Chapter 1: Installation Prerequisites for Windows

This document describes the steps necessary to correctly install and configure all ANSYS, Inc. products
on Windows platforms for Release 19.2. These products include:

• ANSYS Structural Mechanics

– ANSYS Mechanical Products (includes ANSYS Mechanical and Mechanical APDL)

– ANSYS Customization Files for User Programmable Features

• ANSYS Explicit Dynamics

– ANSYS Autodyn

– ANSYS LS-DYNA

• ANSYS Fluid Dynamics

– ANSYS CFX (includes ANSYS CFD-Post)

– ANSYS Fluent (includes ANSYS CFD-Post)

– ANSYS TurboGrid

– ANSYS Polyflow (includes ANSYS CFD-Post)

– ANSYS CFD-Post only

• ANSYS ICEM CFD

• ANSYS Offshore

– ANSYS Aqwa

• ANSYS Additional Tools

– ANSYS Icepak (includes ANSYS CFD-Post)

– Remote Solve Manager Standalone Services

• ANSYS PDM Interfaces

– Teamcenter

• ANSYS Geometry Interfaces

– AutoCAD

– ACIS

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Installation Prerequisites for Windows

– CATIA, Version 4

– CATIA, Version 5

– CATIA, Version 6

– Creo Elements/Direct Modeling

– Autodesk Inventor

– JTOpen

– NX

– Parasolid

– Creo Parametric

– Solid Edge

– SOLIDWORKS

Note

ANSYS Workbench is installed by default as product components to most ANSYS, Inc. products.
ANSYS Workbench is not installed as part of the products under ANSYS Additional Tools, nor
with the CFD-Post only option. ANSYS Workbench includes the following applications:

• The Mechanical Application

• DesignModeler

• Design Exploration

• Meshing

• Remote Solve Manager

• Fluent Meshing

• EKM Client

• SpaceClaim Direct Modeler

Caution

While SpaceClaim Direct Modeler and ANSYS SpaceClaim can be installed

on the same computer, only one of the applications can be configured
with ANSYS Workbench at any given time. Users can choose which version
to configure via the CAD Configuration Manager utility.

Because some of these applications can be run as standalone applications without ANSYS
Workbench, you will see some but not all of these listed separately as options when you

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2 of ANSYS, Inc. and its subsidiaries and affiliates.
 System Prerequisites

uninstall. In such cases, you will need to select those options in order to uninstall those
components.

Where supported, IGES and STEP Geometry Interfaces will be installed.

Some procedures apply only to specific products and are so noted.

Important Notice
If you want to run multiple releases of ANSYS, Inc. software, you MUST install them chronologically (for
example., Release 19.1 followed by Release 19.2). If you install an earlier release after installing Release
19.2, you will encounter licensing issues that may prevent you from running any products/releases. If
you need to install an earlier release after you have already installed Release 19.2, you MUST uninstall
Release 19.2, then re-install the releases in order.

Summary of New and Changed Features

The following features are new or changed at Release 19.2. Review these items carefully.

• To improve functionality, the installation includes an 18.05 upgrade of the 7zip program.

• The EKM client is included in the ANSYS product installer. The EKM client is installed as part of the Workbench
installation.

1.1. System Prerequisites

ANSYS 19.2 is supported on the following Windows platforms and operating system levels. For up-to-
date information on hardware platforms or operating systems that have been certified, see the Platform
Support section of the ANSYS Website.

Table 1.1: Supported Windows Platforms

Processor Operating System Platform architecture Availability

(directory name)
x64 (64-bit) Windows 7 (Professional & Enterprise), winx64 Download, USB
Windows 10 (Professional, Enterprise
& Education), Windows Server 2012
R2 [1], Windows Server 2016
1. Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 is supported only for select solvers for parallel high performance
execution. Any users running on Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 as non-admin should be a member
of the HPC Users Group in the configuration panel of the HPC Cluster Manager.

For detailed and current support information, see go to the Platform Support section of the
ANSYS Website.

Note

Home editions of Windows operating systems are not supported.

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Installation Prerequisites for Windows

Supported Products By Platform For a complete list of products supported by each platform, see
the Platform Support by Application PDF on the Platform Support section of the ANSYS Website.

Supported Platforms for High Performance Computing See the discussions on Configuring Distrib-
uted ANSYS and Configuring ANSYS CFX Parallel for detailed information on supported platforms for
distributed computing.

