Hi Burr,

> I'll be designing actual parts and things like assemblies,
> but i wont be designing buildings. Interoperabilty is a key factor.

Well there's a key word that points to Solidworks, "assemblies".

This is where Solidworks has it's strengths over Rhino, for example in Solidworks when you do an assembly you have the parts 'mated' and these mated faces are remembered by the software so if you move a face in one part say by making it slightly thicker, the mated part would automatically adjust to it, or if you have a shaft diameter linked to a hole diameter in another part, when you change the hole diameter the shaft will adjust accordingly, this is what parametrically linked is.
But Solidworks is mainly a solid modeler the surface toolset is not as rich as Rhino's, like it would be more difficult to achieve more organic shapes in Solidworks than it would in Rhino or MoI.

So you have to weigh up the strengths and weaknesses of each software with what you want to use it for.

Hope this helps.

Thanks Danny,
Seems they are just 2 different animals. May start with Rhino and later move to the parametric stuff. It's feature rich and I should learn most design concepts from there, and then expand out later.

MoI is allowing me to build some fundamentals to take to the next level as a base.

Burr

BTW: Can Parametric be NURBS? What is solidworks?

Hi Burr,

> BTW: Can Parametric be NURBS?

Yes - the standard type of parametric software generates NURBS objects. The objects themselves are NURBS using the same type of geometry that MoI use.

The stuff that makes it "parametric" is the workflow, the UI, and all the other history mechanisms and editing tools which are all extra things than just the NURBS surface geometry.


> What is solidworks?

It's a parametric history-based solid modeler.

- Michael

Hi Burr & All....

Basically I come from solidworks. I have been use solidworks for 3 years. Its a powerful solid & surface modeling also. The big different is solidworks have a parametric concept like Michael mentioned before. As I know solidworks is the easiest parametric modeling software.

But today my favourite software is MoI ( because the easy to use workflow & of course MoI is very affordable ).
You can open MoI file directly use solidworks. So it will give you a good combination.

You can find some solidworks video here : http://www.solidworks.com/pages/products/swofficepro/SWOfficePremium_VidVau_fore.html
Also check this link : http://download.rhino3d.com/download.asp?id=rhino-solidworks

OK, that is my opinion ;)

Thanks guy's. I think I would utilize both. The training I will start with Rhino for a bas then move to solidworks to add to the toolset.

Thanks again.
Burr