The formats you can open with Simulation Mechanical, without having the corresponding CAD application installed, are as follows. The supported versions are indicated in the parentheses:
The disadvantage of opening a model without having the CAD application installed on the same computer is that the CAD model and the FEA files do not remain associative. The loads, boundary conditions, material properties, and other setup parameters will need to be re-entered if the CAD model is changed and re-opened in Simulation Mechanical. (See Import CAD Solid Models with CAD Application for details on Associativity.)
If you open an Autodesk Inventor file in Simulation Mechanical, when Inventor is not installed on the same computer, the file might be updated to a newer version. For example, when you open an Inventor 20xx part with Simulation Mechanical 20yy, the original Inventor file is updated to Inventor 20yy standards. This conversion might prevent the file from opening in the original CAD application. Likewise, Simulation Mechanical will not open an Inventor model created in a version of Inventor that is newer than the version of Simulation Mechanical. If Inventor is installed on the same computer, open the model with Inventor and transfer it to Simulation Mechanical to prevent conversion.
Drag-and-drop technology is also supported, so you can simply drag the file onto the Simulation Mechanical icon on the Windows Desktop, or into an open Simulation Mechanical window, and the software will take care of the rest.
When importing the file, you may be prompted with the Surface Splitting dialog. See the page Surface Splitting for details.