SOLIDWORKS 2020 crashing problem.

ChipSplitter · Feb 27, 2020

Is anyone else having an issue with SW crashing while editing a drawing, assembly, or anything with a lot of external references? We are using 2020 SP1. Right now it crashes about 2-3 times a week. Is there a way to get around it or a more stable version?

Shawnrs · Feb 27, 2020

ChipSplitter said:
Is anyone else having an issue with SW crashing while editing a drawing, assembly, or anything with a lot of external references? We are using 2020 SP1. Right now it crashes about 2-3 times a week. Is there a way to get around it or a more stable version?

I am running 2019 sp4 and I usually get a warning message before most of my crashes usually telling me I am running out of resources.

ChipSplitter · Feb 27, 2020

It used to give a warning but now it just abruptly aborts.

BugRobotics · Feb 27, 2020

ChipSplitter said:
Is anyone else having an issue with SW crashing while editing a drawing, assembly, or anything with a lot of external references? We are using 2020 SP1. Right now it crashes about 2-3 times a week. Is there a way to get around it or a more stable version?

SolidWorks and its ability to run well on a system depends a lot on the hardware/drivers. It's sad that SolidWorks won't publish known good configurations, but through various computer builds I've narrowed it down to graphic cards being the most problematic. I've noticed crashes much more frequently on computer builds with AMD graphics cards. I only run Nvidia cards now.

What hardware are you using?

ChipSplitter · Feb 27, 2020

I am using a Dell Precison 3420 with 48 GB of RAM and a dedicated graphics card (not sure which model).

Fal Grunt · Feb 27, 2020

ChipSplitter;3498051 48 GB of RAM [/QUOTE said:
Jesus, maybe i shouldn't get solid works!

ChipSplitter · Feb 27, 2020

And I used to use 8 GB.........

48 GB works well until you get into large assemblies (north of 500 components).
2020 SP1 has worked well for us, it's just the crashing thing gets on my nerves.

coyoinu · Feb 27, 2020

years ago i worked for a SW reseller. my job was to demonstrate the CAM portion.

there was a crowd of about 100 ppl, including the CEO of my company.

as live demos go sometime, as soon as i loaded my part, i got the spinning wheel of death, locking up my computer hard.

someone yells from the back "I've never seen solidworks do THAT before!"

crowd laughs.

BugRobotics · Feb 27, 2020

ChipSplitter said:
I am using a Dell Precison 3420 with 48 GB of RAM and a dedicated graphics card (not sure which model).

If your dedicated graphics card is an AMD firepro or any of the other AMD workstation variants, in my experience, you'd be miles ahead to move to the Nvidia workstation platform such as the Quadro P2000.

memphisjed · Feb 27, 2020

or update your firepro driver to the solidworks driver from amd. My cad uses same drivers. Stability and speed increase dramatically. My old firepro with 2gb card 4gb system runs circles around my work computers new-ish nuclear powered Quadro with 32 gb system 8 gb card. Autocad is just the opposite, if I open it before 3 or after 5 or if the wind is coming from the south it crashes on my old computer; On the new work computer it doesn't even know it is running.
AMD gives drivers tuned to your specific program if you are running the pro grade cards. Solidworks is an option already available for download.

ChipSplitter · Feb 28, 2020

memphisjed said:
or update your firepro driver to the solidworks driver from amd. My cad uses same drivers. Stability and speed increase dramatically. My old firepro with 2gb card 4gb system runs circles around my work computers new-ish nuclear powered Quadro with 32 gb system 8 gb card. Autocad is just the opposite, if I open it before 3 or after 5 or if the wind is coming from the south it crashes on my old computer; On the new work computer it doesn't even know it is running.
AMD gives drivers tuned to your specific program if you are running the pro grade cards. Solidworks is an option already available for download.

Interesting........
I just checked and I have a 2gb Radeon card.

Rewt · Feb 28, 2020

Just a method of good practice, never switch to a new version of SW till they have SP2 out for it. I'm in charge of upgrading at my plant and after 2015SP1 I swore I'd wait for any 20XXSP2 before I upgraded.

BugRobotics · Feb 28, 2020

memphisjed said:
or update your firepro driver to the solidworks driver from amd. My cad uses same drivers. Stability and speed increase dramatically. My old firepro with 2gb card 4gb system runs circles around my work computers new-ish nuclear powered Quadro with 32 gb system 8 gb card. Autocad is just the opposite, if I open it before 3 or after 5 or if the wind is coming from the south it crashes on my old computer; On the new work computer it doesn't even know it is running.
AMD gives drivers tuned to your specific program if you are running the pro grade cards. Solidworks is an option already available for download.

Hi memphisjed, are you saying that the driver you are using with your Firepro was downloaded from the AMD website and not the SolidWorks driver website? I've never seen a Solidworks specific driver from AMD but will certainly give it a try if you could point me in the right direction. I have an old computer build that uses a Firepro and the stability has always been disappointing.

