3D Home Design Suite Professional 5

I get the impression from the reviews that people think being an architect is something one can learn in an afternoon from a book. Not so. If you really want to design something that will be built, the amount of time you will spend mastering this software is nothing compared to the time it will take you to understand how all of the various local and national building code rules are going to force you to do this or that with your plan.

I am not an architect, but I was able to use this software to enable me to have a house built exactly to my specifications. If you aren't willing to invest a lot of time in it, you should hire a professional.


Most UNINTUITIVE product ever used   March 15, 2004
8 out of 9 found this review helpful

I've been in software development and sales for almost 20 years. This product qualifies as the most unitiutive product I've ever used (going back to DOS days). I've sold very sofisiticated software products that were 100 times easier to use. I can't believe Broderbund trys to sell this as a consumer product. In addition, after working on a design for an hour or so the software would crash and corrupt the file forcing me to recreate my work. Never mind saving your work every few minutes. It didn't matter as it would still corrupt the file. I would highly recommend finding a different solution.


What A Piece Of Garbage!   February 11, 2004
12 out of 12 found this review helpful

Can't add much that hasn't already been said...hard to use, completely counter-intuitive...and the help index and instruction manual are useless. If you type in "soffit," "beam," or "fireplace" there aren't even entries with corresponding instructions! Also, where are commands for crown molding, baseboard, etc? I'll stick with Version 3, which is a much easier-to-use product and offers more features.


This is a HUGE step backward from version 3.0   January 27, 2004
Mark Mills (Fort Collins, CO United States)
14 out of 15 found this review helpful

I've used 3D Home Architect 3.0 for years with great success. Even though it's 5 years old, it beats the pants off of version 5.1. Actually, 5.1 appears to be a completely different package, and you can't open any projects that you created with the older versions. Tasks that were so simple with 3.0 are ridiculously difficult and frustrating with 5.1. For example, if you add an interior wall that is not connected to an exterior wall, you have to drag it to where you think you want it, then measure (with a very difficult to use tape measure), then move it again, measure, and repeat until it's where you want it. What happened to automatical visual dimension lines that were in 3.0!!!? The primary problem with this version lies in it's lack of usability. It takes hours to do what took minutes in the previous version. I was grateful for Broderbund's money back guarantee - I took them up on it. This product stinks. The biggest dissapointment is, there's no upgrade path for fan's of 3D Home Architect 3.0, which was (and still is) an exceptional product. I STRONGLY recommend against this product.