[pbd1971]

Hi to you all, just want to get a bit of a comparison between MC and EC. What areas of manufacturing are they aimed at, how user friendly are they and of course, is there a difference in costs between the 2.

Will ask this same question on the EC Section.

Thanks

[foxsquirrel]

We changed from mastercam X3 to Solidcam 2010 and it is been a blessing for us. Our programming time and R&D time has been cut so much we now wait for the machine time instead of the machine waiting for the program. Best thing we have done in the last couple of years has been to dump MasterCam. I recall a demo of edge cam and did not like the toolpath generation, that is one good thing I can say about mastercam, when it does work with out the frustration of bugs it makes very good toolpaths. A good rule of thumb is to stay away from any package that generates sharp direction changes during high speed 3D toolpaths.

The only people I will recommend Mastercam to will be our competitors.....

[harley4ever]

Pretty harsh criticism on Mastercam, eh?

[beekeeper]

IMHO Its usually the guy driving mastercam that is the problem not the software.

[foxsquirrel]

Pretty harsh criticism on Mastercam, eh?

If its so good why don't you buy our X3 dongle for what we paid for it. Heck, I'd even take half if MC would permit the license to be transfered.

I have yet to find any one on this forum what is willing to step up to the plate and purchase our dongle, fact is many on here (not pointing my finger at you) are using educational or hacked versions. When you get software that is priced at over $20,000 for nothing or $100 for the key from China, how can you complain.

We even upgraded to Win 7 64 and it still does not select (highlight) geometry correctly, you click and have to roll the mouse and hope you can see what you grabbed, then sometimes just restart the program and it works for a while then stops. It was originally on XP 32 and several years later and a new OS and the problem is still present.

[foxsquirrel]

IMHO Its usually the guy driving mastercam that is the problem not the software.

That is pretty common response from the MC cheerleaders, fact is since we switched to Solidcam I have only called tech support TWICE and it was a stupid mistakes on my part. You better come up with a better one than that, the other cheerleaders on here had worn that one out several years ago.

[beekeeper]

If its so good why don't you buy our X3 dongle for what we paid for it. Heck, I'd even take half if MC would permit the license to be transfered.

I have yet to find any one on this forum what is willing to step up to the plate and purchase our dongle, fact is many on here (not pointing my finger at you) are using educational or hacked versions. When you get software that is priced at over $20,000 for nothing or $100 for the key from China, how can you complain.

We even upgraded to Win 7 64 and it still does not select (highlight) geometry correctly, you click and have to roll the mouse and hope you can see what you grabbed, then sometimes just restart the program and it works for a while then stops. It was originally on XP 32 and several years later and a new OS and the problem is still present.

First of all the dongle is non transferable. I gave $15,000 for a legal seat of mastercam. but you are correct there are a lot of people using hacked or educational mastercam. I will admit mastercam is not the best software for modeling. But if you know how to drive it it is one of the best cam tools on the market

[foxsquirrel]

MC does have very good toolpath generation, but it does not understand the concept of taking care of the customer. The last issue that pushed me over the edge to change was it was obsolete in less than a year. We could not directly import Solidworks 2010 files, I had to play around with this and that and was not happy with the imports.

MC is fine if you like to play around all day and tweak this and adjust that and play find the check box that is several layers deep, myself all I want is a toolpath NOW and without alot of playing around with options that are "cool" but when it comes down to it they are only applicable to extreme volume parts that do require every second counts methodology. Shops that are running the same part 24/7/365 would see a savings but those "cool" features become a major liability for the "new norm" production run, one weekers, one day, and R&D.

[beekeeper]

I use mastercam in my shop. Most my work is one off parts. I dont have much trouble with tool paths. But I have been doing it awhile. It did take a bit to get used to the transition from 9 to x. In order to stay current with the latest updates to mastercam you got to buy the maintance and suport package yearly. I think when it comes to cad/cam everyone has there opinion on which one is better. Usually you will find its the one they first became familiar with to there liking. I started programming using G-zero which is a good easy cam software but somewhat limited on 3-d programming.

[John_B]

Wow, there’s alot of acrimony on this forum!

I think I agree with both sides of the conversation in some ways. Yes Mastercam lacks in out-of-the-box-get-to-making-parts functionality, but when you learn even a modicum of its features well and customize it (which is where Mastercam excels – customizing it to your specific needs) then it can be very powerful. The customer service aspect is a local or regional issue I think, my local office of MLC Cadd systems is very helpful - even now that I don’t have current maintenance on my full version of X5.

A lot of people have big time heartburn over the inability to transfer a license, but this was disclosed at the time of sale (it IS in the literature that is supposed to be read). I don’t think it is the best business practice either, but that’s CNC Software way of doing things. I think they would have a larger user base if they did allow transfers for a small fee.

I was a long time Smartcam user, went over to Gibbs and Catia, now on Mastercam. They all have their niche in my experience. I really liked Smartcam for modeling and lathe work (Mastercam still lacks at lathe work). Gibbs I really liked for advanced multi-tasking machining - turn-mill machining is much easier with Gibbs.

I don’t know about Edgecam, but I do know several people that have great things to say about Planit software’s other products.

[TheBigJW]

Wow, there’s alot of acrimony on this forum!

I think I agree with both sides of the conversation in some ways. Yes Mastercam lacks in out-of-the-box-get-to-making-parts functionality, but when you learn even a modicum of its features well and customize it (which is where Mastercam excels – customizing it to your specific needs) then it can be very powerful. The customer service aspect is a local or regional issue I think, my local office of MLC Cadd systems is very helpful - even now that I don’t have current maintenance on my full version of X5.

A lot of people have big time heartburn over the inability to transfer a license, but this was disclosed at the time of sale (it IS in the literature that is supposed to be read). I don’t think it is the best business practice either, but that’s CNC Software way of doing things. I think they would have a larger user base if they did allow transfers for a small fee.

