Selecting your Intel Fortran / Visual Studio Combination
There are a few considerations when determining which PSCAD / Intel Fortran / Microsoft Visual Studio combination to install.
As a general rule, it is best to use a newer, supported compiling combination. As newer versions of PSCAD/Intel/Visual Studio are released, support for older versions is removed, which can affect your models.
For example, a recent compatible combination is: PSCAD v5.0 / Intel oneAPI v19.2 / Visual Studio 2022
On the other hand, it might be necessary to install a particular combination due to one of the following compatibility limitations:
- Intel is Generally Backward Compatible: Pre-compiled models are normally expected to be able to be built using the same or newer versions of Intel.
If you receive a pre-compiled model, the compatible compiling software will normally be specified. You should expect to be able to use the specified version or newer.
Note - A pre-compiled model might work with an older Intel version. - Visual Studio Versions Limitation: Due to changes made to VS 2015 libraries, if a model contains any non-Fortran (e.g. c-code), then models created using VS 2013 and older cannot be run using VS 2015 and newer. And vice versa (if a model contains any non-Fortran (e.g. c-code), then models created using VS 2015 and newer cannot be run using VS 2013 and older).
If you receive a pre-compiled model, the compatible compiling software will normally be specified.
If the model does not contain any non-Fortran code, the general rule is that you should be able to use any version of Visual Studio that is compatible with your PSCAD and Intel versions.
But if the model does contains any non-Fortran code, then you would need to install a version from the same "grouping", either VS 2013 and older or VS 2015 and newer.
Of course, several combinations of Intel/Visual Studio may be installed in parallel, it is not necessary to be limited to one.
Here are some newer compiling combinations for PSCAD v4.6.3 and v5.0:
| Intel Fortran | Visual Studio |
| v19.2 | 2017, 2019, 2022 |
| v19.1 | 2017, 2019 |
| v19.0 (Update 4+) | 2017, 2019 |
| v19.0 | 2017 |
| v18 | 2017 |
| v17 (Update 4+) | 2013, 2015, 2017 |
| v17 (Update 0-3) | 2013, 2015 |
| v16 | 2013, 2015 |
Additional compatiblity information is available in chart 4, posted to this article.