ARE YOU USING THE RECOMMENDED VIDEO DRIVER?

It's very important to use the recommended/certified video driver for SolidWorks.

FIRST: What do you have?
1. Start, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System Information.
2. Check and Note:
—- System Summary:
—- —- A. OS Name
—- —- B. Version
—- —- C. System Manufacturer
—- —- D. System Model
—- —- E. Processor (how many and speed. IE. 2 @ ~2330Mhz)
—- —- F. Total Physical Memory
—- Components, Display
—- —- A. Name
—- —- B. Adapter Ram
—- —- C. Driver Version (IE. 6.14.11.7575)

SECOND: What does SOLIDWORKS Recommend?
1. www.solidworks.com
2. System/Graphics Card Requirements Link
3. System/Graphics Card Requirements Window
—- 1. Certified – leave it selected.
—- 2. System Vendor – VERY IMPORTANT!
How did the card get here? With the PC or separate? There are some differences between NVIDIA from Dell version from somewhere else.
—- 3. SOLIDWORKS Version
—- 4. Operating System
—- 5. Card or Vendor
4. Pick the Show button
5. What Driver version do they list? Are there any notes, what do they say?
Note: Newer version drivers are not guaranteed to work better, and sometimes don't!

THIRD: Get that certified driver.
1. From the Recommended list, select the Blue text for the driver version to download the driver.

FOURTH: How to install that certified driver.
Per SolidWorks
Solution Id: S-033561
Question: When upgrading video card drivers, what is SolidWorks’ recommended process?
Answer: In several cases installation of video card drivers by update rather than as a fresh installation have been found to generate a variety of problems from SOLIDWORKS not starting to black screens and intermittent abnormal terminations.  When installing video card drivers we recommend:

First uninstall the video card driver and revert back to the default Windows VGA / SVGA driver.  After the triggered reboot, reinstall the tested video card drivers.

1. Right click on your My Computer, Properties, Hardware, device manager, display adapters.
2. Then right click the video card, choose uninstall.

This will force you to reboot, then upon restarting disable anti-virus and install the new driver from the downloaded folder. On occasion this will state that it can't find any hardware that matches your driver. If this occurs. Right click on your My Computer, Properties, Hardware, device manager, display adapters. Then right click the video card, choose update driver and browse to the proper location of the new driver.

STILL HAVING PROBLEMS?: It's time to capture the issue with SolidWorksRx

START->All Programs->SolidWorks->SOLIDWORKS 2009 SPx.x->SOLIDWORKS Tools->SolidWorksRx
—Note: Shut SOLIDWORKS down before starting SolidWorksRx—

1. Select Problem Capture
2. a. Describe Problem – Complete this the best you can.
3. b. Re-Create the Problem – Pick "Begin Recording".
4. Recreate Problem Window – Select Re-create the problem in SOLIDWORKS, Start new session, Record with video.
——You can leave the Options button alone.
5. Pick Ok.
SOLIDWORKS will launch, do what you would to make the problem show up or crash etc.
After a crash you'll be returned to SolidWorksRx.
If there isn't a crash and you've recreated the issue, just close out of SolidWorks.
Again you'll be back to the SolidWorksRx window.
6. Package – Please select Add Files under Related SOLIDWORKS File.
7. Package Files.
The filename will be long, it starts with your SOLIDWORKS serial number then the date. {SN}_{Date time group}.  It will be located in My DocumentsSW Log files.  Locate the file and send that to us.

If the zip file is less than 5MB's e-mailing it to CATI should be fine.
If it's bigger than 5MB we should have you FTP the file to us.

This Rx zip file will give us a great deal of information to go on as we troubleshoot the issue further for you.

Thank You,
CATI Technical Support
888-285-2284