This thread is rather old but before I proceed to expound on what I think is holding back 3D CAD packages in general I would like to comment on some of the things that was said here. Bill, SE like SW and Pro/E before it are generic 3D modelers. It can model almost anything that can be manufactured. Including PCB, electrical panels and switch gears. If you want to draw electric circuit diagrams as Andrew has mentioned, since V19, SE has included the excellent diagraming tools. As for dbowen's comment, I am lost there. In modern 3D packages, CAD users don't draw, they model. Drawing is automatically generated from the models. Of course it still needs to be annotated for it to be of any use. Other than that, there is no "drawing" work. Everything is associative. That means any change made to the models are reflected in the drawings. So, I don't understand what that "10 hours to update" is all about.

Now, on to what I intend to say. I find it baffling that no one has taught about why AutoCAD continues to dominate the market and dwg has become the defacto industry standard for CAD data. It should have been as obsolete as WordStar and WordPerfect is but it isn't. The answer is this, competing systems are inflexible. Meaning, it is not backward compatible. 3D makers think this is an essential policy for its continuous growth. By doing so, it forces its customers to continually upgrade. This policy puts off a lot of customers. Take for example, the very excellent freeware, ProgeCAD. It not only allows users to save in the latest 2007 dwg format but also in past formats going all the way back to Release 2.5. Supposing a ProgeCAD user need to work with a contractor who is still using AutoCAD 2002, no problem. This is why I think AutoCAD rules and others are always lagging behind.

Not to be accused of going off tangent, I would like to see in the next release, backward compatibility included.

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T-H Lim