Autodesk Inventor 2016 - Optimising Graphics (NVIDIA)

By Gus Petrikas

Please note (Disclaimer): Please consult your IT department before making any system configuration changes.

Getting the most of your hardware and software can sometimes be a challenge. If you suffer slow performance and experience often Inventor crashes, that usually means it is having trouble communicating with your Graphics Card (GPU). Basically, if you get any visual artifacts, it likely means that your GPU Drivers need updating or changing.

And here is how to do just that:

First of all, what we need to try is to get the Autodesk Certified Graphics Drivers.

Navigate to the Autodesk Certified Hardware website and use the drop-down menus to match the version of your software and select the GPU Manufacturer.

www.autodesk.com/graphics-hardware

Once you have done that, hit Find, and select the Graphics card model you are using. Use the next page to download the Autodesk Certified graphics driver.

When the driver download finishes, run the setup and follow the "Custom Installation" process:

It is crucial to "Perform a clean installation", otherwise you might corrupt your existing driver.

Proceed to finish the installation. Your computer will restart a couple of times (the installer has to uninstall the current driver first, then install the correct drivers afterwards), your screen will change its resolution a few times as well.

Once that's done - you are good to go.
This process could also be applied to other Autodesk products (such as AutoCAD, or Maya), as long as you can find them in the "Products" dropdown.

Side note: Windows might want to update the graphics driver automatically to the latest version. Make sure you refuse the automatic GPU driver update.