looking for an alternative to ANSYS for transient therm-structural SIM

[Aknil]

hello Fellas,
first-off i am not sure if this is the right place to put this thread but it is related to heat transfer.i also did a keyword search and i found nothing.
Now,
I am working for a new giant institute and i want to simulate a transient solidification and the induced thermal stresses in short and long term. i used to work with ANSYS but now i am looking for an alternative with a better GUI and a simpler approach.
i am looking for a software which :
- has a GUI better than ansys classic
- is not very expensive like ANSYS and ABAQUS
-gives me the possibility to model my rather complicated geometry and perform transient thermal-structural analysis
- is capable of long-term creep and life-cycle studies

I have found COMSOL Multiphysics and Siemens Femap, the comsol tutorials look like there is not much you can change and i do not know if comsol can do transient.

any further suggestions or comments on my current choices (comsol and Femap) ?

 

[Aknil]

Alloy plasticity is also needed to be considered in the simulation (it is basically a casting or solidification problem)

 

[dbecker]

Good luck if you find something, I've been using ANSYS classic for a while and I would like to find a program that isn't as convoluted and arbitrary as ANSYS. Although it is a powerful tool, it is the farthest thing from user friendly.

 

[Aknil]

I was using ANSYS classic for about 4 years and now I want to move on. It is just too much hassel for me personally, I developed a model for solder-alloy for a year only to see ABAQUS has a better model for exact same materials as a default model "/
I want to use a program that can really track my mistakes,and has a pleasant GUI.
ANSYS workbench was not an option at the time cause I was running ANSYS on a Remote linux based server and apparently graphics could not be transmitted or something.

COMSOL seems promissing, they sent me several simulations and it looks like it is as efficient as ANSYS.