Kinect-ed’
360, which the computer giant describes as a “controller-free” Industry watchers were surprised that Microsoft was seem-
interface for its video game platform (see Figure 1). ingly unaware of the potential of Kinect for robotics applica-
The Kinect enables control of the Xbox through “natural tions—potential evidenced by the fact that days after Kinect’s
interaction”—a term trademarked by PrimeSense (Tel Aviv, release, it was hacked by code developers wanting to enable
Israel), which developed Kinect’s underlying optical sensing control of the sensor through a PC rather than just the Xbox.
and recognition technology that translates body motion into In response, Microsoft announced plans for a software devel-
control commands. As Microsoft explains, “the Kinect sen- opment kit (SDK) that will allow exploration of Kinect for
sor has a 3D camera and a built-in microphone that tracks other applications. A non-commercial starter kit for Windows,
your full-body movements and responds to your voice.” What which should be available by the time you read this, promises:
makes the sensor captivating is its price tag: $149.99. • Robust, high-performance capabilities for skeletal tracking
“It’s the most exciting sensor to be released in a very long of one or two persons moving within the Kinect field of view.
time,” says Bill Kennedy, co-founder of Amherst, NH-based Mo- • Advanced audio capabilities provided by a four-element
bileRobots, Inc., the maker of autonomous robot cores, bases and microphone array, with sophisticated noise and echo cancel-
accessories that was acquired in 2010 by industrial automation lation, beam formation to identify a sound source; and in-
and robotics multinational Adept Technology, Pleasanton, CA. tegration with the Windows speech recognition application
Fred Nikgohar, CEO of RoboDynamics, Santa Monica, programming interface (SAPI) also included. 
CA, agrees. • Access to a standard color camera stream, as well as depth
“Kinect is a great example of what is possible now with sen- data to indicate distance of an object from the Kinect camera,
sors and embedded systems,” he says. “It’s not that we couldn’t to enable development of novel interfaces.
do 10 years ago what Kinect does, but at $150 it is a radical At an unspecified date, Microsoft also plans to release a com-
game changer.” mercial version of the SDK that will include support and confer
That’s certainly true for service robots, defined by the In- any intellectual property rights—which the non-commercial ver-
ternational Federation of Robotics as those that operate semi- sion will not. Microsoft is releasing no further details at this time.

26 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 FIGURE 2: Even with sophistication
Meanwhile, however, a number of oth- offered by components such as
ers are working on Kinect-like products, Analog Devices’ high-performance,
says Conard Holton, editor-in-chief of Vi- low-power iMEMS gyroscopes,
sion Systems Design. Among them is the dealing with the complexity of
Interface Ecology Lab at Texas A&M Uni- autonomous robotics is a challenge.
versity, whose ZeroTouch sensor was covered
recently by Time, among other publications. notes the Vision for Service Robots Report. Kennedy explains
that most of today’s autonomous mobile robots operate under
Complex and Evolving constrained conditions. For instance, those that ferry supplies in
Robots employ a number of sensor types, including GPS navi- a factory typically follow lines installed in the floor, and will stop
gation, radar, sonar and inertial guidance. However, “the major- if their paths become blocked. The lighting must be just right,
ity of service robots require some sort of vision system,” says too: Shadows will throw the robots off, as will overly bright light.
the Vision for Service Robots Report. According to the report,
these range from simple 2D CMOS sensors to complex sub- Gating Factors
systems capable of 3D imaging and pattern recognition. The “Designing navigation and stability systems requires extensive
vision sensor technologies most often used in service robots are hardware and software knowledge,” maintains Howard Wis-
structured light and two-camera stereo systems, time-of-flight niowski, marketing manager for MEMS/Sensors Technology
sensors, LIDAR, and single-lens camera systems. Group, Analog Devices (ADI), Norwood, MA. Today’s iner-
While some of those options still run in the multiple thou- tial measurement units (IMUs) are sophisticated enough to
sands of dollars, MobileRobots’ Kennedy says on the whole, vi- cover many bases. They may include a multi-axis (X, Y, Z)
sion sensor pricing has dropped dramatically—and sensors them- accelerometer, a multi-axis (X, Y, Z) gyroscope, and a multi-
selves can be relatively easy to put together. However, that doesn’t axis magnetometer (compass). See Figure 2. And yet, dealing
make mobile autonomous movement a simple endeavor. simultaneously with multiple axes as well as angular (pitch,
“The vision software needed to understand these images roll and yaw) and linear (up, down, sideways) motions while
and provide robotic feedback is complex and evolving rapidly,” determining position, velocity, and heading in free space, “is

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deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 27

Mechatronics /// Robotics

Platform Approaches

R
oboDynamics CEO Fred Nikgohar points to
what he sees as three fundamental prob-
lems that hamper the robotics industry:
1. Fragmentation. Nikgohar says that every
company works independently, lacking stan-
dards, unification or collaboration. This prevents
the development of economies of scale.
2. A dearth of affordable, useful platforms.
This severely limits market incentives required
for innovation and, by extension, to create a
diverse ecosystem of adopters and innovators.
3. Lack of designs that will engage people
emotionally.
On May 11, 2011, RoboDynamics made a
move intended to overcome those limitations:
The company’s new Luna is a sleek, 5-ft., 2-in.
open-standard hardware platform (with an 8-in.
touchscreen LCD for a face) designed to enable
robotics innovation (see Figure 3).
“We’ve made the proper tradeoffs to get it to
a consumer-level price,” explains Nikgohar, add- FIGURE 3: RoboDynamics’ new Luna (shown here with
ing that 1,000 limited-edition Luna robots will company CEO Fred Nikgohar) is a 5 ft., 2 in. open-
begin shipping during the fourth quarter of 2011 standard hardware platform featuring feature a native
for $3,000 each. Luna will feature a native App App Store, standard PC architecture, an open Linux-based
Store, standard PC architecture, an open Linux- operating system, touchscreen display, Wi-Fi and multiple
based operating system, touchscreen display, USB ports for expandability.
Wi-Fi and multiple USB ports for expandability.
“Our objective is to aggressively remove cost complex and has many constantly changing variables that need
and complexity, thereby facilitating widespread to be interpreted correctly,” in the context of other variables
consumer adoption while simultaneously providing that need to be understood, such as temperature compensa-
a unique ground-floor opportunity for the develop- tion, offset and hermeticity, says Wisniowski.
er community to bring innovative ideas to a finan- Kennedy says, “even the simplest of tasks, like driving from one
cially viable robotics ecosystem,” says Nikgohar. place to another in a cluttered, dynamic, human-occupied environ-
Other developers—including Willow Garage, ment, requires a lot of robotic sophistication—lots of sensors and
based in Menlo Park, CA, and MIT’s Bilibot lots of processing for the very sophisticated fast-acting software.
Project—are also providing affordable, open- Only when the price of all that hardware comes way, way down
source robotics platforms to encourage innova- will robots become more ubiquitously deployed around people.”
tion. In fact, the MIT team is currently offering a The Kinect is a step in the right direction, though the field
competition with a rebate of up to $350 on the has a long way to go, and Kennedy points out a major stumbling
purchase of a Bilibot (which, by the way, is built block: liability. Just as commercial airplanes have to be far safer
on Kinect) for creating and sharing an open- than cars, the safety issue implies a cost that is “much more than
source application. people are willing to pay to have a robot in their midst.”
If you’ve been thinking about trying your hand
at robotics, this might provide just the incen- Help Wanted
tive to start. Starting now is probably necessary Wisniowski explains that while design tools such as evalua-
if Nikgohar is to achieve his goal of “A robot in tion boards and software development platforms are available
every home in 10 years.” through component suppliers and third-party specialists, they
are not simple to use—and developing the algorithms that the
microprocessor can use and that fit the application is another

