No rush for Vista in the engineering CAD market

He reminds us that 3D CAD software is the victim of Microsoft’s earlier decision to drop the all-important standard OpenGL graphics library, which developers rely on for real-time graphics rendering – preferring its own Direct3D system. “Because most CAD software uses OpenGL, the software runs like molasses in Vista,” says Grabowski. “SolidWorks has the only Vista-approved CAD program to-date [and] even they are flummoxed by the slowdown,” he continues. “The CTO told me they are still working on pinpointing the reasons.” In fact, Grabowski suggests that OpenGL is not the only problem: Vista’s new file system management and security also consumes resources. “As vendors delve into the new OS’s innards, we’ll learn more details. The troubles remind of the transition from DOS to Windows all over again,” he says. He also suggests that Vista patches won’t be ready for CAD users until summer or autumn of this year – and probably the same for the hardware drivers. But he concludes that the CAD vendors’ relatively untroubled silence on Vista is that demand, at least for now, is limited. Just so. Few manufacturers will want the cost and effort of software migration, hardware implications, training and the rest until there is clear competitive business justification.