Customer Reviews

Better Homes and Gardens Home Designer Suite 6.0 [OLD VERSION]

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

I was looking for a software that would let me create a good design of my new house. I am not an architect and I am not interested in details such as plumbing, electrical, framing etc. I just wanted to create the walls, add the doors windows, furniture, stairs, roof, etc.

This software can do all of these easily, no bugs, no frustration, everything fits or can be rezized. So far I am 80% done with my house. I have had no crashes when I use it with my desktop (2.6 GHZ P4, 256 RAM, GeForce FX5200). But it crashes when I use it with my Laptop (P4 1.8 GHZ, 512RAM but a mobility ATI radeon). The error message says it crashed because of my video card and it happens when switching to 3d view.

To see the good about this software read the marketing review, I strongly agree in all of them. I'll list only my complains:
- Not 100% of the objects can be copy/paste from one plan to the other.
- When you start a design make sure you carefully select the template plan. The template plan gives properties to the objects (cabinets, tables, walls, etc). Because when you are half way in your design and realize that you want some object (ie fancy railings) that is not available in your template but it is in another, you also realize that you cannot change the template of the plan you are currently using. You can open a new plan with the correct template, add the object and do a copy and paste, but not all objects can be copy and pasted (ie. Railings).
- When you switch to 3d view it recalculates everything. This gets annoying and slow when your project is almost finished.
- So far i do not see a solution to adding new objects. For example a new door style, a new sofa style. The publisher does not have an online database where they can add new styles for users to keep their design updated.

The software is pricy but it is the best I have used. Granted that I have not used the punch software. I have wasted 15/20$ at a time buying low cost software on the software bins

A few years ago, when designing 2 rooms at my office, I became fluent in most of the off-the-shelf, under $100 design programs. I recall switching between 2 applications that each had great features, and would have made a perfect product if merged. One was 3D Home Architect 3, the other (which I can't recall the name) had some similarities to Home Designer 6. Having just tried 3D Home Architect 5 & Home Designer 6, I still have the same feeling: each has very strong & very weak points.

Having now sampled both applications, I can't seem to figure how so many people posted hate for 3DHA. I think it's a tie between the two.

My big criticism w/ HD6 is that you cannot manually change wall dimensions. It was incredibly tedious to recreate rooms based on the dimensions I had. Apparently, the pro version ($500) allows this function, but I wasn't going to pay that for my little project. When you click a wall you've created in 3DHA, it displays measurements to every other nearby wall. You then can click any of those measurements to resize it manually. This is the absolute most logical way to get exact measurements.

In HD6, the library of items is pretty skimpy compared to 3DHA. 3DHA easily allows custom items to show in the 'library' so it's easy to reuse them.

As for the 3D rendering, 3DHA really sucks. It is incredibly difficult to get the camera view into custom positions. This is where HD6 is best. You can arrange multiple cameras in your layout, each corresponding to another rendered window. You can also double-click the camera in the layout & it brings up other view settings such as height & field of vision angle.

As for working w/ your layout, 3DHA allows you to drag a selection tool over multiple items, creating a multiple selection. You can then move all of those items at once, or select their properties. For changing the color of multiple items, this is great. HD6 does not allow you to select multiple items & then change characteristics of them. Imagine having a room you want to change the color of all of the cabinets. According to my findings, in HD6 you'd have to change each cabinet one by one. In 3DHA you would just hold the shift key & select all of the cabinets, then make your changes.

Maybe I'm asking for too much from <$100 programs, but it sure seems both programs make it much harder to do things then they have to.

After reading each of the reviews for this product and competing products, and then purchasing and using this software, I would suggest to any potential buyer that they use an old statistical averaging method to get a fix on the Home Designer software. Read all of the reviews, and then throw out the "OMIGOD! THIS IS THE BEST SOFTWARE EVER INVENTED!" noise, and do the same with the slam reviews.
This is a three to four star product, depending upon how deep is the level that you want to go in configuring your project. The program is fairly intuitive and easy to learn on the fly, with useful help information and a user manual that allows for quick reference instead of tech-speak, however the available features and the library are very limited.
I needed a program that would allow me to visualize the essence of the remodel work that we are planning, and this product did achieve that goal. The various perspectives are a fun way to view your project after you have completed the setup work, and you can remodel in various ways and compare the views. This program would also be useful for someone who wants to provide a "sketch" of their proposed work to a designer or contractor and then let the pro take over from there, hopefully with a much sharper idea of what you are trying to achieve.
In a nutshell, it's a little pricey for a hobby software (check for rebates or discounts), but when compared with the overall cost of a remodel project or home building project it may save you significant costs in midcourse design changes and mistakes. It has some WOW factor with it's 3D, dollhouse and glass house, interior and exterior views, so you can amaze and delight your friends and neighbors, who will put you on the technology pedestal we all crave so much (yeah...c'mon...admit it). Sit down with a cold beer, plug it in, learn it, use it, enjoy it, just don't expect too much.

I read many reviews of home design programs before buying this one. Although it installed and ran without any problems (on Windows 2000), I was unable to accomplish what I wanted with it, which was draw some designs involving wooden beam structures, and flat Santa Fe style roofs. It seems that one can only draw the high level objects that it has preprogrammed, and cannot draw arbitrary objects. I also found it impossible to draw walls of thichnesses other than the dimensions preprogrammed (e.g., I wanted a 12" thick wall, but the only choices were something like 6 and 9"). The program claims to have "full CAD ability", but this appears to be only 2D CAD, not 3D CAD.
This program is probably good if you can use the objects built in (i.e., their walls, roofs, etc).

This is the right tool in the hundred dollar range for home design. It is simple enough to play with floor plans and let you create and visualize and manipulate them. I've used it a few hours and find it 90% intuitive.

