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Johny1-Visitor
1-Visitor
May 10, 2012
Question

Is it me or has PTC lost it's way

  • May 10, 2012
  • 21 replies
  • 59155 views

Have been a user of Pro-E (now CREO, for some unknown reason) since release 2001 and although, initially the program had new developments with subsequent releases, the later versions are a joke!

The sheet metal module has not changed significantly from Wildfire 3, to produce a paper 2d drawing is such a long winded process that it makes you want to give up. With each release they change the position of the menu structure so you have to spend the next couple of months looking for commands. The mapkeys that you spent so long setting up, no longer work. It's a mess!

My discipline is sheet metal and CREO is rubbish at it. It does not even have a library of standard primitives that most CAD programs have been using since the eighties. By that, I mean 'Conical Frustum's, 'Square to Rounds', 'Pipe Branches' etc. These are from known formulas that sheet metal workers have been using for decades. These basic formulas include triangulation and radial and parallel line developments. Why should it be so difficult to develop sheet metal work from within CREO? I believe that Solid Works has this ability but we are stuck with CREO for parity with the companies we deal with.

My other major gripe is the 2D Drawing side. Surely by now, a certain amount of automation should be entering this module. If you get it to auto dimension, it does not do it intelligently but throws every dimension on to the drawing. Does anybody use auto dimensioning in CREO? The alternative is fairly long winded which is why most of our customers just throw a model at us and we are left with dimensioning and producing drawings for manufacture and inspection. The use of BOMS and tables are not very intuitive and this side of CREO has not changed from 2001 days.

All in all, a huge disappointment. After all the hype about CREO it has failed to live up to expectations. We are only a small company and only hold 4 licenses, but we have decided to drop our maintenance cover for the foreseeable future as we find it hard to justify a product that is going nowhere. Perhaps we will pick it up again when PTC finally realise that their customers are not prepared to support their 'bloatware' when they can't even fix the fundamentals.

Does anyone else out there feel as I do? If so hit them where it hurts and drop your maintenance payments until PTC listen to what their customers want.


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    ptc-68518321-Visitor
    1-Visitor
    March 16, 2015

    I've been a user of PTC products since v. 2000i in college. I thought it to be a great program despite the steep learning curve, which I had grown comfortable with. I used it up until WF3 to design part of the 2009 Whirlpool appliance line up. As a contractor I went on to other companies that used Inventor, Catia, NX, and SolidWorks. I griped about SW when it came to surfacing, didn't like the relative lightweight ability of Inventor. Catia and NX were easily the equal of Pro in thier respective strengths. It was with great anticipation that I accepted a permanent position with a company that used Creo, I would return to the fold. I've been using Creo for 4 months now and I have to say that while the surfacing is likely still much better than SW that's where it stops for me. I find Creo to be lacking in improvements, tedious in feature creation, and clumsy in overall use. Configuration is still a PITA as it was 15 years ago, sketches cannot be derived, drawings views are limited, patterns are not as flexible, and the scrambled shuffling of names every year or two doesn't lend to stability. As a long time fan of PTC products it's my opinion that PTC has NOT made improvement a priority, if it has it certainly hasn't been geared to the designer's experience. Disappointing really, enough to make me purchase a seat of SW last year.

      P
      ptc-68518321-Visitor
      1-Visitor
      March 20, 2015

      We've had "issues" the last 4 weeks with OneSpace 2D drafting (now CoCreate?). Yes I know it's not Creo but it is a PTC product and this is somewhat on topic. We've decided to give the latest version of CoCreate a test run (long story) and I was just sent access to the e-learning library at PTC. For the moment we will ignore the logic behind using any version of ME-10. I want to acknowledge what was nice, a chance to get up to speed on the software you just paid a lot of money for. I'm familiar with 2D drafting software but I can always use a refresher so I checked in to see what's available. There are indeed several, maybe 30 courses in total for versions 16,17,18, and 19. Oh there's one small catch, all but 2 courses (updates, parts library) are NOT available in English. If I spoke Chinese, German, or Japanese (I do but not nearly enough) I'd be just fine. I find it almost laughable that the help/training is so very much a reflection of what Creo is, namely a lot of effort went into creating things that an average designer in the USA will not find useful at all. Congratulations PTC on living down to expectations, I want to recognize the efforts you've made in your fight to the bottom. Go PTC!

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