Basically, I have a Makerbot Replicator 2 3D printer, and I have been experimenting and testing different 3D modelling packages trying to find one that I like that is reliable, simple to use and can produce good prints.. So far one of the packages I really liked to use is 123D Design by AutoDesk. I looked at it first because I have had to use AutoCAD in the past and I know it was the defacto standard drawing package for many years. The problem was, I could run the web version on my home desktop PC but not the installed version. I could run the installed version on my laptops etc which were slightly more up to date. My home desktop PC is a Dell XPS430 purchased from Best Buy back sometime in about 2008/9, it has a quad cores cpu, 6GB RAM 2TB (my upgrades) hard disk and was running an ATI Radeon HD 3650 graphics card. When I would try to run the 123D Design installed, the application would appear to load, start drawing the normal application desktop and then just before it looked like it had finished loading, it would bomb out back to the desktop without a trace of a warning or error report. So I thought what could be wrong with the system, several software things were attempted and tried including:
a) Checking and re-installing updated graphics drivers.
b) Re-installing Oracle Java
c) Cursing and swearing at AutoDesk web support forums lack of information
d) Googling every connotation of possible software problem regarding AutoDesk 123D Design I could think of.
e) Of course I tried, turning it off and back on again!
So, after performing a) I did find an updated driver and installed it OK, but this introduced a problem that it reverted my screen from 1920x1200 to 1920x1080! After a bit more cursing and swearing and thinking WTF it turns out that the more up-to-date drivers actually require the graphics card to obtain the EDID information from the DVI monitor it is connected to now. Since my monitor was connected to a IOGEAR KVM that used VGA connections, it could not, of course, obtain the EDID and Windows 7 did made its mind up to set a max resolution of 1920x1080 even if I manually configured the default monitor to the type that I have. I could not find a way round this and my options are as follows, if I still want to use the KVM switch (which I do):
- disconnect the video from the switch and connect the VGA directly to the monitor, this means I need to switch the display separately between computers and still use the keyboard hot-keys to switch between computers for the keyboard and mouse
- buy a DVI KVM
For now I am using the first option and have orders an IOGEAR DVI 2port USB KVM :)
After all this effort, AutoDesk 123D Design installed version would not work! :(
b,c,d & e of course did nothing either!
Next, up, I had wanted to upgrade to 8GB RAM (the max the motherboard would allow) for along time, now I had the justification :) I doubted this could be the actual issue but I usually need to try these things to to prove the hypothesis..
One of the things I had read somewhere during my google hunt for the solution was that Java apps can be very sensitive to which version of Java they are running, especially graphics applications, this made me wonder if my graphics card and driver were so old that it did not contain the support necessary to run the application. And here comes one of my Java peeves, if any coding or hardware issue is not handled correctly by the application , it will usually just bomb out, this is what appeared to be happening!! So, now I had justified upgrading my video card also...
Since the PC is 4-5 years old I did not want to fork out in excess of $400 for a graphics card for this PC, and since I am not a hardcore PC gamer anymore, so I opted for a quick, cheap and simple solution, I purchased a XFX 6670 graphics card from Best Buy. So last week, one evening after getting home from work I thought I would have an easy evening and replace the RAM and graphics card on my PC.... 6 hours later I was sat on the floor in my home office/work room with my PC in bits cursing and swearing as to WTH was happening..
Replacing the RAM was no problem, everything was hunky dory!!
Replacing the graphics card.. a very different story...
With the new graphics card installed, upon powering the system up nada, nothing .. not even a BIOS boot beep or message!! (Note: All this of course was before I had discovered the DVI issue...) Putting the old graphics card back in, everything worked fine.. So what could be wrong here.. now first thing any PC geek will say after telling you to turn it off and back on again will be to upgrade your power supply, I did not think that the 375W power supply was being overloaded, but I wanted to fix this so I went and purchased a new 500W power supply (only to remember the following day that I had 2 unused perfectly OK PC power supplies sat in my cupboard gathering dust). So after the revelation regarding the old power supplies I installed one of the old ones into the Dell XPS430, after much rewiring and tidying of cables I finally flipped the PC power switch expecting the graphics card to magically burst into life, and again nada, nothing except for the motherboard LED was on and the power supply fan was spinning along with the graphics card fan.. still no display through the VGA.. By now it was around 2am and I decided to give up for the evening and as I would also probably rather sleep at the office the following day. The following evening, I returned to my task, still somewhat stumped, I thought I would retry everything I had previously attempted just to see if by some magic it would work this time but to no avail.. After some deliberating, I needed to take a break so I went into my lounge and sat and watched the Italian Formula 1 Grand Prix at Monza. In front of me on the floor is one of my Raspberry Pi's I have been playing with connected to a Brookstone 1080p HDMI pico projector, since I did not have a long enough HDMI lead to connect it my tv ... It made me wonder if I would get anything on the HDMI port on the new graphics card, so after the Grand Prix I tried it! Hallelujah! Houston we have a display!! So, since the VGA KVM does not support EDID information, the graphics card was defaulting to HDMI.. After further buggering around with it and connecting the DVI between the graphics card and monitor I was back up and somewhat running again..
So, after tidying up all the cables, screwing my pc back up again, applying plasters to all the cuts on my fingers caused by the sharp edges on the PC case, last night I was up and running again..
By now, I had actually forgotten what the original goal of all this was and just wanted my PC back working.. just before packing in the the evening last night I remembered and gave AutoDesk 123D Design on my desktop another try, and to my pleasure it worked first time. So here this if you cant get a graphics Java application to run on your PC, upgrade your graphics card!! :)
Note: I doubt I actually needed to upgrade the PC power supply, but it did no hard, I will probably return the extra power supply I purchased back to the store I got it from..
Here endeth todays lesson. Now hopefully I should be able to do more 3D designing for my Makerbot Replicator 2 3D printer!
