Top 10 Reasons to Use Autodesk Architectural Desktop 2007

Immediate Productivity

Those familiar with AutoCAD software can begin using Autodesk Architectural Desktop immediately to create documentation, drawings and schedules faster, while automating tedious coordination tasks and reducing errors. Architectural Desktop provides intelligent architectural objects, such as walls, doors, and windows, which interact logically, providing a smoother design process.

• Spaces:
  Looking for a more efficient and productive way to tag floor plans with room areas? With Architectural Desktop, you can now autornatically tag every room in a drawing, complete with room areas. And, since you can update spaces as room boundaries change at the click of a button, tags and areas will update automatically, saving you time in maintaining accurate documentation.
  
  
• Stairs:
  Tined of spending so much time generating accurate sections and elevations from your 2D stair plans? Now you can convert that 2D lifework to a fully described stair in Architectural Desktop. Nat only do you have the flexibility of improved graphic control over your stairs plan and model views, you get to take advantage of additional stair enhancements such as improved stringer, landing, tread, and riser control.
  
  
• Multi-component Slabs:
  Do you often find yourself manually adding details to complete section drawings? Now slabs can carry information about their interior construction just as walls can now, giving you the freedom to create slabs with multiple components and materials. Additional graphic enhancements, such as the ability to add interference conditions, give you even greater control of your plan, section, and elevation graphics.
  
  
• Details:
  Are you finding that documenting and annotating designs consumes too much time? Complete these tasks faster with Architectural Desktop's robust library of detail components and powerful keynoting tools. Automate the creation of details to have consistent annotation, and when your details are complete, you can even generate keynote legends with just a few clicks!
  
  
• Improved Walls:
  Looking for a faster way to create and modify floor plans? Take advantage of architectural objects, such as doors, windows, and walls. Far more intelligent than basic lifework and blocks, you not only benefit from a library of standard architectural types, they behave like their real-world counterparts. Automatically insert a door or window into a wall with complete placement control. Move a wall and connected walls and spaces will automatically update. To describe even more complex design conditions, walls have improved interaction with other objects, even enabling you to show interference conditions with columns across xrefs.
  
  
• Improved 2D Sections and Elevations:
  Need a more efficient way to manage the coordination of your designs and construction documents? Directly from your floor plans, use Architectural Desktop to generate 2D section and elevations with material hatching. And since section and elevation graphics are generated directly from your designs, maintaining layer, color, linetype properties, you can easily update them throughout design changes.

Flexibility

Because Architectural Desktop is built on the AutoCAD platform you can work the way you do today, integrating more powerful architectural-specific features at your own pace. This reduces the down-time and learning curve often associated with implementing new software. The filebased approach used by Architectural Desktop is consistent with the standards and practices of current AutoCAD users.

• Improved Scheduling
  New graphic display and calculation tools help ensure that your schedules are accurate and adhere to company standards. Whether you are customizing the appearance of out-of-the-box schedule styles, or creating completely new schedules from scratch, complete with your required calculations, you can do so with ease. Since schedules are linked directly to your designs, you can update them to reflect any design changes at the click of a button.



• Improved Dimensioning:
  Does a change in your design require manual updates to your dimensioning? Let Architectural Desktop's AEC Dimensions help. With even greater flexibility, you can now dimension any wall, including its components according to your own dimensioning standards, including wall stud centerlines and faces. And since the dimensions are associative they automatically update as your designs change, minimizing the tedium of manual updates.

Collaboration

Because Autodesk Architectural Desktop is interoperable with other Autodesk building design solutions and servies, as well as with third-party applications for specific needs, you can be sure that you can collaborate effectively with your extended design team. And because of broad support for industry-standard formats and interoperability standards, collaboration with the extended team is easier and more effective.

• Integrated Rendering:
  Bring designs to life for impressive client preservations at any stage of the design with integrated rendering. The streamlined visualization capabilities are fully integrated into the Architectural Desktop workflow. Break away from the pack and stand out by visually communicating richer design information.
  
