Arena

Excellent programming language, with great flexibility.

Comments: I have used it in my professional field, simulating the entrances and exits of ships in port terminals, and from the academic point of view as a teacher, making simulations of manufacturing processes and inventory management.
This wide range of uses is only allowed by software with the flexibility that Arena has.

Pros:

What most strikes me is that it combines all the facilities of a high-level program, with the flexibility of a general programming language, which is achieved through the interchangeable templates it has, which in turn have modules for the modeling and analysis of graphic simulation. This flexibility at the time of modeling is associated with the completely hierarchical structure that Arena has.

Cons:

As with any mathematical model: it is a powerful tool that in good hands can be very useful, but in the wrong hands can be very dangerous. This software allows through sensitivity analyzes that simulate, make decisions, which are based only on the simulated scenarios, can be very risky, if the model that has been raised has not been validated with real data and statistics.

Good software for simulation

Pros:

User-friendly and great program to learn how to build simulation program. It helps you to detect problems and bottlenecks in the processes. The report of simulation is very useful with good insight to help you with decision making.

Cons:

Some error messages are not directly point to the real root cause. Users need to search for it and figure out by themselves which quite frustrated. No online resources available of how to fix errors. The software only compatible on Windows. The latest updated version look more creative and nice but still has many bugs. The program lagged many times while using and suddenly shut down. Hope the next version will be more stable.

Could Use Better Trainings

Comments: While it offered a great back end for well versed users and administrators, the roll-out and start up process for a new user was too laborious for the needs of our organization.

Pros:

The backend of the software was very customizable and we were continually able to pull out of it the information we were looking for. While it did take some time to get used too, the customization of reports is what really sets the software aside from its competitors.

Cons:

It was a constant struggle to train the average user on the software. The user interface is rather complex and often times our users took so long to get up to speed on the software, that it became non-beneficial for us to continue to use the product.

Useful models -- from very simple to very complex

Pros:

I love being able to animate the simulations that I create in Arena. Running the numbers is one thing, but being able to present the results in animated form the business stake holders is even better. It really helps get the non-technical folks on board with the simulation and helps them understand the results. Animation in Arena is easy and I never want to create another simulation without animation.

Cons:

Sometimes it is hard to find answers to questions you have about Arena. The documentation that comes with the software is helpful, but it is limited. I have not been able to find a great website online for Arena support. For more popular software there is tons of help to be found online, but I guess Arena doesn't have a large enough user-base to have an active support community.

A powerful discrete simulation software

Comments: I used this software to modelate service operations like banks and workshops.

Pros:

Arena is an intituive modeling software that allows you to simulate service and production systems, graphic enviroment is easy to follow.

Cons:

Software input analyzer can be better, model´s graphics animation should be easier top set.

Simulation for beginners

Comments: Arena is one of the simulation software I have ever use, regardless of the complexity of the model, the chances of getting something wrong are very slim as it is straight forward

Pros:

Arena is a very good simulation software for beginners

Cons:

It doesn't show all the details as expected from the simulation software

Large learning curve, little support

Comments: Arena is useful in simulating potential warehouse setups and measuring various metrics for WIP. However, the learning curve is steep, and each simulation takes a long time to initialize. For this reason, although the output is useful, I use Arena as little as possible. I would suggest another more modern simulation tool solely for the reason that a more recently developed tool such as Simio is likely to have more support and better documentation.

Pros:

Once simulations are set up, Arena gives great and usable data. It reports metrics such as WIP and Time in System, and it can be modified to determine other custom metrics. It also outputs them in separate files that are easy to analyze. The .csv files are also easy to upload back into other systems to run further analytics. The visualizations are also helpful, and it is nice that it creates them in-system.

Cons:

The software was hard to learn from scratch. There are certain rules I had to pick up, such as including a 'queuing' block in order to allow any queue selection rules but also needing to include a 'ranking' block to implement these queue selection rules. I could not find support online - I had to resort to sifting through powerpoints from various colleges published in the '90s to help me figure out where I was going wrong because the software documentation was not helpful.

One of the top applications for process simulations

Pros:

I have worked with various Rockwell Automation softwares and this is a very special one. With this software you can simulate and analyse process and flows. Allow you to implement strategies and change variables of the process in simulation modes without using and affecting the real process. The most significant pro is that you can improve your process at a low cost and with low risks, because you can simulate and test different strategies before to deploy them in the real process.

Cons:

This is not a intuitive software, you have to be an expert in the area to be proeficient and get a significant outcome of the product.

A Great Tool for Modeling.

Comments: Arena is a great tool for modeling, and I've been using it for presentation so everyone can understand hard problems.

Pros:

Arena is a great software to create models for different cases. The software is pretty simple to understand and lets you make your own model.

Cons:

It may be a little bit hard to understand the error code/messages at first. Since there isn't much information online, you just have to play with it until you don't get the error code/message.

No support to learn

Comments: It's a great tool with lots of functionality but is very difficult to use and learn.

Pros:

The software runs quickly, and the error messages are easy to understand. Modeling is flexible and fast.

Cons:

There are no resources online to learn or debug Arena. Figuring out what fields mean is nearly impossible unless you know someone who can tell you about it.

Great software, but really expensive.

Comments: I've used Arena during my Masters programme to implement a contractor logistics support dynamics, and evaluate the actual performance against what the simulation would point out as possible to achieve.

