free autocad alternative

[Red Squirrel]

I've been searching google but really can't seem to find a program that is even half as easy to use and effective as AutoCAD. I have AutoCAD 2000 but it wont work on XP. I tried the later version of autocad but I really don't like them. They seem very choppy and tedious to use. They changed lot of stuff around like how toolbars work. I want something simple yet effective, and that supports 3D.

I even considered blender, but that program requires a professional course to really know how to use, it's not really something you can just pickup.

 

[bruceb]

You can try this:

When I tried to install Autocad2000 at WindowsXP I got this messase saying that there is a problem installing Autocad 2000 because of my OS (WindowsXP).

So If you Get this error follow these steps:
Go to the Setup.exe (Of Autocad 2000 )file, right click on it and go to Properties. Then click the Compatibility Tab and where it says compatibility mode just click in the box under it and turn it to Windows 2000.
Then click OK and run the Setup.exe
It will work Fine...

 

[Red Squirrel]

Thanks never even thought of trying that! In fact worse comes to worse I could of just made a win2k VM... But yeah that worked, funny thing is, I only have to do it for the setup program. AutoCAD itself works fine in xp.

I searched for free alternatives but as simple as a drafting app seems, it's very hard to find one that even comes close to Autocad. None of the ones I found even had decent 3D modling support.