Best configuration for architectural use

SketchUp Computer Advice
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1

Hello everyone :waving_hand:,

We have been using commercialy Sketchup for the last 10 years.
We work an port achitectural drawings on Sketchup and Layout.
Our models are quite heavy, between 100 Mo to 600 Mo and can easily be more than 1 km² and we use some plugins (3 to 4 plugins).

We run it each time with new HP Zbook (Ultra 9 185H 2,3 GHz + RTX 2000), Lenovo P53, Asus Rog, Dell Precision (3581), with a budget range from 2 000 to 4 500 €. Always with windows (not possible to consider Mac).

We always experience some troubles like bugsplats, blue screens, very slow moves on sketchup, very long time to response on LayOut.
Indeed, we deleted the shadows and the antialiasing to make it faster.

We tried to contact Skecthup to know what is the optimal laptop to work with.

I also assume that you could maybe have the answer to that : What would be your optimal suggestion ?

Thank you for your precious help !!

Alex

2

The first suggestion is you should ignore the hardware and learn to understand the best way to build a conservative model. It sounds like all these years you have been working with bloated models.
Attaching a model would allow us to evaluate the issue.

1 Like
3

Hi Box,

Thank you for your contribution.
I did not detailed all our efforts to make it smooth but indeed, we optimize our models.
We also got an expertise from a training office specialized in Sketchup and we came to the point that our models are already optimized as much as possible.
We purge, create components, avoid hidden objects or geometry, …

I can’t share a model but I can give you an example with a very simple situation : the last model we have involves +/- 100 000 pallets. In order to optimize, we only materialize a pallet with one simple rectangle of 1x1,2 m. Even with that, the models are heavy to work with.

4

With files that big, even a Mac Studio or a desktop with a 5090 and the fastest cpu, will be laggy on LayOut and sketchup, I’m pretty sure there are ways to optimize your models, I’ve seen a lot of “optimized models” that can be really optimized.

5

And you don’t see where the problem lies!
Just so you know, while using multiple components can reduce file size it doesn’t necessarily reduce the drain on the graphics.

1 Like
6

We already know that this is large models :wink:. Our eyes are fully opened on this point already. However, having large model does not mean that we have to accept huge lags! Even more when we do optimize components, groups, file config, ..
I see that you insist on optimization, do you have one specific topic in mind regarding this aspect? We will still look for other parameters and give them a try if we find some.

We are trying to find the best configuration to help us avoiding too much lags and if someone experienced a good configuration with windows. From our experience, P53 and Rog were the best we experienced for now.

If someone can come back also on this subject it will be helpfull as well :folded_hands:

7

I’ll not bother you again with my ill conceived advice.

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8

What exactly are you doing with that model with 100,000 pallets? Just for rendering?

9

I think the best thing you can do is to upload a file and let some of the experts here take a look.

Without seeing it, people are just offering advice based on guesses.

You never know, someone may spot something your “training office” missed.

11

Don’t feel offended. As explained, we went through optimization over the past 10 years even with Sketchup training specialists that came to our office and bring their expertise. This is why we go now to the next level which is hardware.
I even let it open to you if you think about a topic concerning optimization that could help us and the next readers :slight_smile:

12

Hey Cappo,

I agree with you. Thank’s for the suggetsion. We will prepare a simplification of this 100k pallets file that can be shared without confidentiality issues.

14

We export it to Layout to bring annotations into it (surfaces, capacities, …).
Even in layout we don’t use shadows for this kind of models

15

Thank you for your help, the title is now corrected I think.

16

And in any of the situations, are the 100,000 palettes all visible at once in the LayOut page? Same for surfaces and everything else?

17

In this case of important multiplication of components, we put these components into a “balise” in french (maybe layer in english version?).
We deactivate this layer. In Layout we put the correct camera position and activate the layer again only when necessary and at the full end before the exportation to pdf. At this moment, all pallets are visible at once.

18

Tag. (also it’s étiquette now)

also, layout has been through some changes over the years, you’re using sketchup 19 - 20 - 21 (according to your profile)
you can get a beefier machine. but still, you’ll work with a version that is 4-6 years old.

Try sketchup and layout 2025, it has a new faster engine, it has QOL things that make it work faster…

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19

We are now using 2024 version and we had a significant improvement from 2023.
But we never tried 2025 so we will do it, thank’s.

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20

I think you should use another cad application to handle such a large amount of components.
But you can simplify a lot your components too.

1 Like
21

Yeah, good point is, you can keep several versions installed at the same time. Installing 25 doesn’t mean forsaking 24.

With the engine change, some things are not as stable as they were, but other are better so… you’ll see
(And it should improve in the future too)

22

Hi there,
My SketchUp files are routinely between 200 and 400MB. I just purchased a new rig from MSI based on Lumion Render’s suggestion:

Hope this helps!