[dpryor]

So how many people upgraded from Cadkey19 to KeyCreator?

[moldcore]

I don’t know the number of how many that have upgraded, but many have moved on to SolidWorks and Solid Edge. I talked to a dealer the other day and he said they are seeing a lot of interest in the program again and they continue to sell to new customers.

I upgraded to KeyCreator a couple of years ago and like it much, much better than CK19. Even with some minor features from Draft Pak and FastSurf missing, it’s well worth the upgrade. I dropped the AUC after 3.02 but will take advantage of their recent offer and upgrade to the current version next month when the budget allows even though we have Solid Edge now. I’ve been using Cadkey and KeyCreator since the 1980’s and find it the easiest to use of the CAD software we have here. Even the free SolidWorks 2005 we got with Surfcam last year was abandon after trying to learn because of time. Solid Edge is a great program but just can’t handle imported geometry like KeyCreator can. If you go to Kubotek’s web site and view the videos on KeyCreator capabilities you will be impressed. I keep CK19 on my computer for running some old CDEs and viewing old files and to be honest, I hate it. Simple things like the selection of entities make CK19 act like a dinosaur.

If you’re not in the mood to learn another software, then upgrade, it’s worth it.

[pstephens]

Been using Cadkey since DOS version 3.5, or thereabouts. Stayed pretty much with 2D until KeyCreator came out. Then we made the jump to solids. Still using KC 3.0.0, and really like the modeling end of it, but the layout side seems full of bugs. Now in the process of deciding whether upgrading to 5.2 will address these issues.

Have a good customer who highly recommends Solid Edge (as in, maybe we would get more of their business if we were using it). Am trying it out now. It's slick, but not sure it's enough of an improvement over KC 5.2 to warrant the additional $4k+ investment, and learning curve. I prefer the solids modeling in KeyCreator, even though (because?) it's not parametric. I should mention that most all of our design work is machinery, so we don't use the more advanced modeling features too much, as you might with product design.

As an aside, we keep an old steam-powered Windows 95 computer on hand, running Cadkey6 in DOS. I've found nothing faster for creating simple 2D geometry. I think this was the last DOS version of Cadkey, and it benefits greatly from being able to write directly to the screen, rather than having to work thru the Windows GUI. You really notice the difference with entity selection -- it's instantaneous, versus the slight delay every time you make a selection in the Windows version. I've got twenty, or so, keyboard macros set up (much more powerful and flexible than under Windows) that allow super-rapid geometry creation. Sometimes, it's quicker for me to draw up 2D geometry in CK6 and import it into KeyCreator to extrude a solid, or whatever.

Anyway, apart from the Layout Mode issues, I'm really impressed with KeyCreator so far. I think this was the shot-in-the-arm that Cadkey needed to bring it into the modern age.