28 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

challenge. Indeed, practical algorithms for interpreting sen-
sor measurements/readings is a major factor holding back the INFO ➜ Adept Technology: Adept.com
growth of robotics, says Teddy Yap, Jr. of Washington State
University, whose doctoral dissertation was titled “Mobile
➜ Analog Devices, Inc.: Analog.com
Robot Navigation with Low-Cost Sensors.” ➜ Freescale: Freescale.com/MechBot
In addition to less expensive, more sophisticated sensors ➜ International Federation of Robotics: IFR.org
and processors, Kennedy’s list of things necessary for design
engineers need to take consumer robotics from a niche to ➜ Microsoft: Xbox.com/en-US/kinect
mainstream includes better tools for non-programmers and ➜ MIT’s Bilibot Project: Bilibot.com
training. He notes that MobileRobots offers training, but the
➜ MobileRobots, Inc.: MobileRobots.com
demand is limited.
Training is provided via downloadable PDFs on Freescale’s ➜ PrimeSense: PrimeSense.com
website to support its new 9-in.-tall bipedal sensor robot and ➜ RoboDynamics: RoboDynamics.com
development kit that the company launched in May for $199.
The walking robot has four degrees of freedom, a 32-bit ➜ Texas A&M University’s Interface Ecology Lab:
EcologyLab.net/research/zerotouch/index.html
“brain,” and a three-axis accelerometer for balance, and it of-
fers a choice of easy-to-use scripting languages. DE ➜ SICK USA: Sick.com
➜ Vision Systems Design: Vision-Systems.com/
Barbara G. Goode served as editor-in-chief for Sensors research-reports.html
magazine for nine years, and currently holds the same position at
BioOptics World, which covers optics and photonics for life science ➜ Willow Garage: WillowGarage.com/turtlebot
applications. Contact her via [email protected].. For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com.

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deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 29

High-Performance Computing /// Graphics Cards Review

NVIDIA Raises the Bar

Reviewing the latest workstation-class Quadro professional graphics accelerators.

T
he last time we looked at workstation-class graphics ac-
celerators from NVIDIA (see DE November 2010), we
BY DAVID COHN reviewed one of the new Quadro boards based on the
company’s Fermi architecture. That card, the ultra-high-end
Quadro 5000, was announced at last year’s Siggraph trade show
along with the high-end Quadro 4000 and flagship, ultra-high-
end Quadro 6000. According to NVIDIA, the new boards are
as much as five times faster than previous cards when running
3D applications and up to eight times faster for computational
simulation. What’s more, the graphics processing units (GPUs)
The entry-level in the two new ultra-high-end Quadro boards were also the
NVIDIA Quadro first professional graphics solutions with error correction codes
600. (ECC) memory.
We ran the Quadro 5000 through its paces back in Novem-
ber, along with three older NVIDIA Quadro FX boards. The
Quadro 5000 was also included in recent workstations we’ve re-
viewed from BOXX Technologies and Dell. Since then, NVIDIA
has expanded its Fermi-based Quadro lineup with the introduc-
tion of the mid-range Quadro 2000 and the entry-level Quadro
The mid-range
NVIDIA Quadro 600. For our latest roundup, we look at these two new boards as
2000. well as the Quadro 4000.
All four boards use a PCI Express 2.0 x16 bus interface and
support DirectX 11 and Shader Model 5.0 as well as OpenGL
4. They also all feature a full 30-bit display pipeline, enabling
more color values than 24-bit boards, as well as full-scene anti-
aliasing, hardware 3D window clipping, and HDMI support via
an HDMI adaptor. The NVIDIA GigaThread Engine provides
The high-end up to 10X faster context switching compared to the company’s
NVIDIA Quadro previous generation architectures, while the Quadro Scalable Ge-
4000. ometry Engine improves performance across a range of applica-
tions. And the NVIDIA Parallel DataCache supports a true cache
hierarchy combined with on-chip shared memory to accelerate
real-time ray tracing, physics processing, and texture filtering.
At the high and ultra-high-end, the Quadro 4000, 5000, and
6000 also incorporate Dual Copy Engines, which allow simulta-
neous transfer of data between the GPU and the host computer,
further accelerating operations such as ray tracing and physical
simulations, and enabling high performance computing thanks to
The ultra-high-end
NVIDIA Quadro double-precision floating point performance. All the new boards
5000. support NVIDIA’s Application Configuration Engine (ACE),
which automatically adjusts graphics settings for optimized appli-
cation performance. All four also feature NVIDIA Mosaic Tech-
nology, which enables any application to use one or more Quadro
boards to scale across up to eight high-resolution displays.
Of course, the biggest differences from the previous genera-
tion of Quadro boards are the amount of memory and computa-

30 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

tional power in each card’s GPU. NVIDIA calls its parallel com- Quadro FX 1800. Its GPU also provides 192 CUDA cores, com-
puting architecture CUDA (Compute Unified Device Architecture), pared to just 64 in its predecessor. Although the memory interface
and even the new entry-level Quadro 600 provides 96 such proces- drops from 192-bit to 128-bit, NVIDIA engineers have increased
sors compared to just 32 in the previous entry-level board. the memory bandwidth in the Quadro 2000 to 41.6GB/second.
As a result, the new board delivers better performance on most,
The New NVIDIA Quadro Family but not all, of the datasets in the SPEC Viewperf benchmark.
At the entry-level, the NVIDIA Quadro 600 provides a full The new board also supports NVIDIA SLI technology, a fea-
gigabyte of DDR3 memory, compared to 512MB of GDDR3 ture not present in its predecessor. Like the older FX 1800 board,
memory in the older NVIDIA FX 580 board it succeeds in the the Quadro 2000 requires a single PCIe x16 slot. Although at 62
lineup. As mentioned, the new GPU in the Quadro 600 offers watts it consumes a bit more power, it does not require an auxil-
three times the number of CUDA processors as the previous iary power connection. Its manufacturer’s suggested retail price
generation board. In our tests, however, the two boards per- is a full $100 less than the board it replaces, but its current street
formed about the same, with the older FX 580 even scoring a price is actually a bit more expensive than the Quadro FX 1800.
bit higher on some tests. The new Quadro 600 carries a slightly At the high end, NVIDIA has eclipsed the FX 3800 with
higher price tag than its predecessor and also compromises a the new Quadro 4000. Although its suggested price of $1,199
bit, providing one DisplayPort connection as well as a dual-link is identical to the older board, its average street price is around
DVI port, whereas the FX 580 has two DisplayPorts. Still, with $780, a bit less than the FX 3800. This board comes with 2GB
a street price around $161, the NVIDIA Quadro 600 is an ex- of GDDR5 memory—double that of the older board—while
cellent entry-level board. retaining the same 256-bit memory interface. It also provides
The mid-range proved to be the sweet spot. Although decid- 256 CUDA cores—64 more than its predecessor—yielding an
edly more expensive than entry-level boards, professional graph- 89.6GB/second memory bandwidth. As a result, the new Quadro
ics boards aimed at this segment of the market typically deliver 4000 easily outperforms the older board, often by a wide margin.
significantly better performance at a reasonable price point. In addition to its two DisplayPorts and dual-link DVI connector,
The new NVIDIA Quadro 2000 comes with 1GB of GDDR5 this board also supports stereoscopic 3D output (with an optional
memory compared to 768MB of GDDR3 memory in the older 3-pin Mini-DIN bracket) as well as SLI. In spite of all this power,

Webinar: Automotive Applications of MapleSim

Part I – Powertrain and Driveline

High-Performance Physical
High-Performance Modeling
Physical and Simulation
Modeling and Simulation
5
Thursday, July 28, 2011 • 2:00 - 3:00 pm EST
In this webinar, Paul Goosens, VP of Applications Engineering at
Maplesoft will present a MapleSim library of components, transmission
sub-assemblies, and complete powertrain examples that show the use
of these components in driveline applications. Built with guidance from
several transmission manufacturers, this MapleSim library allows you to
mix the best of physical models and empirical data to maximize model
fidelity, optimize your designs, and improve overall vehicle fuel-efficiency.