  
• Extended Design Team Support:
  Does working in a large firm with multiple locations make it difficult to directly access project files from a centralized location? The result can be multiple drawing versions and drawings that are not coordinated. Architectural Desktop addresses this with improvements to its Project Navigator feature, making file-based collaboration easier with mapped-drive support. Drawing folder locations can also be customized to better align with your existing project management methods, making it even easier to migrate existing cad management standards.
  
  
  

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 With a streamlined user interface, customizable tool palettes, direct object manipulation, automated file and level management, and integrated photorealistic rendering and animation, Autodesk® Architectural Desktop software provides more productivity, better coordination, and smoother collaboration and data exchange than ever before.

Autodesk Architectural Desktop’s streamlined user interface improves on traditional design software in terms of look, feel, and overall functionality. With less focus on dialog boxes and more emphasis on designing directly in the workspace, the new interface provides process-focused tools that make the software easier to use.

Tool palettes provide access to Autodesk Architectural Desktop tools, such as walls, doors, and windows, in a single, consistent user interface. Highly visual tool palettes include a preview of each style. What’s more, you can create a set of custom tool palettes that address your specific design needs and then group these tool palettes into project-based catalogs. Because both tool palettes and catalogs use i-drop® technology, you can post them externally on an intranet, the Web, or the new Content Browser.

The new Content Browser provides quick access to catalogs, tool palettes, and design content in the form of blocks and multiview blocks. The Content Browser is the central location for project-based tools and content, ensuring that every member of your design team has access to the most up-to-date tools. Because the Content Browser uses i-drop technology, team members can drag standard, project-based, and manufacturers’ content into their drawings from an intranet or over the Web.

With direct manipulation you can make design modifications or explore alternative design possibilities directly in the drawing, without using dialog boxes. This streamlined approach enhances productivity by keeping you focused on the task at hand. Direct manipulation functionality has been implemented for all Autodesk Architectural Desktop building model objects. You can easily make design changes using either grip manipulation or in-place object editing.

A new addition to Autodesk Architectural Desktop, materials provide graphic and nongraphic detail to your drawings for design, documentation, and visualization purposes. You can attach materials to building model objects and their respective components for even greater visual detail. For example, you can now specify different materials for a door’s panel, frame, stop, and glass components. Style-based materials further enhance coordination among your design and construction documents; if you change the material of a wall and its individual components, all sections and elevations derived from that wall also update.

Easily create and manage projects and levels, and automate sheet and schedule creation. By enhancing coordination, drawing management tools ensure consistency throughout all aspects of the project. You can be assured that everyone on your design team is accessing the most current documents—such as project templates—from a centralized location.

Autodesk Architectural Desktop includes VIZ Render, its new advanced visualization and rendering tool incorporating industry-leading technology from Discreet, the creators of 3ds max™ and Autodesk® VIZ software. Featuring fully automated data linking, VIZ Render provides a visualization solution that is effectively integrated into the Autodesk Architectural Desktop environment, enhancing design workflow.

Easy to use, VIZ Render provides a streamlined, interactive environment for exploring material finishes and lighting. It also offers a range of rendering and presentation options for communicating and marketing design intent.

The Autodesk Architectural Desktop scheduling features provide the ability to track any object in a drawing. Because schedules are dynamically linked to your design data, they automatically update as your design changes. You can easily create accurate schedules from the building model, helping to increase productivity. You can create schedule tables with page breaks, tag objects through xrefs, and create schedules of external drawings, even of your completed building information model.

Because Autodesk Architectural Desktop is built on AutoCAD® software, you have all the functionality of the latest version of AutoCAD, including performance, plotting, and file-sharing enhancements that simplify collaboration with professionals who need access only to 2D (DWG) design data. With the Export to AutoCAD feature, you can easily export your designs to AutoCAD DWG and DXF™ formats without using object enablers.

Powerful new FLEXlm® 9.2.2 functionality helps you get the full benefit from your Autodesk Architectural Desktop licenses. With license borrowing you can install a time-limited license on your computer while disabling the license on the server for that same period. You can then use the license on your computer without a connection to the license server. License borrowing is a great benefit if you need to take your computer on a business trip or occasionally work from home.