Pros:

I think the ease of use and the incredible power of Arena are the main aspects I could highlight as positive features of the software. I've used mainly the student version and it is amazing what can be done and the infinite modelling variety that can be achieved with it. For a little while I had access to the full version during a workshop I participated in the Rockwell representative company in Brazil and I was amazed by the possibilities it offers.

Cons:

The main problem is the cost in my opinion, even for big companies it is a significant sum. I think this could be compromised considering the intended use for the software, especially by the public sector, which may only require a small portion of the capabilities provided by Arena.

Highly useful process modeler and simulator

Comments: Perfect for both students learning Monte Carlo discrete-event simulation or for those in industry practicing the technique on behalf of their business.

Pros:

Arena provides everything needed to simulate a process in any domain. It is very intuitive for systems engineers or those with a sophisticated level of business process modeling experience but could even be learned by those without formal training, with some patience. The possibilities are limitless.

Cons:

Animation is not the software's strong point and was improved upon in the subsequent product, Simio. Perfectionists will have a nightmare of a time making their lines from one block to another straight--fix one, and you've inevitably caused a staggered line somewhere else. The automatic tools for organizing the UI sometimes miss the mark and caused many crossed lines. Fortunately all of these are UI level complaints--the process modeling engine is great!

Aena Review BYE

Comments: I have been using this software for 20 years.

Pros:

The software is relatively flexible to make any type of models, dynamic or static models.

Cons:

The software does not provide agent-based modelling purpose. For instance, when I utilize the transporter module, I am not able to imterrupt (i.e., stop) it while it is travelling. Such last-minute change features are lacking in ARENA.

Amazing simulation tool

Comments: Amazing! I utilized this software for 6+ month for university coursework. It is intuitive to learn and has a long list of capabilities.

Pros:

I used this software as a tool in upper level university coursework. We utilized many tools from input analyzer to modeling complex stochastic systems. We collected real world data and created models of systems; it was a concrete way to symbolize systems of interest for experimentation. As an engineer, it was fascinating to work with and it is a tool that can be utilized in a wide variety of applications. Definitely recommend.

Cons:

Very communicative despite not being "pretty". Takes a lot of customization and time to make graphics "pretty" and doesn't necessarily add to the function.

Simulation Software That Still Works

Comments: We're using Arena to help automate workflows and diagnose bottlenecks. It's a great platform for this.

Pros:

The amount of customization and options when running simulations. Every possible scenario can be mapped into Arena.

Cons:

The user experience is extremely dated- they seemed to have spent all of their time investing in the backend. This is fine, but it doesn't look like it was built recently.

Great software for modeling

Pros:

This is a great software to model things.

Cons:

Almost no companies use Arena so it's not practical.

My students were using arena for simulation modeling and analysis for hospital projects.

Comments: The software is capable of building a computer simulation model that mimics a complex and dynamic system such as healthcare system, which helps provide analytical recommendations and solutions for decision makers. The software helps my students to get their projects done with analytical results.

Pros:

The software is easy to use and easy to make logic models for care delivery processes and patient flows in hospital units such as emergency department, medical/surgical unit.

Cons:

The software's input analyzer needs improvement over the fitness test of distributions from the data points.

I used Arena when I was taking a graduate course in simulation.

Comments: Arena helped me to learn discrete event simulaion.

Pros:

Arena is a classic discrete event simulation software and very powerful. At least one textbook is written based on Arena.

Cons:

I wish Arena has more vivid animation like Simio and Flexisim. It would be very useful to communite with non-technical people.

Best for discrete event simulation

Pros:

1) It can simulate diverse operation types 2)Very good for simulating a business process

Cons:

The installation can be tricky and I would have preferred having a complete package in the software instead of different versions for different people.

Great software for discrete simulation

Comments: This is 'the Software' for discrete simulation.

Pros:

The software is fabulous to model problems related to the production management. Furthermore, it is excellent to simulate services.

Cons:

Modelling is intuitive, but to make the problem in a graphical way is slow. You need to have a good knowledge of Simulation to use it.

Arena

Comments: I used the Rockwell automation as a University student. In student version I was limited to use only 80 blocks which is very less to create a full project. However, the license is not cheap.

Pros:

1. Good for discrete event simulation 2. Different colors and graphics can be used to visualize which is absent from a smiliar software created

Cons:

1. Still has very old GUI even in newer versions 2. Expensive

Simple, Stable and very powerful

Comments: We have been using Arena for many years now and have been very happy with the power of the software to aid our clients make their strategic decisions more scientific and fatser. The flow charting methodlogy and the software's ability to integrate with databases gives us the power to take data from the client's existing systems and run experiements. Our experience has been with multiple simulation software and we can strongly say that time to build complex models in Arena is way lesser than the other packages that we have used in the past.

Best Simulation Software

Comments: Overall it is an excellent software but requires practice and time. However, it is not hard to use at a basic level.

Pros:

It uses a visual interface that allows an easier design of the systems. It also has a simple animation for the simulation itself.

Cons:

It is very challenging to learn fully. The help system is not very user friendly and is not very helpful. More dynamic tutorials would be useful.

One of the best Discrete Even Simulation tools

Comments: We have used ARENA for simulating and analyzing biofuels supply chain. We were able to create nice graphs for in-depth process analysis. The 3D animation capabilities in ARENA are really good for visualizing results.

Arena experience

Comments: I have used software to teach Operations Research classes, it has been very useful to simulate production lines of bamboo panels used in the construction industry.

Pros:

The best thing about the software is the ease to connect with Microsoft Technologies, in addition there is a version available for student which has been quite useful.

Cons:

What I like least about the software is that the animation is done separately from the model.