To register, go to www.maplesoft.com/powertrain

© Maplesoft, a division of Waterloo Maple Inc., 2011. Maplesoft, Maple, and MapleSim are trademarks of Waterloo Maple Inc.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

webinar.indd 1 11-06-0631
deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 4:00 PM
High-Performance Computing /// Graphics Cards Review
SPECviewperf Benchmark Results for Current NVIDIA Quadro
and Quadro FX Series Graphic Cards Reviewed
NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA Quadro NVIDIA NVIDIA Quadro
FX 5000 FX 4800 4000 FX 3800 2000 FX 1800 Quadro 600 FX 580
NEW! NEW! NEW! NEW!
Manufacturer’s price $2,249 $1,999 $1,199 $1,199 $599 $699 $199 $170
Average street price $1,765 $1,620 $780 $818 $450 $405 $161 $150
SPECviewperf 11.0 (Boxx 8550 XTREME)
catia-03 48.85 24.70 41.17 24.30 30.81 22.12 16.96 15.41
ensight-04 42.54 15.03 30.62 15.04 20.15 11.45 10.50 9.00
lightwave-01 69.48 66.17 69.61 65.36 65.85 58.92 41.99 42.56
maya-03 100.73 51.81 83.43 20.90 21.38 36.54 13.44 24.32
proe-05 11.37 10.79 11.36 10.72 11.33 10.72 10.02 10.09
sw-02 66.16 45.94 57.28 45.40 46.47 40.58 31.36 28.81
tcvis-02 42.36 17.91 35.41 17.59 24.87 15.80 15.45 10.62
snx-01 44.02 17.69 32.15 17.24 21.91 15.90 12.73 11.39
SPECviewperf 10.0 (HP xw6600)
3dsmax-04 62.46 62.89 62.43 62.74 62.69 52.29 62.63 59.74
catia-02 77.93 70.09 77.86 69.91 73.67 68.33 51.41 62.56
ensight-03 112.82 59.45 91.50 56.82 66.97 54.37 44.40 45.38
maya-02 409.21 239.61 352.45 234.88 266.74 221.39 165.60 180.35
proe-04 56.95 55.22 57.00 54.91 56.69 55.75 53.59 53.48
sw-01 102.34 105.48 102.49 105.43 102.45 105.48 88.75 87.16
tcvis-01 80.27 40.47 75.86 40.04 56.73 35.61 34.81 23.71
ugnx-01 89.29 37.91 66.32 37.59 43.80 34.63 29.35 23.23
SPECIFCATIONS
Bus architecture PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16 PCI Express X16
Extra power req’d Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No
Form factor 4.38”x9.75” 4.38”x10.5” 4.38”x9.5” 4.38”x9.0” 4.38”x7.0” 4.38”x7.8” 2.73”x6.6” 4.38”x6.75”
Slots used 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1
Max Power (watts) 152W 150W 142W 108W 62W 59W 40W 40W
PCIe version 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0
Length 3/4-length 3/4-length 3/4-length 2/3-length 2/3-length 2/3-length 1/2-length 1/2-length
Processors 352 192 256 192 192 64 96 32
Memory configuration 2.5GB (GDDR5) 1.5GB (GDDR3) 2GB (GDDR5) 1GB (GDDR3) 1GB (GDDR5) 768MB (GDDR3) 1GB (DDR3) 512MB (GDDR3)
Memory interface 320-bit 384-bit 256-bit 256-bit 128-bit 192-bit 128-bit 128-bit
Memory bandwith 120 GB/sec 76.8 GB/sec 89.6 GB/sec 51.2 GB/sec 41.6GB/sec 38.4 GB/sec 25.6 GB GB/sec 25.6GB/sec
Number of Dual-Link DVI Outputs 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
Number of Display Port Outputs 2 2 2 2 2 2 1 2
Stereo 3D Connector (3-pin) Yes Yes Yes (1) Yes (1) No No No No
SDI-enabled Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No No
Framelock/Genlock Yes (2) Yes (2) No No No No No No
SLI Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No No No
OpenGL version 4.0 3.0 4.1 3.1 4.0 3.0 4.0 3.0
DirectX/Shader Model 11/5.0 10.0/4.0 11/5.0 10.0/4.0 11/5.0 10.0/4.0 11/5.0 10.0/4.0
Maximum Resolution Support (@ 60 Hz) 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600 2560x1600

Notes: 1. Requires optional 3-pin Mini-DIN bracket. 2. Requires optional G-Sync option card.

32 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

the Quadro 4000 requires just a single PCIe x16 slot, but since it benchmark (spec.org): version 10 on the older HP workstation
consumes 142 watts it does require an auxiliary connection to the running Windows XP 32-bit at 1280x1024 resolution and the
system power supply. newer version 11 on the system from BOXX running the 64-bit
version of Windows 7 at 1680x1050.
Benchmarking the Boards Based on our results, with the exception of the entry-level
We tested the three new NVIDIA Quadro boards using the same Quadro 600, the new generation of NVIDIA Quadro boards
system we’ve used for several years now for evaluating graph- surpasses the performance of the older boards. In fact, at the mid-
ics cards, an HP xw6600 workstation equipped with a pair of range, high, and ultra-high-end, the newer boards at the lower
3.0GHz quad-core Xeon E5450 processors. While that system price point once again beat the performance of previous genera-
is certainly showing its age, using the same computer enables tion graphics cards one step higher on the food chain.
us to continue to compare our results to those of older boards All of the new NVIDIA Quadro boards are fully certified with
from both AMD and NVIDIA, making it easy to see just how most CAD and DCC applications and all of the boards in the
much these graphics accelerators have improved over the years. Quadro line, including earlier Quadro FX boards, use the same
However, since NVIDIA updated its driver software for the new- unified video driver. Drivers are available for most 32- and 64-bit
est boards, we also retested the previous generation of NVIDIA operating systems, including Windows 7, Vista, XP, and Linux. DE
graphics cards using the updated driver, so that we could deter-
mine how much things improved simply because of improve- David Cohn is the technical publishing manager at 4D Technologies.
ments in the driver software. He’s a contributing editor to Desktop Engineering and also does con-
But, recognizing that many readers are likely using newer sulting and technical writing from his home in Bellingham, WA. The au-
systems, we also did something a bit different this year, run- thor of more than a dozen books has been benchmarking PCs since 1984.
ning an additional set of tests using the BOXX 3DBOXX You can contact him via email at [email protected] or DSCohn.com.
8550XTREME workstation we recently reviewed. The BOXX
workstation was equipped with a pair of 3.33GHz Intel Xeon
X5680 six-core CPUs over-clocked to 4.2GHz. We tested all of INFO ➜ NVIDIA Corp.: NVIDIA.com
the boards using two different versions of the SPEC Viewperf For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com.
modo® 501 image by SeventhStreet – SeventhStreetStudio.com

Ready for adventure

20110610.DesktopEngineering.quad.halfpage.indd 1 deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 33 AM

6/10/2011 10:57:29
Computer-Aided Design /// Modeler and Renderer Review

A Force to Reckon with

in the 3D World
Luxology’s modo polygon and subdivision surface modeler, continues
to grow by leaps and bounds.
BY MARK CLARKSON

I
reviewed modo 401 back in 2010
(deskeng.com/articles/aaaynw.htm). I
liked what I saw then, and I like the
new release even more.
The first thing I noticed upon firing
up modo 501 was RayGL, modo’s new
real-time render preview. Previous modo
versions have had a dedicated preview
window, but RayGL is better, faster and
available in any window. With a few weird
exceptions, RayGL gave me a fast, accu-
rate preview of the finished render. This
technology is becoming de rigueur in 3D
applications, so it’s not surprising to see it
here, but it’s still extremely welcome.
Luxology claims to have greatly im-
proved the rendering speed with ver-
sion 501, and wow, have they ever. The
first scene I tested—a 22 million poly-
The RayGL option, available in any modeling window,
gon collection of espresso machines—
provides a fast, accurate preview of the finished render.
rendered 2.25 times faster (189 seconds
vs. 83 seconds).
Testing old scenes and new, I found Calling Catmull and Clark the weights of your edges helps some-
501 to consistently be much faster than I use modo’s subdivision surfaces all the what, but it also distorts your textures.
401, often two to three times faster. time. They turn boxy, low-resolution Enter Pixar subdivision surfaces—
The results were often visibly superior, objects into smooth, high-resolution or more properly, Catmull-Clark
and typically used less memory than the objects with a press of the tab button. subdivision surfaces. Pixar sub-d’s are
same scene rendered in 401. While great for organic shapes, they’re very similar to modo’s native sub-d
modo’s renderer is Intel single in- a bit of a pain when it comes to hard- surfaces. In fact, at first the difference
struction, multiple data (SIMD) ac- surface modeling. By their nature, between them might not be at all ap-
celerated, so computers with modern sub-d surfaces smooth things out. So parent. The big benefit comes from
cores (which, sadly, doesn’t include when it comes time to create some hard the Pixar sub-d’s more useful brand
mine) will see an even bigger improve- edges, you’re always fighting against of edge-weighting: You can get a nice,
ment in overall speed. them. You end up adding more geom- crisp edge by simply turning up that
modo’s renderer offers better depth etry than you’d really prefer. To get a edge’s weight. (Pixar sub-d’s are also
of field—complete with Bokeh effects, sharp corner, you typically have to slice less prone to the distortion of UV tex-
if you so desire. New bump map and the object up, adding new edges—and tures, as they have less of a tendency
displacement map engines provide bet- new rows of polygons—just to force the to stretch and compress the underly-
ter results with less memory. sub-d’s into a tighter bend. Tweaking ing geometry around the edges.