I was a long time Smartcam user, went over to Gibbs and Catia, now on Mastercam. They all have their niche in my experience. I really liked Smartcam for modeling and lathe work (Mastercam still lacks at lathe work). Gibbs I really liked for advanced multi-tasking machining - turn-mill machining is much easier with Gibbs.

I don’t know about Edgecam, but I do know several people that have great things to say about Planit software’s other products.

Start a LLC and have that corporation purchase your cam software. Then you can just sell all the shares of the company. Now you can transfer cam software.

John

[Delw]

I was a long time Smartcam user, went over to Gibbs and Catia, now on Mastercam. They all have their niche in my experience. I really liked Smartcam for modeling and lathe work (Mastercam still lacks at lathe work). Gibbs I really liked for advanced multi-tasking machining - turn-mill machining is much easier with Gibbs.

I don’t know about Edgecam, but I do know several people that have great things to say about Planit software’s other products.

John
I agree about the niche market.

I tried Mastercam and still play with it from time to time, while is has some great features its not that great. Smartcam on the other hand is Fantastic as you can control each line of code thats generated(tool path) not to mention the code generators are far much easier to work with.
we had a demo for edgecam last year. it crashed one of the office PCS they havent been back since, Thats my bad as I havent called them back, from what I hear EdgeCam can do everything Smartcam can do.

I am stil on the fence on what cad cam system to buy. this is one reason why I read this and the other forums everyday. I am in no hurry and $500 in books from mastercam(inhouse) so far not to mention countless hours I still havent gotten it right.

The nice thing about mastercam is the amount of how too books avail. Smartcan edgecam and surfcam dont have that.
theres nice features on all of the softwares, but unless have 100% control of my tool paths as far as editing atool path line or too, it doesnt serve my purpose.
one of my customers lets me use his PC from time to time on surfacing jobs for him, he has mx3. I preferr to use smartcam advanced milling, on lots of his jobs I use mastercam only to see a surface then do the real work in smarcam as I can maipulte the tool pathes for fixtures and stuff.

so I have played with a full version mx3 for about 8 months off and on and the demos for the last 2 years, not to mention the $500+ in books

Delw

[foxsquirrel]

John
I agree about the niche market.

I tried Mastercam and still play with it from time to time, while is has some great features its not that great. Smartcam on the other hand is Fantastic as you can control each line of code thats generated(tool path) not to mention the code generators are far much easier to work with.
we had a demo for edgecam last year. it crashed one of the office PCS they havent been back since, Thats my bad as I havent called them back, from what I hear EdgeCam can do everything Smartcam can do.

I am stil on the fence on what cad cam system to buy. this is one reason why I read this and the other forums everyday. I am in no hurry and $500 in books from mastercam(inhouse) so far not to mention countless hours I still havent gotten it right.

The nice thing about mastercam is the amount of how too books avail. Smartcan edgecam and surfcam dont have that.
theres nice features on all of the softwares, but unless have 100% control of my tool paths as far as editing atool path line or too, it doesnt serve my purpose.
one of my customers lets me use his PC from time to time on surfacing jobs for him, he has mx3. I preferr to use smartcam advanced milling, on lots of his jobs I use mastercam only to see a surface then do the real work in smarcam as I can maipulte the tool pathes for fixtures and stuff.

so I have played with a full version mx3 for about 8 months off and on and the demos for the last 2 years, not to mention the $500+ in books

Delw

Regarding SolidCam, my company purchased our seat and we are not affiliated with them other than a service agreement for their product that we pay for.

I hit the deck running with Solidcam, a quick tutorial and I am been on my own ever since. They did create a special post for our Haas that uses G154 P series fixture offsets and its great. Their post editor looks simple, I have not had to use it thanks to their dedicated Rep.

Our local MasterCam rep never did get our posts correct nor did his tech have the smarts or ambition to get it correct and that is why we dropped their service agreement. Not happy, why continue to pay, in a years time I broke more tools and spent more time fiddling with MasterCam than what the service agreement costs per year. I have only had to call SC tech support twice and both times it was my fault!

With SolidCam I don't feel we need a service agreement because its not quirky like MasterBug releases. We continue with our service agreement because we are VERY satisfied with the product and would like to see them in business for a long time.

If we could have sold MC and got part of my investment back you would not be reading this, everytime I see the $20,000 dongle my blood pressure goes off the chart because I could have bought 1/3 of a new VF-1 for what I waisted on software that does not work for us.

[John_B]

Start a LLC and have that corporation purchase your cam software. Then you can just sell all the shares of the company. Now you can transfer cam software.

John

I've seen you mention this before. It's actually not a bad idea if you structure it right so that it isn't more effort keeping up with all the legalities - I guess it would have to be a holding company. I'm not really familiar with those type of corporate entities and how to go about that. Shouldn't be too big a deal though....

[foxsquirrel]

I've seen you mention this before. It's actually not a bad idea if you structure it right so that it isn't more effort keeping up with all the legalities - I guess it would have to be a holding company. I'm not really familiar with those type of corporate entities and how to go about that. Shouldn't be too big a deal though....

That statement reinforced what I have though about many times over the last several years. If I would have stuided financial engineering instead of electrical engineering I would be rich.

[John_B]

Heard that, oh well hind sight being 20/20 and all...

pbd, whatever choice you make think ahead regarding the license aspect!

[postguy]

Compare GibbsCAM, EdgeCAM, MasterCAM and PowerMILL

Voting result (12 FEB. 2013) :

1, GibbsCAM: 36.36%
2, EdgeCAM: 29.55%
3, MasterCAM: 18.18%
4, PowerMILL: 6.82%
5, Other: 9.09%