Recommendations for Survey Programs

I have been using a 1990 era survey program for years and I am thinking of upgrading.  It has become increasingly difficult to work with AutoCAD files.

 I want a program that works with AutoCAD but doesn't have the price tag of Civil 3d. I interact with Civil Engineers but do not do much design.  My primary use is to create and export point files from Engineers AutoCAD files. 

I am looking for suggestions from other surveyors.  

Carlson Survey with Intellicad...awesome combination!

You may want to look at http://www.generalcadd.com/surveyor3d.htm . Reasonably priced-demo version is a free download. It's based on the same two alpha/numeric input as the old Generic Cadd program, with several routines for surveyors. Solid program, and excellent support.

I think Oldmaps is right, but I like the stand alone survey.   Carlson is pretty easy to use...

I really like the idea of using a program for a time before I have to buy it.  That gives me an opportunity to test things before spending hard earned cash.

Carlson allows you to use the program (fully functional) for 30 days or 8000 program calls with no obligation.

If you want, call my office (800) 533-4387 and I can walk you through the steps necessary to get the demo.

Larry P

I use the Carlson 2010 with embedded autocad, it's a good program at a resonable price and a fast learning curve for someone who hasn't used Carlson before.

What is needed exactly, besides The Carlson software to draw a survey? I though you had to have a CAD engine or something..... educate me.


what the hell do I need to buy other than just caralson survey?

If you don't get into fancy civil engineering kind of stuff, you can do everything you need with Carlson Survey.  Having said that, there are several different "flavors".

If you have an existing seat of AutoCAD, you can purchase Carlson Survey and install it so that your existing ACAD is your CAD engine.

If you do not have an existing seat of AutoCAD, you can install Carlson Survey so that is uses Intellicad as your CAD engine.  (Same software, same price just different CAD engine.)

If you do not have AutoCAD and you do not want to use the Intellicad Engine, you can purchase what is called the OEM version of Carlson Survey.  The price is in the neighborhood of double the ICAD version but you get a sort of version of AutoCAD as the CAD engine running things.  It is not full AutoCAD, but it is pretty close for just standard kind of stuff.  No, you can't render drawings and calculate center of gravity but what boundary surveyor does those things?

So the bottom line is, if all you want to do is draft boundary surveys, Carlson Survey is all you need.  FYI, list price for that is $1,500.

FYI, I am a dealer and will be glad to set you up with a demo so you can see for yourself if you like it.

Larry P
NCPLS

Sounds a little confusing. 

I have AutoCAD vs 2004 and 2006 which Iv'e used that for linework.  All my survey cogo/ect is been done in Foresight (TDS).

 I find that more and more projects  I get to construction stake have been coming over in AutoCAD vs that do not work well with Foresight (XREFS, ect).    I need a smooth system that can work with AutoCAD files for construction staking.  Ie create/ export point files .I have worked a little with Civil 3d but the price tag is too high. They'll put me out of business.

From what I am reading it sounds like most are happy with Carlson.

But I'm looking so lay it on me...

I primarily do topographic surveys and a fair amount of volumes (stock pile inventory)... and it has to flow into my engineering clients C3D... regular Carlson survey will do the trick if these are my focuses then? I cannot/will not pay 7K for C3D.

<1>This fancy souped up version that has the fancy AutoCAD engine costs what?  $1500???
<2>Does one license cover my desktop and my laptop as does C3D license?  or do I have to spend another 1500 for the laptop?
<3>Can I open all my old 2004 LANDdeskTOP dwgs with Carlson?

You ask:

The one word answer was my favorite Larry... with what you just told me it is a NO brain-er to at least give the demo a look.

(1) Is the demo version intellicad or the Autocad engine?
(2) both versions (intellicad or the Autocad engine) will flow smoothly into Civil3D for my engineering client's? AND what are the usability /functionality differences in the two?
(3) which do you sell more of?

I currently run LDD on Windows XP... but want to upgrade computers to Windows 7 and upgrade drafting software as well. Carlson is looking STOUT.

 I upgraded to Win 7.  Many of my programs don't work.  Even with Virtual XP available in Win 7 Pro, I  Have not had much success getting things to run smoothly. Maybe others have been more sucessful.  But from my experience If you upgrade don't be surprized in if you regret it. 

Regarding the Virtual Wndows XP.
The s/w that widows recomends is a POS.
I tried it and was very dissatisfied. My puter geek loaded the "Oracle" version and LDD2 runs smoothe as silk.

