Loading pro with suite installed

[Sunny]

Suite has done well for me, but it lacks a few features I could use. I have ordered Pro. When it comes, is it best to uninstall suite before loading HD Pro? I don't need both on the machine, but wonder what happens if Suite is there when I put on HD Pro vs if I uninstall first. Your recommendations please.

Sunny

[Kilgore Trout]

You don't need to uninstall suite before you install pro. The programs should play nicely together. You should be able to open any of your suite plans in pro to continue your work. Once you save any plans in pro, you will only be able to view them in suite and you won't be able to change them.

[Sunny]

Kilgore, thanks for the tidbit.
I didn't want to mess up something simple after all the work I've done w/ suite. The old 'never assume anything' routine. I am working w/ pro, and it is solving almost all my previous problems, plus it's easier to play 'gee, Honey, what would it look like if...' because of pro's ability to alter conditions with shift select.

The only limit I've run into so far seems to be my inability to use different platform thicknesses for different rooms, on the same floor. We have a very old farmhouse with several previous add ons. I think I can get by with floor and hung ceiling adjustments to get the second floor to line up, but wish I could draw it like it really is. Every other minor scuffle I had with suite has been overcome so far, and the project design is coming along nicely.

Thanks for all the help here at the site.

Sunny

[John Pallett]

Hi Sunny --

If you set your platform thickness in the floor defaults you're setting the default thickness for the floor - you can still set it for each ROOM in the Room Specification dialog (see the "Structure" tab).

Glad Pro is working out for you, would love to see some renderings here when you get the model done.

[Sunny]

John,

With your last advice, I have been making excellent progreess at drawing the as built plan of the old homestead. Thanks very much. And, yes, I would be happy to share when I get both the as builts, and the mods plan completed, just let me know how to do that. It is an interesting task. The century+ old family farm stead has had several additions over its life. Each made sense at the time, but very steep stairs, 17" original stone foundations, one of which runs through the middle of the first floor, double layer block wall additions, slopped shed style roofs over floor and a half rooms, and the house being built into a hill side have made this a true adventure. So far, HD Pro is handling things pretty well.

I did, however, have something unusual happen that has me a little confused. In the first floor layout, we have a living room adjacent to a mud room. The concrete slab of the mud room is about 1 foot lower than the rest of the 1st floor. I had these rooms separated with a wall, added the existing staircase in the living room, lowered the room floor in the mud room , and adjusted the mud room wall toward the side of the staircase. Some time later, I was checking floor and ceiling heights before moving on to the second floor. I found that the mud room had become 0 for the floor, not -12". I could not select only the living room or only the mud room. When I changed the floor height in one, I got the change in both. After some time, I put an invisible wall just insde the walls of the mud room, and found that my -12" had come back. This has sufficed for depicting the lowered floor, over which will go a new floor surface level with the rest of the first floor, and provide a space for drain plumbing for a new guest powder room. However, I must wonder where I did something that got me into a situation where I could not select individual rooms when they were clearly separated by walls.

I have some theories, but can't resolve them with experimentation. What did I do to 'bleed' specifications; disallow individual room selection for specification?

Back to the drawing,

Sunny

[John Pallett]

Hi Sunny --

When you originally build foundations, it determines what kind of room (and floor height) is above it, and adapts accordingly. That's the only thing I can think of off-hand that would account for what you saw.

You can attach JPGs to messages here, or send images in to http://support.homedesignersoftware.com/ -- they may even get posted in the user gallery, if you're interested.

Glad things are going well!