34 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 modo 501 /// Review

This array of 225 espresso machines, generated using modo’s

Got Drawings?
Replicator feature, renders 2.25 times faster in modo 501, while
using less memory.
Need Parts?
Pixar sub-d’s also enable modo’s new nightmarishly complex assemblies—
multi-resolution mesh sculpting. This entire internal combustion engines,
allows you to sculpt details at ever- industrial robots, etc.
higher levels of resolution without de- modo 501’s new schematic view
stroying the previous resolution. takes a giant leap in the right direc-
Pixar sub-d’s are more computa- tion. Now you can lay your relation-
tionally complex, and they do gener- ships out in a very visual way, and a
ate a higher density mesh (read: more normal human being has a much bet-
polys) at any given subdivision level, ter chance of being able to create, edit
so your computer works harder while and use complex assemblies.
you work less. To recreate my submarine rig, I
drag the submarine’s Z position—and
Schematics View each propeller’s Z rotation—onto the
modo’s animation system, in addition stage, where they appear as labeled
to doing both forward and inverse boxes. I hook the boxes up by dragging
kinematics, lets you hook up nearly from any box’s output to any other
anything to nearly anything else via box’s input. Where math is needed, I
constraints, linkages and relation- drag a math operator onto the stage
ships. You scale an object’s texture and hook it up. The results are easy to
when that object is scaled, for ex- read, and easy to modify.
ample. But you can also change an Even better, you can package these
object’s color when it’s scaled. Most schematics up into assemblies. Assem-
applications are more prosaic: having blies not only keep things nice and
windows open together, or one gear neat, but also allow you to reuse your
driving another. animation rigs, texture drivers and
On an animation I did of a sub- what-have-you by applying them to
marine, for example, the screws are different objects.
driven by a simple relationship with
the sub’s position: for every X meters
the sub moves forward, the screws re-
It’s the Little Things
There are little improvements all
Get Quotes
volves once on their axes. (As they are
counter-rotating screws, one of them
around. You can now define the de-
fault snap, axis, brush and snap state
Online
multiplies the sub’s position by -1.) for your tools. Sculpt tools work in
This works really well, but any- the UV mapping workspace. modo’s
thing more complex becomes pro-
gressively more difficult to visualize
fur—with new frizz and kink set-
tings—is also easier to comb. modo
www.MFG.com
and maintain. And modo is capable of reads RGB-alpha images directly, giv-

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 35

Computer-Aided Design /// Modeler and Renderer Review

modo’s schematic view makes setting up animated relationships

easier than before. This setup uses the submarine’s position along
with two math operators, to drive the rotation of the two screws.

your geometry—areas that would be clicking on an element on the screen—

shadowed or would be exposed to the the Push tool, for example—opens the
light—and build procedural textures help file at the page covering that tool.
based on them. It’s great for adding rust Users can even rate help sections
and dirt (admittedly, not something de- and add their own comments and ad-
signers do that often) but also for build- ditions, leveraging the community to
ing complex organic textures, or ce- improve the documentation over time.
ramic glazes with a hand-applied look.
Unlike previous versions, the 64-bit Worth the Cost
version of 501 now opens SolidWorks At $995—$100 more than the previ-
parts and assemblies natively. Appear- ous version—modo remains a relative
ances and decals now come through. bargain. A trial version is available at
Luxology has recently announced its Luxology.com/trymodo.
SolidWorks Kit ($299), a module that While modo still can’t compete
promises to smooth still further the with more complete packages like 3ds
processes of moving your work be- Max or Lightwave, especially in terms
tween SolidWorks and modo. of animation and dynamics, it’s a very
powerful package with a great modeler
A simple 6-poly cube (top), converted
Documentation and renderer. Luxology is clearly laying
If I have a pet peeve—and believe me, the groundwork for something big. I’ll
to a tube with modo subdivision
I do—it’s bad documentation. Docu- be watching for it. DE
surfaces (middle) and the new Pixar
mentation is so often overlooked and
subdivision surfaces (bottom). Pixar
under-loved that it’s commonly the low Contributing Editor Mark Clarkson is
subdivision surfaces give crisper
point of my product reviews. It’s gen- DE’s expert in visualization, computer
corners, with less distortion.
erally easier and more effective to use animation, and graphics. His newest book
Google than inline help. is “Photoshop Elements by Example.”
ing you alpha and color channel in one I’m happy to report that modo’s help Visit him on the web at markclarkson.
file. You can also work with really huge has gotten much, much better with this com or send e-mail about this article to de-
image maps. release. modo has always had a lot of [email protected].
modo 501 comes with a whole new good information, examples and videos
set of procedural textures, with every- available, but up to now it’s been kind INFO ➜ Luxology LLC: Luxology.com
thing from dripping water to space- of scattershot. In 501, it’s much better
ship panels to the extremely useful oc- organized, with a search feature that ac- ➜ SolidWorks: SolidWorks.com
clusion shader. The occlusion shader tually returned me helpful results more For more information on this topic,
lets you isolate low or high areas of often than not. Pushing F1 and then visit deskeng.com.

36 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

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deskeng.com /// June 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 37
Simulation & Analysis /// Optimization

Learn the Two-Step

Two-step optimization for product design takes manufacturing variability
into account.
BY JERRY FIREMAN

I
t’s not all that difficult to design an ide-
Design-Expert® Software
alized product that will perform well Factor Coding: Actual
RSC TTP
when each one is built exactly to nomi-
nal conditions. But variation is inevitable X1 = D: Motor Voltage

in everything. It’s much harder to design X2 = B: M/C Flow

a real-world product that can be built in a

Actual Factors
A: Corner Displ

real-world process in such a way that every

C: Inlet Tube Flow
E: S/V Flow

unit will perform exactly like its predeces-

RSC TTP
sor. Will a particular combination of de-
sign parameter values cause a performance
problem—or worse yet, a safety problem?
It typically costs money, often lots of
money, to reduce manufacturing variabil-
ity. So which design parameters should
we target for reductions in variation? And
how can we optimize both the nominal
B: M/C Flow
value and the variability of each design D: Motor Voltage
parameter to achieve the highest perfor-
mance over the entire production volume FIGURE 1: Time-to-pressure as a function of motor voltage and
at the lowest cost? master cylinder flow.
Design engineers have had many tools
available to evaluate variation-free part per-
formance for worst-case or nominal conditions. But they’ve Under Pressure, So to Speak
had few options to evaluate the potentially infinite possibili- For example, Johnson offers, the TRW team recently fo-
ties for how the finished products may actually turn out in cused on a braking system where one of the objectives was to
mass production. Chad Johnson at TRW Automotive has quickly generate pressure when demanded by the vehicle sta-
been working on this problem. He has applied methods for bility control system. The team selected the following factors
optimizing the performance robustness and cost of designs as those with the greatest potential to influence the critical
with variation taken into account, a combination of objectives time-to-pressure performance variable:
coined by Dr. Genichi Taguchi as two-step optimization.
The process begins with establishing a polynomial y=f(x) • Corner displacement—the amount of fluid that needs to be
relationship to model, the relationship between the inputs moved between the pump and the brake, measured in cubic
and the response. The model can be acquired through a re- centimeters (cc).
sponse surface methodology (RSM) design of experiments • Master cylinder (M/C) flow rate, in cc/second.
(DOE) analysis. A Monte Carlo simulation leverages that • Inlet tube flow—the flow rate in the inlet orifice in the
model to simulate building thousands of products. The re- hydraulic line, in cc/second.
sults indicate which factors are having the greatest effect on • Motor voltage, in volts.
performance variation and which are affecting the mean. • Solenoid valve (S/V) flow—flow rate of the solenoid valve
The user can then change the nominal values or variability that controls the master cylinder, in cc/second.
of any factor (within cost or performance constraints), and
measure the impact on the performance of the entire popu- The first question to answer regarded the impact of these
lation of products. variables on the time-to-pressure. The traditional approach

