slodat
ALLIANCE MEMBER
I've found myself wanting more feature rich sheet metal CAD. As I stated above, I've been using Fusion for years. I've hit some challenges with sheet metal that has me looking at options. A couple of very experienced sheet metal engineers have both unequivocally recommended SolidWorks. In the spirit of shopping around and looking at options, I looked at a lot of them. Alibre came up as the only real option for what I'm wanting. SolidWorks is SUBSTATIALLY more money. With that said, I believe it to be the industry standard, and recommendation of these two experienced guys because it's a great CAD system for my application.
With that said, I see no reason to transition my machined parts away from Fusion 360. It has not left me wanting anything. And, it will continue to do all my CAM, including cutting the sheet metal parts.
The Alibre team has been very responsive to pre-sale questions. Where the SolidWorks VARs just come across as unnecessary middlemen. I'm not sure what they are adding for their $1800/year honestly other than access to online training. With that said, they all do claim to offer support. I'm skeptical because of the VAR model. Time will surely tell.
With that said, I see no reason to transition my machined parts away from Fusion 360. It has not left me wanting anything. And, it will continue to do all my CAM, including cutting the sheet metal parts.
The Alibre team has been very responsive to pre-sale questions. Where the SolidWorks VARs just come across as unnecessary middlemen. I'm not sure what they are adding for their $1800/year honestly other than access to online training. With that said, they all do claim to offer support. I'm skeptical because of the VAR model. Time will surely tell.