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jbskaggs  
#1 Posted : Saturday, September 17, 2016 10:24:40 AM(UTC)
jbskaggs

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I run a furniture shop. Most of my stuff is non standard. Even my cabinetry is non standard. Years ago in 2002 I used Broderbund and Punch software to design and build my house and my restauraunt back then (I sold the restaurant then went into woodworking)

SO I have a fond memory of those namebrands.

But in my woodshop I have used Google Sketchup for years. It is expensive for pro ($300 a year). But it was fast for modeling, but terrible at shop drawings. So I started my search for which cad program would best serve my shop. I did not look at price when testing the programs- but rather the ability of a woodworker to produce drawings. Here is the list I tried:

Autocad Lite
Autocad 123
Doodle
Sketchup pro
Turbocad
Iron Cad
SolidWorks
Viacad
Freecad
Openscad
Designcad
Blender
Master Art
VisualCadCam
CabinetWorks

And others on here not listed.

Overall regardless of price, I found I can use Viacad (though I am very much a rough beginner) to 3d model and produce shop plans and a bill of material faster than any other software on my list.

I have a great deal to learn about VIacad so I quit making screwups and can increase my efficiency (for now that means not messing up my object names and mastering 3d to sheet functions)

A few months back I downloaded the trial ver of pro used it for a month, then went and tried all these others until their trials ran out. Some were exceedingly powerful and were really not geared towards what I do in my shop.

So for custom woodshop I suggest seriously considering buying this ViaCad software.
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