1.1.1. CAD Support

The following CAD and auxiliary programs are supported on the indicated products and platforms
(where the CAD product is supported on the noted platforms). Products are:

A = Mechanical APDL
W = ANSYS Workbench
I = ANSYS ICEM CFD (standalone and ANSYS Workbench Readers)

Table 1.2: CAD Support by Platform

Product Windows 7 Windows 10 5

CATIA 4.2.4 A, W, I A, W, I
CATIA V5–6R2018 A, W, I A, W, I
CATIA V5 (CADNexus CAPRI CAE Gateway V3.40.0) W, I W, I2
V5–6R2016, V5–6R2017, V5–6R2018
CATIA V6 R2017x W, I W, I
Parasolid 30.0 A, W, I A, W, I
Creo Parametric 3.0 A, W, I A, W, I3
Creo Parametric 4.0 A, W, I A , W, I8
Creo Parametric 5.0 A, W, I A, W, I
ACIS 2018 A, W, I 1 A, W, I 1
NX 10.0 A, W, I
NX 11.0 A, W, I A, W, I
NX 12.06 A, W, I A, W, I
SOLIDWORKS 2017 W, I W, I
SOLIDWORKS 2018 W, I W, I
Solid Edge ST10 W, I W, I
Solid Edge 2019 W, I W, I
Inventor 2018 W, I W, I
Inventor 2019 W, I7 W, I9
AutoCAD 2018 W, I W, I
AutoCAD 2019 W, I7 W, I9
IGES4 A, W, I A, W, I
JT 10.0 W, I W, I
STEP AP203, AP214 W, I W, I
Creo Elements/Direct Modeling 20.0 W, I W, I
Creo Elements/Direct Modeling 20.1 W, I10 (p. 5) W, I

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 Disk Space and Memory Requirements

Product Windows 7 Windows 10 5

Teamcenter Unified Architecture 11.2 (2– & 4–tier) with NX W, I
10.0 only
Teamcenter Unified Architecture 11.2.2 (NX 11 only) W, I
GEMS I I
IDI MS8/9 I I
Rhinoceros W, I W, I
SketchUp W, I W, I
GAMBIT 2.4 W, I W, I

1. For ICEM CFD standalone, ACIS 18.0.1 is the supported version for all platforms.

2. Requires V5-6R2016 or later.

3. Requires Creo Parametric 2.0 M190.

4. IGES Versions 4.0, 5.2, and 5.3 are supported.

5. Professional, Education and Enterprise

6. Not supported with ANSYS Fluent

7. Requires operating system's SP1 Update KB4019990

8. Requires Creo Parametric 3.0 M060 or later.

9. Requires operating system's Anniversary Update version 1607 or higher

10. Requires operating system SP1.

Note

View the latest supported CAD packages at ansys.com> Solutions> Solutions by Role>
IT Professionals> Platform Support> CAD Support.

1.2. Disk Space and Memory Requirements

You will need the disk space shown here for each product for installation and proper functioning. The
numbers listed here are the maximum amount of disk space you will need for each ANSYS, Inc. product.
Depending on the options selected for each product and shared product features, you may require less
disk space when installing multiple products.

Product Disk Space

ANSYS Discovery AIM 17.3 GB
ANSYS Autodyn 9.1 GB
ANSYS LS-DYNA 9.6 GB
ANSYS CFD Post only 9.0 GB
ANSYS CFX 9.3 GB

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Installation Prerequisites for Windows

Product Disk Space

ANSYS Chemkin 9.4 GB
ANSYS Energico 9.4 GB
ANSYS Model Fuel Library (Encrypted) 9.4 GB
ANSYS Reaction Workbench 9.4 GB
ANSYS FENSAP-ICE 9.3 GB
ANSYS Fluent 11.6 GB
ANSYS Forte 9.3 GB
ANSYS Polyflow 12.6 GB
ANSYS TurboGrid 9.1 GB
ANSYS ICEM CFD 9.5 GB
ANSYS Aqwa 8.9 GB
ANSYS Mechanical APDL 12.6 GB
ANSYS Icepak 12.5 GB
ANSYS Remote Solve Manager Standalone Services 8.6 GB
ANSYS Viewer 8.7 GB
Teamcenter 8.7 GB
ANSYS Geometry Interfaces 8.9 GB
CATIA V5 8.6 GB
CATIA v6 8.8 GB
Disk space required to install all products: 29.4 GB

Product installations also require an additional 500 MB of free disk space during an installation.