38 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

of building a few prototypes and measuring their perfor- DOE Maps Design Space
mance only helps to understand a tiny fraction of the design The statistical results enabled Johnson to graphically ex-
space. One-factor-at-a-time (OFAT) experiments go further plore the design space by producing response surface maps
by systematically varying one factor, while holding the others that offer better understanding of individual factor com-
constant, and recording the impact on performance. But the bination effects on the response. Figure 1 maps time-to-
time required for each run makes it practical to cover only a pressure as a function of motor voltage and master cylinder
small fraction of the design space. This approach also fails to flow. The map shape also indicates the non-linear effects of
account for multiple-factor interactions. these two factors.
The response surface map provides all of the information
Applying RSM DOE needed to evaluate the performance of the design, based on
Johnson addressed these challenges by using RSM DOE any given set of values for the design parameters. It provides
to map out the complete design space while running only the ideal tool for optimizing the design parameters, as well
a relatively small number of experiments. The model was as determining the robustness of any particular set of nomi-
validated by measuring several vehicles under controlled nal values. But the team needed to go one step further, and
conditions. DOE requires far fewer experimental iterations simulate the performance of a large number of products built
than the traditional OFAT approach, and makes it possible under real-world manufacturing conditions.
to identify the most robust combination of factors for the
product. RSM provides a solid estimate for the value of re- The Monte Carlo Simulation
sponses for every possible combination of the factors by Johnson used Monte Carlo simulation to accomplish this
varying the values of all factors in parallel. In other words, task. He defined a probability distribution for each input.
it allows one to comprehend a multi-dimensional surface Then he applied Monte Carlo techniques using the Apo-
with non-linear shapes. gee tool created by Statistical Design Institute to simulate
Johnson reaches for Stat-Ease’s Design-Expert software a large production population. The technique works by
from his Six Sigma Master Black Belt toolbox. randomly selecting a value for each input factor (from the
“It offers a powerful, easy-to-use and statistically sound earlier described polynomial) based on the assigned prob-
set of DOE tools behind an interface that is designed for ability distributions. The polynomial formula calculated by
use by an engineer, rather than a statistical expert,” he Design-Expert is then leveraged to calculate the time-to-
says. “Further, the Stat-Ease staffers are all excellent peo- pressure (response) for each virtual product built during
ple, always willing to assist in any way they can.” the simulation.
For the braking system project, Johnson selected a One of the most powerful aspects of the Monte Carlo sim-
64-run central composite design (CCD) response surface ulation is the insight it provides on understanding the impact
method (RSM) because it enables the user to visualize of each factor on the variability of the dependent variable.
both the response values and their sensitivity to change “The combination of DOE and Monte Carlo analysis
in the factors. helps us understand how much impact the variation of each
Johnson’s team completed the experiment and entered factor has on the overall performance of the product, while
the results into the software. The software then performed simultaneously taking into account the variation of all other
statistical analysis that mapped out the complete time-to- involved parameters,” Johnson explains. “We can make much
pressure design space as a function of the five factors plus smarter design decisions than would be possible with either
second order (squared terms) and multiple interaction ef- worst-case or root-sum-squares tolerancing methods. Fur-
fects. The software fitted the following predictive model thermore, we can leverage the same model to optimize the
(actual coefficients omitted for proprietary reasons): design by evaluating alternatives to determine where to set
the combination of parameter mean and variation to opti-
Time to Pressure = mize the performance of every unit we make.” DE
+ ß0
+ ß1 * Corner Displacement Jerry Fireman , is president of Structured Information, Need-
+ ß2 * M/C Flow ham Heights, MA.
- ß3 * Inlet Tube Flow
- ß4 * Motor Voltage
- ß5 * S/V Flow INFO ➜ TRW Automotive: TRW.com
- ß12 * Corner Displacement * M/C Flow ➜ Stat-Ease: StatEase.com
- ß34 * Inlet Tube Flow * Motor Voltage
+ ß33 * Inlet Tube Flow2 ➜ Statistical Design Institute: Stat-Design.com
+ ß44 * Motor Voltage2 For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com.

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 39

High-Performance Computing /// Clusters

Finding the Speed

for Multiple Designs
How to simulate multiple design scenarios in high-performance computing
environments.
BY JASON GHIDELLA

S
imulation is a core enabling
technology for successful or-
ganizations using model-based
design. By simulating software models
for multiple scenarios, engineers can
explore innovative designs and gain
deeper insight into system behavior
early in the development process—and
before physical prototypes of the system
are available. This approach enables en-

➜
FIGURE 1: The
gineers to develop complex embedded
low-fidelity Simulink
systems efficiently and cost-effectively.
model of the vehicle
The ability to run multiple simulations
used in the case
also helps organizations meet quality
study includes
and robustness goals with techniques
engine, transmission,
such as design optimization, design
vehicle dynamics
exploration, robustness studies, Monte
and transmission
Carlo studies, parameter sweeps and bit
control components.
error rate (BER) calculations.
Depending upon the complexity of
the model, the number of simulations
to be completed, and the frequency of
➜

FIGURE 2: The Parallel Computing Toolbox enables simulations to use

the task, simulation time can become a
up to eight local workers on a multi-core or multi-processor computer.
critical bottleneck in the development
When used with MathWorks’ MATLAB Distributed Computing Server,
process. An approach that leverages the
application simulation can be run using any number of workers on
computing power readily available in
computer clusters or grid and cloud computing services.
today’s multi-core desktops and gen-
eral-purpose, commercial off-the-shelf
(COTS) clusters can overcome this limiting factor. namic parameters. To overcome this uncertainty, they can use
the executable specification of the control system and model
Case in Point of the vehicle to conduct a simulation study on a range of pa-
Aerodynamic drag forces can significantly reduce the fuel effi- rameter values. This enables them to assess the robustness of
ciency of a vehicle. Typically, vehicle body design is an iterative their design for multiple body geometry variations. The re-
process, in which trade-offs between performance and body style sults of such studies are invaluable for management, as they
considerations are made. The iterative nature of the development make critical decisions on the vehicle style while balancing
process affects engineers across all phases of development. performance and fuel economy needs.
In the initial phases, for example, powertrain controls en- Figure 1 shows a low-fidelity automotive vehicle model built
gineers will not have exact knowledge of the vehicle’s aerody- in MathWorks’ Simulink and chosen specifically for the illus-

40 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

trative purposes of this article. Across a fixed drive cycle, the cessing cores. Parallel Computing Toolbox provides a scalable
vehicle speed will be simulated and studied for a set of drag solution to solve computationally and data-intensive problems
coefficients that varies from 0.2, which is typical of a sleek elec- by distributing them on multi-core and multi-processor com-
tric car concept vehicle, to 0.6, which is typical of a large truck. puters, as shown in Figure 2.
Intuitively, one might approach this parameter sweep by Using the PARFOR command, an intuitive high-level con-
simulating drag coefficients at 0.2, 0.3, and so on. However, struct that parallelizes FOR loops in conjunction with functions
this would risk missing potential design candidates, as even a from the Simulink application programming interface (API),
2% change in aerodynamic drag can affect fuel economy by as engineers can construct a MATLAB script to automate the pro-
much as a 1%. In addition, engineers will also want to evaluate cess. Engineers save time because they can program this within
performance robustness across parameter variations. MATLAB, instead of with complex cluster software.
To address these issues, the study was conducted with much This case study was conducted using a computer cluster
finer granularity. Specifically, the aerodynamic drag was in- comprising 16 quad-core computers, for a total of 64 processing
creased in steps of 0.4% from 0.2 to 0.6, resulting in 512 de- cores. The number of available cores was varied to evaluate its
sign scenarios and providing a dataset large enough to ensure effect on the overall simulation time. For a two-core setup, the
confidence in the resulting vehicle design. simulation was completed in approximately 380 seconds. The
Because a low-fidelity model was used, a drive cycle spanning resulting 1.9-fold speedup is close to the best possible outcome
1,000 seconds took, on average, less than 2 seconds to simulate of a two-fold speedup.
on a single core machine. However, because 512 simulations A plot of the vehicle speeds for the standard drive-cycle at dif-
were required for this study, the total time needed to complete ferent aerodynamic drag values is shown in Figure 3. The graph
all simulations serially on the same machine was approximately shows some interesting properties for the automatic transmis-
730 seconds, or more than 12 minutes. For a more realistic, sion controller used in this design. The highest decline in vehicle
higher-fidelity model in which each simulation takes 10 to 15 speed performance because of drag was about 10 mph during
minutes to run, the study would require four days to complete. the cruise phase (shown on the right of Figure 3). Drag did not
Because the simulation scenarios are independent of one have as much influence during the acceleration phases, and the
another, they can be executed concurrently on multiple pro- braking phase actually benefited from the additional drag. These

