[1fastredsc]

Funny, i always hear from professors and some students that solidworks is one of the easier cad programs. Our department here taught us Pro-E, but just last year moved to Unigraphics(the class behind us learned the new one), and in high school i was taught AutoCAD. AutoCAD of back then was easy if you stayed to 2 dimensions, but if you wanted to model in 3D then forget it, Pro-E is like a god send when it came to that. Also Pro-E does part assemblies, CAM, and simple structure and thermo analysis. Unigraphics doesn't seem to hard, i've watched our lower undergrads use it and it seems straight forward. I've never used solidworks, or even seen it, so i'll refrain from personal opinion until i maybe one day get my hands on a copy. One thing to note, CAD programs are a tool. Like any other tool, they all do the same thing but some just "feel right" or take some getting used to to "feel right". Once your head is used to translating what you want to do into what the CAD program understands, it becomes very easy after that. When in the learning process of that CAD program, doesn't matter which one it is, they all make you go "WTF?" once in awhile.