ChipSplitter · Feb 28, 2020

BugRobotics said:
Hi memphisjed, are you saying that the driver you are using with your Firepro was downloaded from the AMD website and not the SolidWorks driver website? I've never seen a Solidworks specific driver from AMD but will certainly give it a try if you could point me in the right direction. I have an old computer build that uses a Firepro and the stability has always been disappointing.

I'm interested too. Is it a customized one or just one recomended for SW?

memphisjed · Feb 28, 2020

ChipSplitter said:
I'm interested too. Is it a customized one or just one recomended for SW?

I do not see the driver list page, granted not really scouring. I was directed to it by calling them. Mine is a catia/sw tuned driver. I use Shark almost exclusively now on my computers, and the same driver makes it stable and snappy, unless there is text in the drawing or model on exposed layer.
https://www.amd.com/en/support/contact-call

nordlichtFanuc · Mar 1, 2020

Rewt said:
Just a method of good practice, never switch to a new version of SW till they have SP2 out for it. I'm in charge of upgrading at my plant and after 2015SP1 I swore I'd wait for any 20XXSP2 before I upgraded.

I absolutely agree with you.
We are doing the same.. Even our VAR recommends (off record of course

) waiting for SP2..

Pete Deal · Mar 5, 2020

Fal Grunt said:
maybe i shouldn't get solid works!

You definitely should buy a computer for the job. I am running 32gb and it is very satisfactory. Really a decent pc for the job is not all that expensive. I think I paid $1500 for mine. Same thing is cheaper now.

gregormarwick · Mar 6, 2020

BugRobotics said:
If your dedicated graphics card is an AMD firepro or any of the other AMD workstation variants, in my experience, you'd be miles ahead to move to the Nvidia workstation platform such as the Quadro P2000.

Don't wish to start an argument, but this has not been my experience at all.

I have and use both Radeon Pro / FirePro and Quadro cards, and Solidworks crashes with no discernible difference in frequency on both of them.

Solidworks needs to be restarted fairly frequently. There is one particular very long standing problem with not deallocating Windows GDI objects, which have a hard limit of instances per-process, and system-wide. The Solidworks Resource Monitor that lives in the taskbar will sometimes warn you when it's approaching 10k GDI objects, but is more often than not entirely complacent about that.

If you open and close a lot of documents and rarely restart the program, SW will eventually get up to the limit and then crash.

BugRobotics · Mar 6, 2020

gregormarwick said:
Don't wish to start an argument, but this has not been my experience at all.

I have and use both Radeon Pro / FirePro and Quadro cards, and Solidworks crashes with no discernible difference in frequency on both of them.

Solidworks needs to be restarted fairly frequently. There is one particular very long standing problem with not deallocating Windows GDI objects, which have a hard limit of instances per-process, and system-wide. The Solidworks Resource Monitor that lives in the taskbar will sometimes warn you when it's approaching 10k GDI objects, but is more often than not entirely complacent about that.

If you open and close a lot of documents and rarely restart the program, SW will eventually get up to the limit and then crash.

You won't get an argument from me. It would be interesting to find out if the way we used SolidWorks was the difference.

I had quite a few crashes with rendering and placing custom cameras/lights with a Firepro card. When I logged these types of problems to my VAR they told me me there were some previously reported issues around that workflow and Firepro cards.

I use a late 2013 Macbook in my shop, dual booted into Windows, that has a Radeon card and has never had the same crashing issues as the two other computers I've had with "supported" Firepro cards.

gregormarwick · Mar 6, 2020

BugRobotics said:
You won't get an argument from me. It would be interesting to find out if the way we used SolidWorks was the difference.

I had quite a few crashes with rendering and placing custom cameras/lights with a Firepro card. When I logged these types of problems to my VAR they told me me there were some previously reported issues around that workflow and Firepro cards.

I use a late 2013 Macbook in my shop, dual booted into Windows, that has a Radeon card and has never had the same crashing issues as the two other computers I've had with "supported" Firepro cards.

I haven't done a lot of rendering/scene editing in SW, but when I have I don't recall having any issues. Probably just haven't done it enough to encounter them.

The GDI object overflow issue that I mentioned in my previous post has been a huge source of aggravation though, and that one is entirely gpu agnostic...

I have two workstations with SW right now, both are identical apart from one has a Quadro P2000 and the other a Radeon Pro WX5100. The reason being they are running other software besides SW which have very specific GPU requirements (not actual GPU requirements I might add, but support politics "requirements").

They both run SW just fine with no noticeable differences in function or performance, just as long as a single SW session doesn't span more than a day or two, or too many individual parts.

SOLIDWORKS 2020 crashing problem.

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