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 41

High-Performance Computing /// Clusters

FIGURE 4: Speedup increased almost linearly with the

number of processing cores used.

sors increased, the overhead involved in distributing data and

work across them limited the performance improvement to a
less-than-perfect linear speedup. For example, with 64 cores,
the speedup was approximately 42-fold, not 64-fold.

Explore Better Designs with HPC

In this case study, robustness of various designs was demon-
strated by simulating multiple design scenarios. High-fidelity
models and large parameter sets can create bottlenecks in the
development process when using this approach. By taking
advantage of a high-performance computing (HPC) environ-
ment, the simulation time was shortened by a factor of 40 as
FIGURE 3: Vehicle speed profiles for the given drive-cycle the number of processing cores was increased to 64.
for aerodynamic drag coefficients varying from 0.2 (blue) To give some context to this speedup, a simulation that
to 0.6 (green) show that the largest effect of drag occurs would have taken four days on a single processor can be com-
during the cruise phase. pleted in 2.5 hours on the cluster. These techniques can be ap-
plied with minimal engineering effort to eliminate the bottle-
results indicate that the controller design is robust to changes in necks associated with running multiple simulations for design
aerodynamic drag, as the speed profile varies smoothly. optimization, design exploration, robustness studies, Monte
Simulation times for 4, 8, 12, 16, 24, 32, 40, 48, 56 and 64 cores Carlo studies, parameter sweeps, and BER calculations. DE
are shown in Figure 4, where the overall time to complete the
512 simulations is on the left axis, and the resulting speedup in Jason Ghidella is technical marketing manager at MathWorks,
comparison to the baseline serial run is shown on the right axis. Natick, MA.
The trend shows that the speedup improvement scaled al-
most linearly with the number of processors used from the
cluster. Conversely, simulation time had an inverse relation- INFO ➜ MathWorks: MathWorks.com
ship with the number of processors. As the number of proces- For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com.

42 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Engineering Case Studies Fast Apps
‘Clear’-ing the Way Testing Seals with Back on Track
An axle manufacturer sees its way to a
better design, thanks to some help from
Prototyped Parts Plasma-Therm completes a successful
management buyout, with help
Here’s how one company created an
3-Dimensional Services. from Adept’s engineering document
inexpensive way to work out the kinks of
management.
BY ED SZYKULA their latest design.

Though typically a casting, this clear

plastic transfer case prototype produced by
3-Dimensional Services allows the customer to An Adept engineering document management
clearly view the vital flow of oil within it. The seal test for the enclosure pieces needed facilitates Plasma-Therm’s ISO 9001 audit.
for the functional testing of a newly designed
handheld device.
Automotive companies today are Plasma-Therm LLC is a supplier of
constantly seeking to improve vehicle Eric Schneider is a design engineer who advanced plasma process equipment to
operating efficiency and thus improve took on the job of producing a generation various specialty markets. Incorporated
fuel efficiency, especially in light of the of handheld devices for a new client. in March 1975, Plasma-Therm, Inc.
ongoing upward climb in gas prices. He works for Key Tech, Inc., a Baltimore was sold in 2000 to Oerlikon, a large
Improving efficiency, however, is no consulting firm known for its designs Swiss industrial conglomerate. In
longer easy because the low-hanging fruit of medical devices, instruments and January 2009, four Plasma-Therm
has already been picked. So, in pursuit consumer electronics. They’ve worked managers pooled their resources and
of this goal, automakers and major auto on everything from climate-controlled pet bought controlling interest back. This
suppliers are increasingly turning to carriers to spa circuit boards to devices executive management team now
tech-savvy partners to help them turn that measure red blood cells. owns the company.
innovative ideas into reality. Schneider’s latest project was a chal- At the time of the buyout, Plasma-
This was the situation when an lenge because the handheld needed to Therm was in a vulnerable posi-
axle manufacturer partnered with be waterproof, operating in up to a meter tion. “When the company changed
3-Dimensional Services,Rochester Hills, of water. After researching materials and ownership,” explains Kenneth Pizzo,
MI, on a new testing device. costs, he selected several seals with vari- product engineering manager at
3-Dimensional Services is a firm that ous cross sections that he thought would Plasma-Therm, “we were in the midst
specializes in the design, engineering do the job. But he still needed to test of designing several customer spe-
and analysis, in-house tool construction, them to be sure they’d hold up. If the test cials, required to fill orders that were
and complete build of prototype first- proved unsuccessful, he’d have to either already accepted.”
off parts and low- to medium-volume redesign the enclosure or go for more During that period, Pizzo had to orga-
production runs. Prototype parts are typi- expensive seals, which could push the nize an entire engineering department,
cally provided faster than conventionally project outside its cost estimate. and replace the document management
equipped prototype shops are able to In the past, Schneider would have to solution from the former owner’s prod-
offer—sometimes as much as 70% faster, design the enclosure and outsource it uct lifecycle management (PLM) system
according to the company. to a model shop. This could take several as quickly and seamlessly as possible.
In this instance, 3-Dimensional was weeks, and costs could go way over bud- “We knew we needed to purchase
asked to focus its various areas of get fast. If he had to redesign the enclo- some sort of product data manage-
expertise on a transfer case oil flow test- sure and go through the same process ment (PDM) system, due to the com-
ing system for a new axle design for cars again, things could get even worse. Then plexity of our product and the dynamic
and light trucks. Schneider had another idea. nature of our business,” says Pizzo.
MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabbfw.htm MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabbfy.htm MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabbfx.htm

➜ For the complete application stories visit deskeng.com/fastapps

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 43
Editor’s Picks by Anthony J. Lockwood

Each week, Tony Lockwood combs through dozens of new products to bring you the ones he thinks will
help you do your job better, smarter and faster. Here are Lockwood’s most recent musings about the
products that have really grabbed his attention.

Altair Engineering Acquires ACUSIM Software

Acquisition strengthens Altair’s position in CFD and multiphysics simulation.
Altair has quietly built itself up into a pow- analytics solutions, and a product devel-
erhouse engineering software, services, opment consulting division.
and technology development company. It Still, what Altair really did not offer was
offers everything from MCAD and indus- CFD technology that competed toe-to-toe
trial design in the form of its solidThink- with that offered by other top-level develop-
ing subsidiary to world-class CAE in its ers. With ACUSIM in its quiver, Altair can
HyperWorks platform. It has on-demand scratch that off the to-do list.
cloud computing technologies, business MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabaas.htm

AutoCAD Alternative for Mac OS X

Developer says iCADMac exports DWG files to Apple’s hand-held devices as well.
I was at a relative’s house and on a counter announcement of iCADMac from progeCAD
was a beautiful, big-screen iMac. The guy’s serves as another example of the rapid speed
self-employed, so I asked him if he used it for of your changing desktop.
working from home. “Naaa,” he lamented. iCADMac uses a native format that’s DWG-
“I love it, but the software I need for my busi- compatible, and it can handle 2D/3D DWG/
ness only runs on PCs.” Such has been the DXF files formats from AutoCAD version 2.5
complaint of many an engineering Mac maven through 2011.
for years now, but life changes. And the recent MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabacs.htm

