Autodesk Inventor 3D CAD software offers professional-grade 3D mechanical design, documentation, and product simulation tools. These blend parametric, direct, freeform, and rules-based design capabilities. Inventor includes integrated tools for sheet metal, frame design, tube and pipe, cable & harness, presentations, rendering, simulation, and machine design. It also features TrustedDWG® compatibility and Model-Based Definition capabilities for embedding manufacturing information directly in…
$300
12 days over 1 year via Flex pricing 100 tokens
Axure RP
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Axure RP is a software prototyping tool used by UX designers, from Axure Software Solutions in San Diego.
N/A
Pricing
Autodesk Inventor
Axure RP
Editions & Modules
Subscription - Monthly
$305
per month per user
Subscription - Yearly
$2440
per year per user
Subscription - 3 Years
$7320
3 years per user
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Autodesk Inventor
Axure RP
Free Trial
Yes
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
Also available for limited use through tokens on a Flex plan.
Autodesk Inventor is a great tool for students and faculty for engineering areas that don't require great precision or development of more thorough scientific results. Is you are conducting research, or deal with very intricate and complex systems I would recommend a more robust platform that complies more to industry standards.
Still the best IMHO for dynamic prototyping. Sometimes you need to wireframe novel on-page widgets, such as draggable search areas (in the context of map-based search), or interactive annotations on diagrams. And sometimes real data values are necessary for test participants to give good feedback. However, this is something of a niche scenario. The majority of uxers prefer xd or Figma and find that static prototypes (screen1->click->screen2) is sufficient.
The program is very good at simplicity. Each of the buttons, menus, and options has an explanation of exactly what the feature does, and even a more advanced description if you desire to learn more about what each one does.
Autodesk Inventor is a very fast program. Everything renders extremely quickly and there are no delays when examining a 3D model, part, or assembly. This is especially useful when giving a presentation about a product or design, and you need to be able to show a concept to an audience in real time.
The software has an extremely accurate simulation feature that lets users do stress analysis on a 3D model. It can calculate precisely where the stress concentrations are going to be in a particular model and even give you an accurate depiction of where the part could likely fracture and/or fracture during loading.
Adaptive views enable us to create truly responsive designs, even when they are very complex.
The platform’s many available templates and ability to create a library of reusable designs enables us to prototype faster and more efficiently than creating every single design from the ground up.
The company provides a lot of support options, from training videos to online forums. This is a pretty complex tool, so knowing that we can always look up or ask a question and get a quick answer has helped us immensely.
Axure’s comprehensive suite of tools to portray interactivity in prototypes has truly helped us show stakeholders and clients what an end product will look like, which has really helped us gain necessary internal and external buy-in.
Inventor demonstrates a lack of fluidity in the process of transferring data between programs.
Inventor shows some lack of sophistication that certain features that are readily available in other design software packages are limited in use in Inventor.
Inventor can often have difficulty in creating models that show true color, as in blacks can come out as dark grays in certain renders, even when the material and appearance settings are the same from part to part.
Axure feels like a tool that started with a simple interface that wasn't redesigned over time. Simple tasks sometimes require clicking through multiple layers. Crucial pieces of functionality are hidden under text links, or just flatly aren't discoverable. Much of the quirks of the interface only come from having screwed up numerous times, and knowing that certain things are just difficult to accomplish.
I'm giving the overall support rating a 5 only because I rarely have to use it. Trying to find the answer on the help pages hardly ever helps me because any problem I have is usually too deep for what the help offers. Given the popularity of Autodesk, I have always been able to find an answer online after doing enough looking!
I've never used the support for Axure but they do have an online community that can be helpful when you're unsure how to accomplish a specific bit of interactivity. Overall the community for Axure is a great benefit for the software. There are also a lot of shared library assets which can help reduce the time you spend on projects.
I think that the online training videos cover all product features and are a great resource to point people to. The newsletter is also frequent and passes on a range of tips and techniques for users that are eager to learn more, or just want to keep themselves up to date
When it comes to solid modeling, the bad choices died out years ago. So we looked at the total ecosystem and chose Autodesk Inventor because of the integration with Nastran, HSM (machining), Autodesk CFD, MoldFlow, and AutoCAD. This means our legacy data (2D) is still a valid part of our design methodologies going forward, and we have the full breadth of engineering tools at our disposal. Other solutions in this space have similar offerings but not nearly as potent of a portfolio in total. It's worth saying that we do not consider Inventor in the same space as CATIA or NX, but that the entire Autodesk portfolio (e.g. Alias, PowerMill, etc) includes a total toolset that exceeds these industry giants.
Since Axure RP is a desktop software that can work without a cloud connection, it is easy to have approved within a highly restricted corporate environment for a low cost with a small team. iRise is a solution that requires greater amounts of management, best service a group of designers in a corporate environment. InVision is cloud-based and, although not impossible, would require a long-term agreement to be made between the corporate and InVision. These could take years. Origami is free and desktop based and has great control of the transitions and data - but is so granular that additional time commitments may have to be made to make a prototype of this fidelity
Working on a project designed with Inventor provides a modular design platform that can quickly be configured or changed as required. This allows for the quick turn around time for the design and revision of drawings.
We've used Inventor over the years (since 2013) and the updates and newly released versions of Inventor do not require re-training or restrict use.
Autodesk follows an intuitive approach and users or designers who have worked on other design platforms like SolidWorks can transition easily to Inventor.
Axure allows for us to quickly get the entire sales team trained on a specific narrative and gives them a fool proof click path for them to use in the demo.
Axure is relatively inexpensive and allows for purchasing the software without having to pay a monthly subscription (although they do have that option).
The Sketch integration has allowed for a 10 fold increase in productivity by taking designs already created in another program and quickly adding them to Axure.