Memory Requirements You must have a minimum of 8 GB of memory to run product installations;
16 or 32 GB of memory is recommended.

1.3. Software Prerequisites

You must have the following software installed on your system. Administrator privileges are required
to install these files. These software prerequisites are installed automatically when you launch the
product installation. If, after installing the ANSYS products, you need to check your system for these
software prerequisites or re-install any of them at a later date, open the Product & CAD Configuration
Manager and select Check for Required Prerequisites or Install Required Prerequisites.

• A minimum version of Microsoft .NET Framework 4.6.2 is required.

Note

If your computer does not have Microsoft .NET Framework 4.6.2 installed, the install-
ation program installs .NET 4.6.2 as a prerequisite and may require a system restart
after exiting the installation and before running any ANSYS products.

• Intel OpenCL runtimes when using the ANSYS Discovery AIM product

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 Requirements for the GPU Accelerator in Mechanical APDL

• Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable (32 and 64 bit versions)

• Microsoft Visual C++ 2012 Redistributable (32 and 64 bit versions)

• Microsoft Visual C++ 2013 Redistributable (32 and 64 bit versions)

• Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Redistributable (32 and 64 bit versions)

Note

The Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Redistributable will not be installed if you already have
the Microsoft Visual C++ 2017 Redistributable installed on your computer.

Prior to installing, you can find the executables for the software prerequisites in the root \prereq
directory of the media/download package.

1.4. Requirements for the GPU Accelerator in Mechanical APDL

Your system must meet the following requirements to use the GPU accelerator capability in Mechanical
APDL:

• The machine(s) being used for the simulation must contain at least one NVIDIA GPU card. The following
cards are recommended:

NVIDIA Tesla Series (any model)

NVIDIA Quadro GV100
NVIDIA Quadro GP100
NVIDIA Quadro P6000
NVIDIA Quadro P5000
NVIDIA Quadro M6000
NVIDIA Quadro K6000

• When using the sparse solver or eigensolvers based on the sparse solver (for example, Block Lanczos or
subspace), only NVIDIA GPU devices with significant double precision performance (FP64) are recommended
in order to achieve optimal performance. These include the following models:

NVIDIA Tesla Series (any model except the following: K10/M4/M40/M6/M60/P4/P40)

NVIDIA Quadro GV100
NVIDIA Quadro GP100
NVIDIA Quadro K6000

• NVIDIA GPU devices with at least 12GB of on-card memory are recommended in order to achieve optimal
performance.

• For NVIDIA GPU cards, the driver version must be 385.54 or newer. For optimal performance on Windows,
the TCC (Tesla Compute Cluster) driver mode is recommended when using Tesla series GPU cards. Some
limitations exist when using this driver mode. Check your GPU card documentation for more details on how
to set this driver mode and the existing limitations.

• To utilize a NVIDIA GPU device that is not on the recommended list of cards, set the following environment
variable:

ANSGPU_OVERRIDE=1

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Installation Prerequisites for Windows

This is most beneficial when you wish to run on newer NVIDIA GPUs that were not available at the
time of release of this version of the ANSYS program. If you choose to use this environment variable,
you should ensure that the NVIDIA GPU device that you wish to use is sufficiently powerful, in terms
of both double-precision compute power and on-card memory, to achieve meaningful acceleration
for your simulation. Using this environment variable with an underpowered CPU may actually decel-
erate your simulation.

Note

On Windows, the use of Remote Desktop may disable the use of a GPU device. Launching
Mechanical APDL through the ANSYS Remote Solve Manager (RSM) when RSM is installed
as a service may also disable the use of a GPU. In these two scenarios, the GPU accelerator
capability cannot be used. Using the TCC (Tesla Compute Cluster) driver mode, if applicable,
can circumvent this restriction.

1.5. Additional Hardware and Software Requirements

• Intel 64 / AMD64 system with the correct operating system version installed

• 8 GB of RAM

• 128 GB free on the hard drive is recommended

• A current default web browser must be installed to view the ANSYS internet-based help documentation.

For a complete list of supported browsers, see the Browser Support PDF on the Platform Support
section of the ANSYS Website.

For a local copy of the product documentation on your system, download an installable version from
the ANSYS Download Center. Instructions for installing the Local Help are included with the download
package.

• Discrete graphics card with the latest drivers and compatible with the supported operating systems. For full
functionality, use of a recent NVIDIA Quadro or AMD FirePro card with at least 1 GB of discrete video memory
and supporting OpenGL version 4.5 or above. Intel Iris Pro Integrated graphics has also been used successfully.

