VW 2018 slow start up time

[MartinFahrer]

I hope this si the correct space to put this.  Just installed and ran VW 2018.  Start up time takes 2 to 3 times longer than 2017 and this is on a SS Drive.  Any Ideas on how to speed things up?  I noticed I get the circle switching tabs too.  Looks to me that there were to many resources added on the default libraries that I never use, is there a way to get rid of some of that?

 

 

Thanks

M

Edited September 20, 2017 by MartinFahrer

[RGyori]

I too have noticed similar long load times on my new  27"  i7 iMac with SSD as well. Still using 2017 for daily work and only dabbling with 2018 thus it is in "out of the box" state.

[Art V]

If you close the program and then start it again, is it still as slow or does it load faster? With VW2017 and Win10 the first startup is slower, but closing it and then start it again e.g. an hour later was noticably faster than the first time and basically on par with VW2016. (provided the computer wasn't restarted during that time).

[P Retondo]

Wow, this is disappointing news.  I have already noticed a big lag in booting between 2016 and 2017.  I installed an SSD just so that 2016 would boot faster - 15 seconds.  Now with 2017 it is at least twice as slow, and if 2018 makes it worse, that is a very bad trend.  I am blaming the handling of resources as at least one problem.  The resource palette is now very unwieldy, and doesn't really do any more than the old more compact palette did.  When I click on the attributes palette to apply a hatch, it takes seconds for the hatch selection dialog to open, and then instead of just clicking on the desired hatch I also have to click on "select."  I told my sales rep at NNA that if 2018 continued in this vein - making things slower and not solving longstanding issues such as window sills, stairs, etc., plus adding new unresolved display and snapping glitches - they can count me out for future upgrades.  As a loyal and longstanding user and renewer for full Designer, I think I am entitled to make this complaint, and unless I see better reviews of 2018 I will not be installing the upgrades that I have paid for!

[MartinFahrer]

Is anyone at V works listening.  I agree the resource browser is handy for stuff I put in there, not so much filled with stuff I DO NOT USE.  I am an entertainment designer, I have very little use for all the plumbing stuff, on the flip side I am sure an architect has very little use for  stage lights and truss.  I paid full Designer prices to.  I want an interface that will be customize able, not one that has everything and the kitchen sink thrown in.  I thought I was tho only one having problems with snap points.

 

I hope this is taken to heart.

Edited September 22, 2017 by MartinFahrer

[beanus]

I'm having a problems with the time it takes VW2018 to load compared to VW2017, 2017 takes 45 seconds to load and 2018 takes 3 minutes 45 seconds to load, is this normal?

[PVA - Admin]

It is not supposed to be, but I have had many reports of the load stalling on the "Checking Activation" phase in the splash screen. Is yours stopping there for a large chunk of time as well or is it halting somewhere else along the way?

[PVA - Admin]

Suspect this is also related:
 

Merging a few threads with the same issue here. Tech support is currently tracking this now, seems to affect Mac and Windows both, but I am unable to replicate here. We suspect the problem with replication is because we are on the corporate network so I'm running some remote tests through my home machine on my own ISP to see if I can get the same problem.

[PVA - Admin]

Update: 

If anyone who has experienced longer than 40 second start times could please direct message me the time it takes for you to launch, your OS as well as the last 6 of your serial number, that would be most helpful. We are working with engineering to see if we can track down the hangup in our server logs.

(DO NOT POST ANY PORTION OF YOUR SERIAL NUMBER HERE, PLEASE DIRECTLY MESSAGE ME)

[Art V]

3 hours ago, beanus said:

I'm having a problems with the time it takes VW2018 to load compared to VW2017, 2017 takes 45 seconds to load and 2018 takes 3 minutes 45 seconds to load, is this normal?

Just out of curiousity, is your system drive a hard drive or an SSD and are you using encryption on the system drive? I've recently noticed that on an encrypted hard drive it can take much longer than on a non-encrypted hard drive, ditto for SSD but SSD should be noticably faster than a hard drive but even on an encrypted SSD loading time basically doubles compared to a non-encrypted one. This also applies to opening files.

I've read somewhere that Macs are more and more using drive encryption, so maybe that could be a contributing factor for those on a Mac.

Startup times are roughly the same for me for VW2018 and VW2017 (i.e. a second difference, 22 vs 21) for starting just VW with the a custom default template (i.e. not opening a working drawing file) but it seems activation checking is taking longer than in the past since VW2018 got launched, though VW2017 is now also taking longer to check activation. Both start activation after 12 seconds of starting up and then it takes another 10 seconds for the default document to show up. This is on a standard SSD drive as system drive.

[rowbear97]

Was just a bit curious about this from a perception standpoint I thought 2018 was slower. I timed it just now and 2017 was just only faster by a second or two. I have encrypted my drive and I'm running High Sierra on a Early 2013 Mac Pro with 32 Gb of RAM. Both installs are custom with Designer and take nearly 43 seconds.

[PVA - Admin]

Just now, rowbear97 said:

Was just a bit curious about this from a perception standpoint I thought 2018 was slower. I timed it just now and 2017 was just only faster by a second or two. I have encrypted my drive and I'm running High Sierra on a Early 2013 Mac Pro with 32 Gb of RAM. Both installs are custom with Designer and take nearly 43 seconds.

The issue we are tracking right now gives upwards of 3 minutes to 5 minutes for startup.

