Hello all
I have received my upgrade keys to SketchUP 2018 PRO. I have not yet installed. Can I keep my SketchUP 2017 Pro and install 2018 Pro on the same computer ? I do not wish to uninstall 2017. I want to keep both the versions. My licenses are Standalone licenses. Please advise.
Thanks in advance
PRSS
You can activate 2018 and keep 2017 running also. However, I donât think you can reinstall the 2017 on a new computerâŚ
Thank you Ian T. I do not need to install 2017 on another computer. Why I would like to keep both the versions working on the same computer is because, I need to know if all my plugins would run perfectly on 2018 Pro. I have to test them. If some did not, I would have to wait for an update. Till then I need to use the plugin on the 2017 version.
Also, in quite a few SU Forums, people have written that 2018 was running slower than 2017. They said 2018 required a much better graphics card than 2017. May be it was a bug. In that case, I have to wait till a bug fix was available as an update. So, in fact, I have not yet installed the 2018 version at all. May be I should install as trial and test it for one month. May be within that time a fix might come from the SU team. (obviously SU team should not expect us to upgrade graphics card every year as a new version rolled out.)
I just wanted to make sure that my 2017 would still run even if I activated 2108 - as a backup ! If 2018 failed ! Hence my query.
Thank you once more
Best regards
PRSS
I only use an intel 5500 integrated graphics card on a laptop. I know itâs frowned upon but it serves my needs just fine. Just my opinion but 2018 looks and feels much smoother than 2017 which felt a little clunky.
The biggest change in graphics requirements came with SU 2017, in which full support for OpenGL 3.0 became mandatory and software emulation was removed. I think SU 2018 tuned and refined various things but didnât significantly up the requirements (tech experts, please correct me if that is wrong!). I would expect that in most cases if 2017 runs with your graphics, 2018 will too.
Extension authors often take a while to get around to marking their extensions as compatible with a new SketchUp version, but my experience has been that the vast majority of extensions/plugins that ran under 2017 are just fine under 2018. The worst issues I have read about involved a change in how macOS X returns folder contents unsorted, which breaks extension that assume a particular order of loading.
The greatest number of complaints about poor performance lately have been from Windows updates that gratuitously replace graphics drivers with ones that arenât SketchUp-friendly - especially Windows 10. It can be a whack-a-mole battle to keep replacing the drivers with ones that work!
Thank you IanT. I think I should install as trial and see how it goes. I
guess as long as I did not activate it, the 2017 version license would not
expire.
Best regards
PRSS
Thank you slbaumgartner ! I have an Asus nvidia GeForce GTX 770 Ti with 4 GB Ram, on a Core-i7 HQ processor machine with 32 GB RAM. And SketchUP 2017 runs on this very well indeed.
So the glitch is Windows 10 forced updates ! Well, I am still on Windows 7 SP-1 Pro. Another license in on Windows 8.1 Pro. (same machine configuration). So I think I am safe from the Windows 10 forced update issues!!
May be I may not get any problems at all (excepting for the test on plugins - and you say that the plugins that work in 2017 works ok with 2018.) So let me give a serious try.
Thank you once again
Best regards
PRSS
I removed the post as I remembered you already had your key.
By all means install the trial though without activating yet, although youâve paid for your key anyhow so thereâs little difference. The 2017 wonât expire if you do activate.
Maybe it would be better to try the trial before you buy the keys in the future.
Thank you again IanT for your reply. I shall do so.
Best regards
PRSS
As a follow up question, when you have more than one version of SU on your machine, is there any problem with renaming them âSketchUp 2018â, âSketchUp 2017â, etc. to keep them straight? Renaming apps and their ancillary files is sometimes a no-no.
They will install in separate folders (which is why they can coexist), so naming is not usually a problem. I havenât tried it, but I donât think the app cares what name you give the exe file.
I rely on Dock position to differentiate between 3 versions, latest to the rightâŚ
john
DO NOT RENAME THE EXE FILE(S) !
Doing so will invalidate registry settings such as the exe path for double-clicking on .skp files.
It is safe to rename desktop icons.
It is quite safe to do this on a Mac. I just changed it to âSketchup 18.appâ for fun there. Double-clicking a .skp file in the Finder did want to try opening it in v17, but its simple to change the default app to open that type of file in the Finder with Get Info. Open with: Sketchup 18.app then click âchange allâ.
EXCEPT, ⌠that:
(1) OSX does not use .exe files, âŚand âŚ
(2) we are discussing the Windows edition as the OP said âŚ
Steve, is quite experienced, and knows this, so I believe he was also referring to PC, and not Mac.
As I said, on Windows, ⌠it is safe to rename desktop (start menu) icons (which are ".lnk" files.)
I was answering @RTCoolâs question and he is on a Mac and not the original poster who is on windows, sorry for the confusion.
Well I wish you had then quoted him so your comment was directed at him, instead of me and looking like it was refuting what I said (which is true for the OP and Windows.)
Unfortunately, Discourseâs junky flagging system will now not let me remove the âoff-topicâ flag I gave your post. (Seems we can only âunflagâ whilst still in the topic. Once we leave it the option is gone.)
But thatâs not the end of the world ⌠
I stand corrected 
. Itâs been a while since I used Windows regularlyâŚ
In my defense, though, it makes no sense to me for the system to automagically tie registry keys to the appâs ânameâ, which is just a text field in a mutable directory structure!
It is not âautomagicâ the keys are created by the SketchUp installer to register handlers for certain file extensions (.skp, .skm, .layout, etc.) The handlers are for various command types âopenâ, âeditâ etc. In order for the system to know what program to use to load (or view, or edit, âŚ) the clicked file, the system needs to refer to the registry to get the executableâs full absolute pathname, so it can build an application load call using the two paths (application and datafile.)
Computers are just machines that do what they are told. But they must be told what to do, how to do and where to do and with whom to do. They cannot just âguessâ where the application executable is. And Windows does not enforce any âone executable per folderâ rule. Also Windows does not have any âbegins withâ partial pathname feature. The pathname needs to be complete and correct otherwise the user will see an error messagebox asking to perform alternatives including searching the web for an application to install and open the file type, or manually browse the local computer filesystem for another program, ⌠etc., which just leads to more problems especially if the user is not computer savvy.
The same limitation surrounds the registry setting that registers the thumbnail image handler for the Windows file explorer. Changing the name of SketchUpâs "ThumbsUp.DLL" file would break the pathname to this dynamic library and then ⌠no thumbnails in explorer.
Thanks for the, as usual, clarifying tech details.
Question: are you implying that there are OSâs that do so, or just making a statement about what Windows does? This is for my edification, as I donât know of anyâŚ