In addition to being the No. 1 software among professional integrators, D-Tools System Integrator (SI) is also used by many major higher-education institutions to design, manage and job cost the construction of their on-campus facilities. University of Colorado Boulder Senior Audio Visual Design Engineer Greg Carstens says D-Tools SI is an important tool in his arsenal. He uses D-Tools SI not only for design and collaboration, but also it is integral for project management, purchasing and centralized communications.
“Here at the University of Colorado, we are technically an end user, but we like to call ourselves an in-house integrator,” Carstens explains. “We use D-Tools similar to how an integrator might use it, but different in that the financial side is very flat-lined… in that our costing and pricing are identical. It really does a great job for labor tracking, which is very important because we are a cost-recovery entity.”
Carstens says the biggest advantage is the ability to have predictable outcomes on their project costs versus using just AutoCAD, Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and Microsoft Word documents. He says D-Tools is an “all-in-one tool and our downstream derivatives are so much more realized.”
D-Tools SI has been particularly helpful during the multi-year redevelopment of the university’s historic Hellems Arts and Sciences building, according to Carstens. The facility was one of the first structures built at the renowned university and is undergoing a major renovation to make it more accessible and inviting for students and staff. The remodel has more than $1.1 million in AV, including labor.
“I was able to get through that project, and get through a lot of revisions because of D-Tools,” he recalls. The project has 40+ spaces but only eight to nine unique spaces. That enabled the design team to repeat the design for those spaces using D-Tools SI.
“[D-Tools software] saved countless hours of my time,” he concludes.