Scanner a 3D Virtuoso with Macs and PCs

Non-contact laser scanner reportedly scans objects in most any light.
Have I mentioned lately that I think it’s — the desktop engineering community.
exciting that developers are embracing So, it was with great interest that I came
the Mac more with each passing day? to learn of the Mac- and PC-compatible
A lot of the “we do Mac and PCs” trend Virtuoso 3D scanner. You industrial
has to do with the Unix roots of Mac OS designers at the forefront of engineering
X, but it’s also a nod from the developers on the Mac will be especially interested
that the Mac has serious applicability in this portable unit.
in — and a growing presence throughout MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabaer.htm

Convert CAD Data into Interactive 3D PDFs

Tetra 4D’s 3D PDF Converter leverages Adobe Acrobat X Pro user interface and features.
When 3DF first hit the market, it was ing pizazz, and recently I came across news
greeted with much fanfare. But design of an intriguing CAD-optimized 3D PDF
and manufacturing engineers soon cooled application from a company I did not know
because it seemed difficult to create PDFs too much about. I think this will interest all
of CAD files with the flare to blow away of you tasked with documenting manufac-
clients or make your documents idiot proof turing data for clients, downstream users,
for downstream users. A cottage industry and even web marketing.
sprang up offering that sort of manufactur- MORE ➜ deskeng.com/articles/aabafz.htm

44 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Mobile Computing Commentary

The World as Your Workstation

By Bertrand Sicot

Sam, a sales engineer, lingers over lunch with a customer, looking at a effect a late-stage design change has on tooling, machine lay-
tablet computer displaying a 3D solid model of a product on which two out or production costs. And the product manager on the road
other engineers are working. The customer tells Sam that he is inter- cannot approve those changes without accessing the corporate
ested in the product, but he needs a variation on the original design. network or product lifecycle management (PLM) system.
Sam modifies the product to his specifications during lunch. He’s
also able to reassure the customer that the modification won’t affect The State of the Art
the product’s performance, that the parts to meet the customer’s re- New mobile computing paradigms make portable devices a
quirements are available, and that his company’s production line can gateway to a new collaborative model, where everyone con-
accommodate them without any inconvenience. With the knowledge nected to product development can access all of the latest
that his company can produce the customer’s variation without ex- data on a project. From calling up the most current design
traordinary costs, Sam sends the specifications to the product develop- iteration for a sales meeting to modifying the design in real
ment team—and signs a deal with the customer on the spot. time, emerging “cloud computing” infrastructures will elimi-

T
nate boundaries to fully mobile product design. Applications
he concept sounds simple: Put engineering data, are moving from the desktop to the Internet, making it pos-
knowledge and processing power where business oc- sible—in theory, at least—to design in 3D on any device with
curs, which could be on sales calls, the shop floor, or an Internet connection.
someplace on the road. But while business has been Over the next few years, purpose-built applications and
mobile for years now, product development has been teth- viewers will bring product designs to all of the platforms
ered to desktops since the computer-aided design era began. that your employees, partners, and customers use—including
Processing requirements and the cost of applications for de- desktops, mobile devices and browsers, with experiences ap-
signing, testing and manufacturing products meant that only propriate to the platform. New delivery models will provide
a fraction of product design could be performed in the field. on-demand access to software, processing capacity and data
The serious tasks—such as major modifications, simulations storage, ensuring that mobile designers and engineers always
and performance optimization—had to wait for engineers and have the right tools for the job, regardless of where they are.
designers to return to their desks, where they had access to The result will be increased creativity, greater productivity
and livelier, more interactive collaboration.
Engineers and product designers’ careers are built around
Engineering and product knocking down barriers through the design of new and im-
proved products—products that perform better and more ef-
design will happen ficiently, at lower production costs, and with minimal impact
everywhere you want to be. on the environment. Yet, they’ve had to accept limitations on
their creativity and collaboration because their primary tools
kept them in the office, even though much of what they do
wired networks and enough computing power to operate the occurs somewhere else.
full range of software they needed to complete their work. Desktop CAD software freed product design from high-
Being out in the field, on a shop floor or on a customer site powered workstations by putting essential design tools on
meant being cut off from the computing assets needed to per- everyday PCs. Mobile engineering goes the next step, put-
form every facet of your job. ting those tools where products go from design to reality. DE
The lack of processing power and application functionality
are obvious drawbacks to being away from the office, but they’re Bertrand Sicot is CEO of Concord, MA-based Dassault Sys-
not the only ones. Engineers and designers working with cus- tèmes SolidWorks Corp.
tomers or partners in the field are also largely cut off from one
another—or, more specifically, one another’s data. They can
communicate through email and cell phones, but they don’t INFO ➜ Dassault Systèmes
have direct access to all of the data for a given product. Design SolidWorks Corp.: SolidWorks.com
engineers onsite with a customer are unable to determine the For more information on this topic, visit deskeng.com

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 45

Tools of the Month New Products for Engineers

1 2 3

1 Collier Research
Releases HyperSizer v6
Collier Research Corporation
architects to customize their
work environments. Priced
at $699 for new custom-
Internet. Users can interface
up to 12 different wireless
connectors with one receiv-
mation Computers: the
UNO-2050G, UNO-2053GL,
and the UNO-2059GL.
(hypersizer.com) has an- ers and $499 for regis- er. Low power operation and The UNO-2050G has an
nounced the release of tered users of CorelDRAW sleep mode allows for long onboard AMD Geode LX800
HyperSizer v6 structural Graphics Suite X4 and Corel battery life. The CE-compli- 500MHz CPU with dual
sizing and analysis soft- DESIGNER Technical Suite ant UWRTD is compatible LAN and 8-channel isolated
ware designed for reducing X4 or higher, CorelCAD of- with the UWTC-REC family of digital input and 8-channel
weight, maintaining strength, fers small- to medium-sized wireless receivers, which can isolated digital output with
and improving the manufac- businesses and larger enter- accept signals from up to 48 timer and counter. The UNO-
turability of complex com- prises an affordable option wireless transmitters and 2053GL has an onboard
posite and metallic designs. for site-wide deployments, display them on a PC. Prices AMD Geode LX800 500MHz
HyperSizer integrates with according to the company. start at $135. CPU with dual LAN and two
FEA solvers in a continuous, 10/100Base-T RJ-45 ports
automated iterative loop, Canfield Connector Dassault Systèmes SIMU- and two USB 2.0 ports.
conducting trade studies Releases Reed and LIA Announces Isight 5.5 The UNO-2059GL has an
and examining millions of Electronic Sensors Dassault Systèmes SIMULIA onboard AMD Geode GX533
potential design candidates Canfield Connector’s (simulia.com) has an- LX800 500MHz CPU with
down to the ply and element (canfieldconnector.com) nounced the latest en- one 10/100Base-T RJ-45
level. The software helps Series 9Q is a magnetic hancements for modeling port and two USB 2.0 ports.
ensure structural integrity proximity switch specifically and simulation of integrated
through a suite of failure engineered to fit “T” slot ex- systems within Isight 5.5,
analysis predictions that
are validated to test data.
The tool also helps enhance
truded actuators. The 9Q’s
small size is applicable for
most space requirements,
an open desktop solution
for simulation process
automation and design
3 SolidCAM Launches
iMachining CAM
Software
manufacturability by mini- according to the company. optimization. Isight pro- SolidCAM (solidcam.com)
mizing ply drops, identifying Its design enables instal- vides designers, engineers, has launched its iMachining
and controlling laminate lation anywhere along the and researchers with an CAM software as part of its
transition drop/add bound- slot and assembly without open system for integrat- latest SolidCAM2011 release.
aries, and defining best ply removing the actuator ing design and simulation The company says iMachin-
shapes and patterns. end cap. The sensors are models—created with ing reduces cutting times by
offered as a flying lead or various CAD, CAE and other up to 70% by optimizing tool
Corel Releases CorelCAD 8mm quick connect. software applications—to engagement and cutting feed
Corel (corel.com) has automate the execution of through the entire tool-path.
expanded its graphics and hundreds or even thou- iMachining is driven by a
technical illustration port-
folio with the introduction
of CorelCAD, which delivers
2 Omega Releases RTD-
to-Wireless Connector/
Converter
sands of simulations.

