Help, SpaceNavigator seems to be really slow in SketchUp?

[wm_cheng]

Hi all,

I have a fairly fast machine, but when I load up large or complex models in SketchUp, the SpaceNavigator slows right down to the point where its unusable. On small simple models, it works beautifully. But on larger ones, it gets quite choppy. I have noticed that the mouse navigation still works at an acceptable level - while the SpaceNavigator slows right down.

I believe that while using the mouse navigation, SketchUp was able to change high-polygon elements to bounding boxes (only some elements like landscaping and trees) to decrease the graphics workload, while SpaceNavigator kept all the high-polygon elements intact. Is this true? (just my observation). Is there some way to enable or toggle conversion to bounding boxes of certain elements while using the SpaceNavigator as well. (other than manually toggling off the layers) It certainly works for the mouse navigation. Without this feature, I can't really use the SpaceNavigator as a replace for mouse navigation. There shouldn't be any speed or qualitative differences between navigating via mouse or SpaceNavigator (unfortunately there is).

I am using the most up to date graphics drivers and 3DConnexion drivers.
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 2.4Ghz
nVidia 8800GTS 640Mb
2Gb DDR2 - PC6400 800Mhz dual channel
WinXP SP2
SketchUp 6.0.312
3Dconnexion release version 3.3.2 (driver version: 6.3.3)

Thanks,
Wm

[ngomes]

Hi wm_cheng,

Thanks for your feedback.

This is a known issue. Currently, support for 3D Mice in Google SketchUp is implemented by an extension that was developed and is maintained by 3Dconnexion. This extension uses the SketchUp API.

In large assemblies, and when using the normal mouse, an application feature known as Level of Details (LOD) control kicks in. When active, the LOD feature reduces the quality of the drawn image whilst keeping a decent frame rate.

Unfortunately, the SketchUp API does not provide a way to activate that feature, thus the observed degradation in performance with large models.

3Dconnexion is currently working with Google to improve the navigation solution for 3D Mice.