Bill Teas:
 I upgraded to Win 7.  Many of my programs don't work.  Even with Virtual XP available in Win 7 Pro, I  Have not had much success getting things to run smoothly. Maybe others have been more sucessful.  But from my experience If you upgrade don't be surprized in if you regret it. 

I'm guessing that, since you're using a 90's-era Survey program, you have a lot of rather old software.  That probably has something to do with it.

I've been using Win 7 x64 since it came out, and the problems have been minimal.  In fact, things seem better in general, and quite significantly better in a number of ways.  We still have some XP computers in the office, and I hate using them, even for a few minutes.  Unfortuantely, as the de-facto sysadmin for our company, I still have to use them from time to time, but I'm looking forward to the day the last XP machine is retired.  But we've been keeping up with technology in general, and are using rather recent software pretty much accross the board.  (We're using C3D 2011.)  The big exception is I still use TGO occasionally (we haven't upgraded that to TBC).

Can someone recommend an adjustment program that will allow me to adjust combined GPS and terrestrial data that is exported out of Trimble Geomatics Office? I want to be able to process and qc the data in TGO, export out the network with seeded coordinates and then adjust the data in something else. Is there anything like this?

I'm not exactly sure what your are asking for, but if you look at primacode's "transform for windows" it might be what you're looking for.   It's not a post-processing program but a program that allows you to compare differing sets of coords and adjust to each other...  (kind of scale to fit)

Probably the best and most affordable option is Carlson with Intellicad. I use it every day for calcualtions, drafting and COGO. I send data back and forth with engineers all day long and they of course run Autocadd Civil. Carlson still uses a .dwg extension so the drawings open right up. You can export many different file types and to different platforms and you can import just as many.

I would check to see if it recognizes your current software so you can still use your old files.

Jason Simes, PLS, Cfeds

The best on the market today is MicroSurvey out of Canada.  There are two major programs, both are great - Microsurvey 2010 and InCAD.  MS 2010 runs on the intellcad engine and InCad which runs on the AudoCad 2011 engine.  Before you purchase anything, download a free working copy and give it a try.  My CadTech uses AutoCad 2011 with Civil 3D  and can only after a great struggle do what I do on or in a normal days work.  These are complete programs with Survey, Sanitary and Road design and layout.  Great support, free up-grades with 400 dollar maintance agreement per year.


RA Thompson
Las Vegas, Nv.
 

Based on my experience, recommend that you do not use AutoCAD Civil 3x for survey computations. I use AutoCAD 2004 for survey computations then export to Civil 2012 for the techs to design the projects. Surveyors in this area seem to have gravitated to Carlson as a solution to AutoCAD frustration but I have not gone that route yet. Good luck.

Both micro survey and carlson have versions that work on an auto cad or an inteli cad engin, they are seperate programs. You buy one or the other. You can down load either for a 30 day free trial period which would be the best way to decide which is the best for you. I can not speak  for  carlson I have micro survey. You are given a USB key when you purchase the program and you can use it on your laptop or desk top but not at the same time if  you need to do this you will have to purchase a second copy of the program. With regard to a progam that will adjust GPS and survey networks Micro survey has a program that does least square adjustments called star net  this can also be downloaded for a free 30 day trial period also.
Pat  

Martin Miccio:
Based on my experience, recommend that you do not use AutoCAD Civil 3x for survey computations. I use AutoCAD 2004 for survey computations then export to Civil 2012 for the techs to design the projects.

AutoCAD 2004...?  By itself?  Without even Land Desktop?

I couldn't imagine doing that.  There's virtually no Survey support in AutoCAD 2004.  Even compared to Land Desktop, we can do far more work, far faster, and to higher quality levels with Civil 3D.  There are things that would take us days with LDD, and we do them in hours now.  One trained C3D tech can keep up with three or four field crews, easy.  We used to have more of a 1:1 relationship between field and office staff when we used LDD.

I couldn't imagine using plain Autocad, especially something as old as 2004...  We use too many of the new features too much.  The Sheet Set Manager alone saves an incredible amount of time.  Not to mention MLeaders, Annotative Text, 3D Visualization styles like "Shades of Gray", and more.  I'm not a fan of the yearly release cycle and the new crop of bugs that comes with each new release, but I would be miserable using AutoCAD 2004 again.  And I don't think I could use LDD at all at this point, not even LDD 2009...

Civil 3d is really the Rolls Royce, but if you're on a budget you need PC SURVEY. [google it] It does everything including writing legal descriptions and drafting. Learning curve is short and simple.

Carlson, and don't even look back.  Easy to use, fast, intuitive, and just plain great.

With Carlson standalone what does it not have that AutoCAD (Vanilla) does? Other than 3d design and lisp?