Advantech Releases
Technology Wizard, which
considers the machine being
used, the material being cut
native DWG support, and Omega Engineering’s Embedded Automation and the entire geometry and
the ability to navigate be- (omega.com) new UWRTD Computers material of the cutting tool.
tween 2D and 3D environ- transmits process tempera- The Industrial Automa- This helps ensure the tool
ments. Optimized for the ture, ambient temperature, tion Group of Advantech load is constant, which in turn
Mac and Windows plat- signal strength and battery (advantech.com) has increases tool life and makes
forms, CorelCAD enables status in real time, wirelessly upgraded three of their it possible to machine with the
engineers, designers and to a user’s computer or the fanless Embedded Auto- full length of the cutter.

46 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

Altair’s PBS Professional
Added to Dell’s
4 5
HPC Portfolio
Altair Engineering Inc.
(altair.com) has announced
that PBS Professional, the
commercial-grade high-
performance computing
(HPC) workload manage-
ment solution and job
scheduler, is now available

5
directly through Dell’s (dell. communication software NX product lifecycle manage- EOS Debuts M 280
com) ordering system for its helps design teams over- ment (PLM) software. The
high-performance comput- Laser Sintering
come language and knowl- FloEFD for Siemens NX soft- System
ing customers. PBS Works edge barriers while reducing ware from Mentor Graphics EOS says its (eos.info) EO-
is a solution for optimizing costs and production time, works directly with native NX SINT M 280, a direct metal
workload scheduling and according to the company. geometry using Finite Volume laser sintering (DMLS)
management of complex The newest version of 3DVIA mathematical techniques, system, has process and
jobs in the HPC environment Composer, V6R2011x,
to help ensure that technolo- while supporting a range of control features that com-
transforms 3D CAD data into applications. The FloEFD for
gies are being used to their images or animated visual plete the evolution of DMLS
greatest efficiency. It enables Siemens NX product uses a systems into full-fledged
assets for use in product
organizations to maximize ef- hexahedral immersed bound- production tools for the
communication deliverables.
ficient use of their computing ary meshing approach that economical, batch-size,
resources and to initiate HPC Mentor Graphics the company says is for more optimized manufacture of
jobs rapidly, thereby improv- Announces FloEFD accurate and computationally parts at all stages—from
ing their overall productivity for Siemens NX efficient simulations com- prototyping through fin-
and return on investment. Mentor Graphics Corporation pared to tetrahedral and pris- ished product. It features
(mentor.com) has announced matic elements found in other either a 200- or a 400-watt

4 SolidWorks Releases
3DVIA Composer
V6R2011x
the new FloEFD for Siemens
NX (plm.automation.siemens.
com) product for concurrent
tools. As a result, the FloEFD
software can support a range
of physical simulation capabili-
solid-state laser, laser
power monitoring (LPM) to
control the build process,
Dassault Systèmes Solid- computational fluid dynamics ties: highly turbulent flow fields, and the ability to use either
Works’ (solidworks.com) (CFD) simulation, seamlessly compressible flows, combus- nitrogen or argon protective
3DVIA Composer technical integrated with the Siemens tion and cavity modelling. atmospheres. DE

Advertising Index /// Publisher does not assume any liability for index errors or omissions.

AMD ....................................................... CV3 Okino Computer Graphics, Inc. ................... 41

CD-adapco ................................................. 24 Omega Engineering, Inc. .............................. 1
COMSOL, Inc. ............................................ 5 OriginLab Corp. ......................................... 27
IMSI Design ............................................... 37 Protocast, Inc. ............................................ 37
Industrial Press .......................................... 37 PTC ....................................................... CV2
Intel .......................................................... 13 Rave Computer Association, Inc. ................. 25
Lenovo ....................................................... 29 Remcom ..................................................... 37
Luxology LLC ............................................ 33 Simulia ....................................................... 7
MapleSoft .................................................. 31 Solid Modeling Solutions ............................ 37
MFG.com ................................................... 35 Stratasys-Dimension 3D ........................... CV4
Micoway, Inc. ............................................. 37 Synergeering Group .................................... 37
National Instruments ................................... 3 Tormach LLC ............................................. 41

deskeng.com /// July 2011 DESKTOP ENGINEERING 47

Cool Tools Tebis Version 3.5 CAD/CAM System

3
1

4
Updated User Interface
1 The user interface provides more room by moving dialogs off the
work space. The work environment can be adapted based on indi-
vidual preferences. It also features easier handling of the libraries, more
transparency—thanks to hierarchically structured layers— and new anal-
ysis functions for component comparison, costing, and bore analysis.

Faster Speeds
2 According to the company, Tebis Version 3.5 offers a number
of speed advantages, such as when loading model files, graph-
ics performance, and in areas of NC programming. Roughing and
re-roughing in particular are up to three times faster for large com- FYI
ponents, according to Tebis. The job manager is also designed for
speed, helping to simplify the tasks of the NC programmers.
Tebis Version 3.5
Tebis software
5-axis Simultaneous Milling is developed
3 Tebis Version 3.5 allows users to control the tool direction with
plumb curves for the tool center, for example, in order to avoid
a potential collision. New analysis functions help find the optimal
by Tebis Tech-
nische Informa-
tionssysteme
tilt direction vectors between which the tool direction interpolates. AG of Germany.
Expanded options for axis clamping and new spiral-shaped stepover The company
in surface machining are also included. has its U.S. of-
fices in Troy, MI.
A number of
Surface and BREP Design modules are

4 New and expanded CAD functions of Tebis Verison 3.5 include

faster unlinking of topologies and more accurate silhouette
curves. It also features globally rounding of curves. Boundary repre-
available for
Tebis, including
modules for virtual CNC machin-
sentation (BREP) design is now integrated in the standard applica- ing, electrodes, and 2.5D milling
tion, with BREP models as standard elements. Kink edges are sup- and drilling.
ported throughout. In version 3.5, the job manager is
the central control element for all
machining steps.
➜ DO YOU HAVE A COOL TOOL? Desktop Engineering editors are always For more information,
on the hunt for great tools to share with our readers. Send us your ideas visit tebis.com.
at [email protected].

48 DESKTOP ENGINEERING July 2011 /// deskeng.com

 Give your Productivity a Boost

Problem: You’re being asked to do more in less time.

Solution: Get the workstation that can keep up.

Find your customized Dell Precision™ workstation with AMD FirePro™ Professional Graphics.

Spend more time designing and less time rendering as you:

> Multitask on up to three monitors at the same time with AMD Eyefinity technology.1
> Get end-to-end support2 through Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp
> Access optional 24/7 Dell ProSupport

Find the Dell Workstation solution that’s right for you at

www.dell.com/solidworks_amd Good.
ATI FirePro V4800

Better.
AMD FirePro V5900

Best.
AMD FirePro V7900

Dell Precision™ Workstation* Screenshot images courtesy of DS SolidWorks Corp.

1 AMD Eyefinity technology can support multiple displays using a single enabled AMD FirePro™ professional graphics card; the number of supported displays
varies by card model. Microsoft® Windows® 7, Windows Vista®, or Linux® is required in order to support more than 2 displays. Depending on the card model, native
DisplayPort™ connectors and/or certified DisplayPort™ active or passive adapters to convert your monitor’s native input to your card’s DisplayPort™
or Mini-DisplayPort™ connector(s) may be required. See www.amd.com/firepro for details.
2 Complimentary, end-to-end support provided through Dassault Systemes SolidWorks Corp.
©2011 Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. All rights reserved. AMD, the AMD Arrow logo, Radeon, and combinations thereof are trademarks of
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Other names are for informational purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners. 49428G
 N OW I T H I N K I N 3 D.
AND MY DESIGNS JUST KEEP GET TING BET TER.

With our Dimension ® 3D Printer, I know my model will represent my idea exactly.
And that makes it easier to improve my design with each iteration. Our Dimension
is right here in the office, and that helps us get our products to
market faster. The Dimension models we create are made in ABS,
S,
so they’re tough and durable. Leases start at only $275 a month, or you can
n
buy a printer for under $15,000, so they’re also really affordable. Overall,
all,
Dimension gives me an amazing sense of freedom—and creativity.

Find out more at dimensionprinting.com/de4

Prices applicable in the United States. Additional options, shipping, applicable taxes and/or duties not included. ©2011 Stratasys, Inc.