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PDM Enterprise

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CADShark

Mechanical
Oct 2, 2003
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Our company is looking to use PDM enterprise to help streamline our documentation.
We recieved a quote and...ouch. Our IT guys also informed us that if it uses "Microsoft SQL Server" we can look to spend a whole lot more cause of the software anf hardware required to run it.
We are a relatively small company (150 or so, including production).
Has anyone this size implemented PDM and how much did it cost you, if you don't mind me asking.

If first you do succeed...try something harder.

Blair H.
SW 2009 sp3.0, HP x4600
3.16ghz Intel Core2 Duo,
3.0 GB ram,
Nvidia Quadro FX 1700
Space Pilot Pro...they ROCK!!
 
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There are a ton of options available. If your operation is small enough, you could just simply implement PDMWorks (aka SolidWorks Workgroup PDM).

If you using a PLM, such as offerings from Oracle or SAP, you can use their PDM modules.

However, any good PDM is going to use SQL, and there's nothing ground breaking about SQL, so it seems rather silly for IT to be protesting its implementation. It can even run on the same server as the EPDM! Heck, even blogs and wikis run on SQL.

You may wish to shop around for a PDM that fits your needs. There's a lot more options available that your VAR may be telling you. I'll just got done writing an article about this (ironically), and it will be available Monday:




Matt Lorono
CAD Engineer/ECN Analyst
Silicon Valley, CA
Lorono's SolidWorks Resources
Co-moderator of Solidworks Yahoo! Group
and Mechnical.Engineering Yahoo! Group
 
We are a bit smaller and are running Enterprise. There are some key features that are nice; such as the process flows and notifications. We have a fairly large engineering group (electrical and mechanical total about 15 users CAD guys included) so it's nice to be able to layout the processes with ECN's. We even setup a flow for quoting to help determine what's been sent and what's still in-process. Overall I think it's good but there may be cheaper solutions. Just keep in mind that SW is phasing out Workgroups and you may be forced into a lower version of Enterprise before you know it.
 
Thanks for all the info everyone.
We already run SQL on our servers that need it.
From what our IT guys say it would cost us about an additional 50k to get a server capable of running "Microsoft" SQL.
-OR-
They're just blowing smoke cause they don't want to deal with it.

I dont know.

If first you do succeed...try something harder.

Blair H.
SW 2009 sp3.0, HP x4600
3.16ghz Intel Core2 Duo,
3.0 GB ram,
Nvidia Quadro FX 1700
Space Pilot Pro...they ROCK!!
 
Very interesting Anna...
Can anyone confirm that SQL may come with EPDM?
I haven't contacted my VAR yet.

Anna...nice cpu specs, how do you like Win7?

If first you do succeed...try something harder.

Blair H.
SW 2009 sp3.0, HP x4600
3.16ghz Intel Core2 Duo,
3.0 GB ram,
Nvidia Quadro FX 1700
Space Pilot Pro...they ROCK!!
 
Careful with Workgroup PDM. I'm hearing more and more rumors that it won't be supported for much more. Depending on where your business is when that goes down you could be stranded in a major version of the software.

Joe Hasik,
CSWP/SMTL/MTLS
SW 09 x64, SP 4.1
Dell T3400
Intel Core2 Quad
Q6700 2.66 GHz
3.93 GB RAM
NVIDIA Quadro FX 4600

 
SQL is included with EPDM. When Enterprise PDM requires a newer version or the previous SQL version is phased out, customers will get the SQL update discs along with the updated EPDM version.

Michael
 
Joe,
Why are you stirring the pot with PDM Workgroup, oops, I mean Workgroup PDM, my bad, and it being obsolete soon. That's my job to stir the pot! LOL!

Really, SW is falling into the realm of CATIA as far as selling different modules of the software and charging ya out the butt for them.

my 2 cents,

Colin Fitzpatrick (aka Macduff)
Mechanical Designer
Solidworks 2009 SP 3.0
Dell 490 XP Pro SP 2
Xeon CPU 3.00 GHz 3.00 GB of RAM
nVida Quadro FX 3450 512 MB
3D Connexion-SpaceExplorer
 
We are running Enterprise in the recommended 2 server setup. One server for SQL and the other for the drawings. Both servers together cost less than £6000 and they far exceed the minimum spec. We can just about run on one server when we have to (for maintenance etc). SQL server does indeed come with Enterprise. We just recently received a free upgrade to SQL Server 2008.
 
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