It does all that is says that it will do. I don't see any false claims in the descriptions.

Here are some things that I haven't figured out to make it do easily or at all.
1. Construction details for framing connections are not part of this package.
2. Same thing for all other concrete wall and roof structures.
3. No engineering support for beam calcs, earthquake, snow load or the like.
4. Some complex roof lines that you might want to create are difficult or even impossible to express with this package, but you can likely get close.
5. Roofs that cross floors and split level homes are possible but not intuitive to create for me.

You likely will find this a design/visualization tool for expressing your ideas in a better way than you can draw them with pencil. A couple of hours to learn to use it and you can start playing with interesting ideas.

Highly recommended.

This is great software. I have the Home Architect Deluxe 3.0, so I already had some experience with how the program would work. From that, this version let's you do amazing things if you take the time and put in a little effort. Photo quality renderings that no architect could ever give you.

Anyone who is giving this a low rating isn't spending enough time with it. And that's not to say you need to take a course on it.... I spent about 3-4 hours and got the results I wanted, which was a 3D rendering of our planned house, which has a complex roofline. Powerful software can overwhelm people, or they just don't want to give it the time to learn. Like Microsoft Excel, you can't expect to become an ace with spreadsheets just because you buy the software. You have to put in a little time to learn.

The results you can get from this software can't be produced any other way. Buy it and spend some time with it and you will love it.

Let me preface this by saying: I spent 10 years building houses and I am now a 10 year IT professional who can use almost any software out of the box with no assistance.

This program is one of the most unintuitive programs I have ever used. You WILL need to read the thick user manual to use this program. You WILL laugh when you figure out how the design team expects you to figure out how to do what should be something very simple.

If you want to design one room, or a simple rancher with a gable roof, you will eventually be successful. However, if your house has any type of architectural details or varying roof lines, forget it. The scaled down version of Chief Architect's full product offers very few options for almost everything: roof types, surface and wall coverings, kitchen cabinets, windows, doors, and furnishings. I was shocked that staples of almost every house designed today are completely missing. Have a cathedral ceiling in the house? Forget it. Have a tray ceiling? Forget it. Putting an appliance garage in the kitchen? Nope. Have dormers on the roof? Forget it. Jacuzzi tub? Uh uh. Big windows in the family room? If you happen to have one of the 3 sets available in the program, you are in luck. I could go on and on...

I had the blueprints of the house, with all measurements, and even with my software and building experience, the house is 75% complete after 5 attempts and I have given up. I am an opinionated person who has written one review of a product in my whole life, this one, because I feel you should know what you are getting. Like I said, for one room, or a rancher, you will probably be successful but otherwise, save your money.

We bought this software after researching alot of others to find the best product for the price we wanted to spend. We are very happy that we chose Home Designer! Our project is adding 1500 square feet, part of which is a second story, to our existing home as owner/builders (pretty ambitious, huh?). We have been able to design and redesign with this software while working out alot of the problems we have with our lot constrictions. We read about other programs only having preprogrammed lot dimensions that weren't editable, but we drew our weird lot dimensions and started right in! It's nice to see that things we thought would work in our heads aren't really that practical when you put them "on paper". We now have the luxury of seeing everything in the new space that we dreamed about for years! The decorating aspect of Home Designer is great too with lots of options and textures. We've been able to see the space and plan it better with the AWESOME 3D views, Doll House view and Glass House view. AND it takes hardly any time, is easy to use (love the drag and drop) and we had a "do-able" plan within 3-4 hours. We still have the roof to work out but that's it. We haven't had any problems with crashing or drawing speed. It all works seamlessly and really quite fast. Our computer runs Windows XP with 512mb RAM and a 64mb GeForce4 MX graphics card. We highly recommend this software for home building or remodeling!

Great Product,
My wife and I have been planning to remodel our kitchen. A friend recommended BHG Home Designer. It was easy to install, and within an hour we had a plan of our current kitchen down to the tile floor and cabinet woodgrain. We drew four walls, made a 3D view, and then were able to add and resize cabinets, appliances, windows, and lights. The best thing was that my wife and I can sit down together and design different kitchens, save and modify them later. Next, I am going to model my entire home and test different exterior paint colors. I understand that the landscaping tools are just as good as the home design tools. I can't wait to use them. The best $80.00 that I have spent in a long time!

When I read the other reviews on this product, I was a bit surprised at their very positive nature. Then I remembered how I felt when I first tried this program and it all made sense. My guess is that the folks who wrote the positive reviews probably haven't worked with the program for very long or tried to create anything but the most elementary structures. I know I was very impressed at first. That is until I tried to re-create my own home as the starting point for a remodeling project.

This program is very intuitive and easy to learn, the problem is that it is also very limited. After you get past the ease of creating floor plans, the next obvious progression is to see the building in 3D. That's where the problems begin. The roof planes are nearly impossible to control. If you are creating anything other than a simple cape or ranch, you will quickly see how un-nerving this program can be.

Since most homes are comprised of several sections, controlling how the roof planes associated with those sections are generated is critical if you are to be able to create an end product that resembles what you had in mind. This program takes almost all of the roof plane control away from the user. The program generates the roof planes based on a few user defined parameters. This results in 3D images that almost never match what I had in mind.

Just for the record, I'm not technologically impaired. I am an engineer by trade. If I can't get it to work, then the average user is likely going to have even more trouble. In the end, if you can't get an accurate 3D model from this program that resembles what you are trying to create, then why spend the money or the time on this program. Just get a $10 floor plan program or jump up to the $500 version of this Chief Architect program which, as I've been told (haven't used it myself) , is very capable.