For information on the most recently tested graphics cards, see the Graphics Cards TestedPDF on
the Platform Support section of the ANSYS Website.

For the ANSYS DiscoveryAIM product, see also ANSYS Discovery AIM Requirements (p. 9).

Note

– Vendor Legacy Support: To be compatible, legacy GL 4.5 compliant cards should

still be within the official legacy support period of their respective graphics vendor,
and must still be receiving regular driver updates. Visit the vendor websites (AMD
and NVIDIA) to review legacy hardware lists.

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 Additional Hardware and Software Requirements

• A minimum screen resolution of: 1024 x 768 (4:3 aspect ratio), 1366 x 768 (16:9 aspect ratio) or 1280 x 800
(16:10 aspect ratio) with minimum 24 bit color. A higher screen resolution such as 1920x1080 (16:9) or
1920x1200 (16:10) is strongly recommended for most applications.

Note

– Some combinations of graphics card type, operating system, and MPEG resolution fail
to play MPEGs properly. You may be able to get normal playback results simply by
changing the MPEG settings. Alternatively, you can upgrade your graphics card.

– Ultra High Definition (4K) Graphics Cards: Use of Ultra High Definition (4K) graphics
cards may cause a number of cosmetic display issues (including enlarged or reduced
text and incorrect positioning of option labels). These issues do not affect the function-
ality of the installation program.

• Microsoft Mouse or a mouse. Most applications require a three-button mouse.

• If you use a 3Dconnexion product, ensure that you have the latest version of the drivers installed.

• Approximately twice as much swap space as memory. The amount of memory swap space on the system
may limit the size of the ANSYS model that can be created and/or solved.

• TCP/IP for the license manager (see the ANSYS Licensing Guide for more information on TCP/IP).

Although TCP/IP is included as part of the operating system, it may not be installed by default. When
TCP/IP is installed, it must be bound to a network adapter. On machines that are connected to an
internal network, TCP/IP must be bound to a network card such as an Ethernet adapter. The vast
majority of systems using TCP/IP will fall into this category. On machines that connect to the internet
or corporate intranet through a modem, TCP/IP can be bound to the Remote Access Service. Also,
the Autodial option of the Internet Options must be disabled so that the machine does not attempt
to connect to the Internet every time ANSYS is run. See the ANSYS Licensing Guide for more inform-
ation.

• Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) 11 or greater is recommended for proper operation of ANSYS Workbench.
Once the correct version of IE is installed, it does not have to be your default Internet browser. After install-
ation, simply run your preferred browser and reestablish it as the default.

• PDF reader software is required to read the installation guides and other user documentation.

To access our help system videos, ANSYS recommends that you set Windows Media Player as your
default.

1.5.1. ANSYS Discovery AIM Requirements

Minimum of OpenCL 1.2 drivers are required to make use of Exploratory Results Processing in AIM.

• Graphics driver installation for AMD, NVIDIA and Intel will either provide OpenCL by default or as an option.

• We recommend you additionally have installed INTEL or AMD CPU drivers, these can allow us to offload
more work to unused cores.

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Installation Prerequisites for Windows

1.5.2. 3Dconnexion Product Support

Only specific ANSYS applications have been tested for manipulating the model (turning, zooming,
panning, etc.) with the 3Dconnexion products. While these 3Dconnexion products do provide significantly
enhanced 3D control over viewing the model, they do not function as a mouse replacement and selection
operations still require a mouse. For a complete list of 3Dconnexion products certified with the current
release of ANSYS applications, see the 3Dconnexion Devices Certification PDF on the Platform Support
section of the ANSYS Website.

To use a 3Dconnexion product with the listed products, you must download and install the appropriate
Microsoft Windows driver for your version of Windows. Refer to http://www.3dconnexion.com for more
information on using Space products and to download the appropriate drivers.

Spaceball/Connexion3D functionality in ANSYS Discovery AIM

• Only the "FIT" built in function is supported.

• Most of the other operations can be simulated by mapping Connexion functions to keyboard shortcuts
supported in ANSYS Discovery AIM. See Manipulating a Geometric Entity for more information on AIM key-
board shortcuts.

1.6. Third-Party Software and other Security Considerations

The following third-party products are used as part of the installation process. In order for the installation
to work properly, you must allow access to these products.

Product Name Executable Name

Tcl tclsh.exe
Tk want.exe
Perl perl.exe
7zip 7z.exe
Microsoft .NET .net
Framework

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