The supported capabilities without scripting, however, are enormously powerful. The tool will not serve well for users who need or already have large scripting applications for automating their design tasks. This is an important usability feature for users who need to automate key design tasks, such as making variations automatically given a starting or genus mechanical design. However, VariCAD does not have a user-accessible scripting language. This all seems appropriate for a tool in the 2-D/3-D field. The language makes a lot of sense, and screen real estate for icons is well suited for providing control over a strongly visual environment. Going through this really aids in understanding how the iconic language works. VariCAD supports a nice on-line tutorial to help you familiarize yourself with the menu flow for icons and available features. However, due to the numerous GUI icons, there is a learning curve to get up to speed on the iconic language within the tool. The 3-D interface is responsive on my test system, a KDS Valiant 6480CiPTD laptop with an 800MHz Intel PIII, 512MB of RAM and a Trident CyberBLADE Ai1 video chipset. High-performance graphics are vital to a mechanical CAD tool, where a designer's time cannot be wasted on slow screen redraws for changes in views. VariCAD is a fast GUI tool based on OpenGL. The tool capabilities include 3-D modeling and 2-D drafting, support for metadata, such as title blocks, and linking libraries of machine parts to designs. In fact, if you have a design team, discount pricing is also available. VariCAD supports binaries for Red Hat, Mandrake and SuSE Linux distributions, as well as for Microsoft Windows.ĭespite the low price (less than $400), VariCAD is a serious, high-end 2-D and 3-D CAD tool for mechanical engineering design and competes favorably with tools costing substantially more. The product reviewed here was VariCAD 8.2-02, which was tested on a Red Hat Linux 7.3 system. They are a friendly company, willing to interact with you to solve a problem or glean feedback about their tool. Their software has been continuously improved under industrial use for 14 years and has users in 40 countries around the world. VariCAD is well known as one of Central Europe's strongest players for CAD tools for mechanical engineering.
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