BricsCAD

It does everything I used to do in AutoCAD LT, with very similar functionality, and it works on Ubuntu, which is a big plus. I'm a structural engineer and tried all of the free options, none of which were anywhere near developed enough and lacked essential functionality such as XRefs (which are a big part of my work). It is too expensive for casual users to consider (unless 1 month free trial is enough for you!), but all of the viable options seem to have similar prices. I was previously using Draftsight before they dropped support.

I am only giving 4 starts as although it works well, there are a few rough edges and for this money there shouldn't be any!

Hi I recently purchased Bricscad Pro for about $1300. I opened a customer support ticket about four days ago but no one responded. All I needed was the BRX SDK, an application for writing c++ programs for Bricscad. This is easily and freely downloadable for AutoCad users, even if you just have a student/trial version. I contacted the Bricsys channel director (whatever that is) and I was told I need to register as a developer, which I did, but still I cannot access the BRX SDK. I asked the channel director where I can get the SDK but he has not responded. I also emailed backoffice@bricsys.com, two corporate headquarters and the US help desk concerning this issue and again no has responded. If I had known that they treat customers this badly I would have never have purchased their product. I could demand a refund, but I think I would have better luck pushing a piano up ten flights of stairs.

I don't know anything about it yet. I am browsing looking for alternative to TurboCAD MAC.

I use version 17 of the BricsCAD for Linux for aproximately 1.5 years. The review is based on this experience. PRO:

1. Similar to AutoCAD: 2D/3D dwg files, system variables, supports AutoCAD commands, works well with AutoLISP.
2. Cheaper than an AutoCAD.
3. Has versions not only for Windows. CONS:
4. Very unstable under Linux: crashes, freezes.
5. After the number of parts in the model over 5-10 work is very slowed down.
6. Problems with non-ASCII encodings.
7. Very inflexible. Not enough settings, some settings that are not working.
8. Terrible support. For more than a year, I have been contacting the support service and have not received any real help.

[Edited by umix, October 17]

Modeling in rendered mode is made easy. You can learn it in just about an hour thanks to the Quad interface, reducing clicks to an minimum.