The performance of SYNCHRO 4D Pro and its suite of products (including SYNCHRO OpenViewer and Scheduler) relies not only on your hardware setup but also on the expertise, habits, and workflows of its users.

The SYNCHRO 4D team has compiled these hardware requirements, recommendations, and best practices, drawing from internal research and feedback from our dedicated users. The following suggestions should be used in combination to help you take the first step to bring models to SYNCHRO 4D Pro more efficiently and reliably.

General rules of thumb:

• Any .sp file over 250MB is considered a large file or project. Over the years, .sp file size has improved and is highly compressed. SYNCHRO 4D Pro does not limit file sizes – whether it is for a private project .sp, or cloud-based 4D models managed through Bentley Infrastructure Cloud Portal, and it can become very large, up to 2 GB or more.
• .sp or model file size is NOT the most important indicator of file performance, so there isn't a “recommended" size for .sp files.
• Topics in this article contribute to optimized model performance and should be considered before creating a 4D model in SYNCHRO 4D Pro.

Topics in this section

1. Hardware and system requirements - configure your workstation hardware, operating system, and network environments to improve performance.
2. Performance optimization starts before using SYNCHRO 4D Pro: 
   1. SYNCHRO 4D Pro offers the best-in-class 3D interoperability with support for import, export, and synchronization of various model file types. For all file types supported by SYNCHRO 4D Pro, please review the in-product Help documentation (press F1 in the product).
   2. Before creating a 4D model in SYNCHRO 4D Pro, it is up to you to decide the most suitable approach by following the best practices below and adhering to the same file and model management approach throughout the project.
   3. Additionally, you can leverage the tools in the authoring product to hide and filter out the unneeded 3D objects, choose to export only the needed properties to user fields and values, remove textures and materials, reduce the level of detail, etc. Focus on what matters (those that need to be visualized in the 4D model), only export what's needed, and/or import them into SYNCHRO 4D Pro.
   4. Leverage Bentley iModels for cloud projects – see supported file formats by iModel Connectors here.
   5. Performance optimization when working with Autodesk file formats
      1. Revit (link to best practices, under construction) – either using the Plugin for Revit, or using DWF/DWFx
      2. Navisworks – Plugin for Navisworks. It is generally NOT recommended to use the Plugin for Navisworks due to its known limitations, generating excessive and unnecessary levels and objects. However, we understand that not all projects have access to model files in their native formats, and this approach sometimes is the only option.
      3. Infraworks (link to best practices, under construction)
3. Expected model performance and behaviors on example large models (link to metrics on most recent example large projects, under construction)
4. Optimize performance and navigation experience in SYNCHRO 4D Pro
5. Troubleshooting SYNCHRO 4D Pro Performance with Bentley Support - Follow these instructions and raise a service case. 

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SYNCHRO 4D Pro Best Practices and FAQ