Before I buy into software does anyone use Vcarve Pro on the Pro 5 4x4 with bit setter and bit zero?
My question is does it work just like in Carbide V7 or V8?
If you select an appropriate post-processor, it should work quite well.
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I have a Shapeoko Pro 5 4x2, and I almost exclusively use Vectric Vcarve Pro to design my projects and generate toolpaths.
I’m running the exported toolpaths with Carbide Motion, and I can confirm that BitSetter and BitZero work as intended.
That is my question so export all and use Motion for the file to run?
I have the trail right now and on setup it asked about carbide motion
So I did not know
Just not sure I want to spend money on vcarve pro just yet
…so export all and use Motion for the file to run?
Yes, that’s what I’m doing.
When exporting a project from Vcarve that contains multiple toolpaths, you can create a single file containing all the toolpaths, and Carbide Motion will correctly prompt for tool changes.
You can also export each toolpath seperately if you wanted to run them one at a time I guess.
As to whether Vcarve is worth the money or not…hard to say. I’m not very sophisticated, and probably I could use Carbide Create for everything, but Vcarve definitely feels more powerful and more polished, and I guess it just clicked with me after spending time with the demo. It is $699 which is not cheap, though.
Vcarve is a nice program but is rather expensive. So if you are going to go from free to a paid program my question would be what would be the advantage to make it worth while. I have thought about Vetric Vcarve but that is as far as it went. Until I starting bumping my head on the upper limit of Carbide Create I cannot justify the expense of going to Vetric Vcarve.
So unless you have run out of options in CC for what you are doing why upgrade? Now if your answer is I just want to that is a different situation over I need to upgrade. If you feel it would have some advantage then go for it but if you have not mastered CC or got it strained to 100% of its capability I would not move up. That is just my humble opinion. I spend my money the way I want and you have the privilege of spending your money the way you want. A lot of our forum users use Vetric and are quite happy with it. However more on the forum are using CC and are quite happy with it. Decisions Decisions. 
Carbide create has gotten alot more features over the years. If the carbide create of today was available back when I bought my shapeoko I would probably still be with it.
At the time, however, I decided to upgrade to paid software. What I did was go to VCarve desktop. No issues running it with the shapeoko.
The 24” limitations of vcarve desktop was fine for most of what I cut. When I was cutting a sheet goods that was bigger, I exported the svg from vcarve to carbide create to make the toolpaths that where larger then 24”.
There isnt a requirement to spend large amounts of money upfront, consider growing into the hobby as your needs grow since vectric can be upgraded at a latter day.
I owned Vectric Aspire before I owned a Shapeoko so I never tried Carbide Create. But I will say that Carbide Motion works flawlessly with Vectric Products.
I have a 4x2 and use these and everything works great. I have no issues.
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