Sadly, Vectorworks taking anywhere between 20 and 50 seconds is considered well within acceptable limits. I disagree with this accepted load time and am pushing it to be improved by offsetting some lesser used components to be loaded in the background, but the issue we are tracking now is causing WAY slower times even than that and is a more recent development/bug.

[Art V]

15 minutes ago, JimW said:

Sadly, Vectorworks taking anywhere between 20 and 50 seconds is considered well within acceptable limits. I disagree with this accepted load time and am pushing it to be improved by offsetting some lesser used components to be loaded in the background, but ....

As I said before, loading times for a first start are not a major concern. Of course faster is better but whether it is 20 seconds or 30 seconds does not really matter to me.

 

That being said, I do  agree that background loading of lesser used components would be a very good idea to implement anyway. This could be extended to opening drawings so that the content of the drawing is loaded first and any linked libraries and referenced files are being loaded in the background so that you can start working right away instead of having to wait for everything to be loaded. Especially if it concerns background files that are not immediately needed upon opening a drawing (e.g. satellite/aerial images, large referenced DWG's or other files) it will speed things up. If these files are needed before you can start working then it would not make a difference anyway, so no harm done in that case.

 

Now I have to wait until all references have been updated/loaded when opening a drawing, while these are not the things I want to modify.

[Steven Kenzer]

Just wanted to chime in that I too have very slow startup times. Just timed it to be close to 4 minutes. Hope an update can remedy this. Thanks.

[PVA - Admin]

4 minutes ago, Steven Kenzer said:

Just wanted to chime in that I too have very slow startup times. Just timed it to be close to 4 minutes. Hope an update can remedy this. Thanks.

Send the last 6 of your serial number, your operating system and the exact time it takes between starting the app and the app actually opening in a direct message please.

[Steven Kenzer]

Interesting..I just quit and restarted and it took a more typical time of about 40 seconds. I guess the opening time is not consistent from startup to startup. I'll still get you the info you asked for. I should add to my signature Mac OS 10.13. Thanks, Jim.

[michael john williams]

2 minutes 47 seconds start time. Not 'responding' came up. 

[The Hamma]

The 2018 version is just slow all around!! zooming in and out as well as rendering and rotating renderings. editing PIO's. etc. 

[Christian Fekete]

Why does it take sooooooo long to get VW started, literaly 5mn. This is sooooooo frustrating.

[Art V]

On 11/8/2017 at 10:16 PM, The Hamma said:

The 2018 version is just slow all around!! zooming in and out as well as rendering and rotating renderings. editing PIO's. etc. 

Is this with new files created in VW2018 or with files/content that were originally made in a VW version before 2017 or 2018?

[Jim Smith]

On 2017-11-09 at 10:55 AM, Christian Fekete said:

Why does it take sooooooo long to get VW started, literaly 5mn. This is sooooooo frustrating.

 

I find this very frustrating, I too see this when the computron is restarted to get my day started & VW2018 takes 4-ever. As per my routine I also close the programme at lunch & restart VW (without restarting my the computron) with a couple of other programmes open VW clocked at 54.24 seconds to open. For a larff I restarted two more times without other programmes running: 52.14 & 52.19 seconds... 

 

Frankly my experience in starting VW seems to be getting slower rather than faster since SP1 & OS 10.13.1 - but that may be a causal connection on my part. 

[Jim Smith]

Update on the post above. Time to restart after force quit :

1:01.90 - this after hung up with BBSD (beach ball of spinning death) for several minutes

BTW - there should be a way to kill the  paint bucket mode of create Polygon, this tool, while helpful seems to have rules know only to the gods - adding that to a wish list now.

[Christian Fekete]

I just found that the automatic backup on my time machine (mac) seems to be preventing VW from opening normally. Once I stoped this backup process VW started right away. Still takes some time but much faster.

[MartinFahrer]

I was timing my Start up with VW.  The Program will open and be ready in 10 to 20 seconds.  Not bad, however it takes almost a minute for the Resource browser, and all the crap I never use (See all the default and cloud libraries to load automatically.  Is there any way to limit the default start up to only the things I need?  I don't need - showers, escalators, doors, HVAC crap as well as building services etc.  I am an entertainment set designer.  I am sure Architects don't need all the theatrical lighting resources.  as a set designer I don't need those, or even the truss 90% of the time.

[P Retondo]

As of v2016, all the resources, crap or not, were loaded on my machine with an SSD in 15 seconds to complete the whole startup cycle.  As of v2017, with the new look and handling of resources, time has ballooned for startup and lots of other operations - such as, just assigning a hatch to an object.  It is really not acceptable that we pay for poorer performance with supposedly improved software.  Can someone from NNA explain why this has happened, and if there is some benefit we should be getting from all these slowdowns?

[PVA - Admin]

3 minutes ago, P Retondo said:

As of v2016, all the resources, crap or not, were loaded on my machine with an SSD in 15 seconds to complete the whole startup cycle.  As of v2017, with the new look and handling of resources, time has ballooned for startup and lots of other operations - such as, just assigning a hatch to an object.  It is really not acceptable that we pay for poorer performance with supposedly improved software.  Can someone from NNA explain why this has happened, and if there is some benefit we should be getting from all these slowdowns?

If the load time is taking longer than 25-35 seconds, it is most likely part of a larger bug we are tracking now where load times can take between 1 and 5 minutes. We suspect these are related to activation, since the delay doesnt seem to depend on the read/write speed of the drive Vectorworks is installed to, but there is currently no new info. The bug is still being tracked now.

Moved thread to Known Issues to reflect this.