Final Suggestions on New System

aposatsk

Junior Member
Mar 4, 2007
19
0
0
Hi.

Through suggestions on this forum, I've come down to some "final" choices for my ~$1750(Canadian) CAD workstation for my home. Please give me any final suggestions.

I've come down to a few 'final' choices. Please correct me if you think that I've made a bad choice. Once again, it's for home CAD design.

Video Card: GF 7900GT $305.99
Motherboard: Intel 975X ATX $239.99
Processor: E6600 $465.99
RAM: 2x OCZ 1024MB PC4200 DDR2 533MHz $239.98
PS: Enermax 535-Watt $113.99
Screen: SAMSUNG 740BF $215.99


Also, I'm considering getting the ATI FireGL V3400 instead of the 7900GT.


ps. Is newegg available in Canada?

Also, any suggestions for a quiet <$50 case would be appreciated.
 

Zolty

Diamond Member
Feb 7, 2005
3,603
0
0
pricy small monitor

I know CAD is systems intensive but does it really care about a top tier video card?

I am fairly sure http://newegg.ca works, if not then you should check the http://newegg.com site.

motherboard / proc / memory / psu look good.


Your specs seem to be overboard for Auto CAD
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/index?siteID=123112&id=5158199
Suggested:

Intel® Pentium® 4 or later, with 2.8 GHz or a faster processor (e.g. Intel® Pentium® M 1.8GHz for Laptop) and with at least 1MB total Cache
1.5 GB or more RAM
2 GB of free disk space not including installation
128 MB or more Open GL work-station class graphics card or DirectX 9 support
 

engiNURD

Diamond Member
Jan 15, 2004
3,975
0
76
That system is NOT overboard for CAD. Though, I agree, you should get a larger monitor... especially for CAD, hehe. Weren't the OpenGL flavors of GPUs just different drivers but same GPU as high end gaming cards? If that still holds true, go for a higher end ATI card instead.
 

aposatsk

Junior Member
Mar 4, 2007
19
0
0
Which higher end video card do you suggest?

I've heard that Nvidia is better for CAD software.

By the way, I'm not only using AutoCAD. Drafting probably doesn't require much power. Instead, I'm working with assemblies with SolidWorks and CATIA. Therefore, I think that power's important.


I've also heard that my choice of a motherboard is overboard. Is there a better one for a cheaper price?
 

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,718
44
91
i just spec'd a machine for a buddy of mine that is a mechanical engineer and works with solidworks almost daily. we ended up with this -
m/b - gigabyte 965p-s3
cpu - c2d 6300
ram - g.skill 2GB
gpu - 7600gt
psu - fsp 450W

the thing that sucks is that currently solidworks is not dual core aware, but i am not sure about catia. he is very happy with it compared to a 3GHz P4 machine it replaced but for the parts he works on he said there is not a night and day difference, but he does also do a lot of encoding on it and that is where it can really stretch its legs. plus i read on the solidworks website that they were working on a smp/smt aware setup soon, so when that comes dual and quad cores will be excellent.

also he stated that solidworks recommend basically they same rig but suggested a 6600, which we are going to make up in a slight o/c, but still recommended the same gpu, so all is wel.
 

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,718
44
91
Originally posted by: bamacre
I thought Quadro cards were better for solidworks.

i think it depends on what exactly you are making and how intricate the drawings are. my friend does some pretty intense stuff and his cruises along just fine. if you go on the forum for solidworks, people say you don't know if you have never used one, but for the $$$ nobody could really tell me what they did that was so great, so really don't know
 

sjandrewbsme

Senior member
Jan 1, 2007
304
0
0
Originally posted by: bamacre
I thought Quadro cards were better for solidworks.

They are.

But - I think the cards are a tad overrated as there are lots of things you can turn off and make it still workable (shadows, lighting, textures).

There's nothing you can do if you have a dog for a CPU or not enough RAM.
 

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,718
44
91
Originally posted by: sjandrewbsme
Originally posted by: bamacre
I thought Quadro cards were better for solidworks.

They are.

But - I think the cards are a tad overrated as there are lots of things you can turn off and make it still workable (shadows, lighting, textures).

There's nothing you can do if you have a dog for a CPU or not enough RAM.

how intricate does the part have to be to notice it? say you modeled a cell phone in solidworks and did it to perfect scale inside and out, or possibly a home stereo receiver, maybe a radio controlled buggy or airplae, would you notice a quatto compared to a7600gt or x1800xt? where is the cut off point? i could see if you modeled an entire full size car, but for something smaller is there any benefit?
 

Indolent

Platinum Member
Mar 7, 2003
2,128
2
0
I'd definitely go for more than 1 gig of ram and a bigger monitor.

edit: yup I can't read...
 

sjandrewbsme

Senior member
Jan 1, 2007
304
0
0
Originally posted by: bob4432
Originally posted by: sjandrewbsme
Originally posted by: bamacre
I thought Quadro cards were better for solidworks.

They are.

But - I think the cards are a tad overrated as there are lots of things you can turn off and make it still workable (shadows, lighting, textures).

There's nothing you can do if you have a dog for a CPU or not enough RAM.

how intricate does the part have to be to notice it? say you modeled a cell phone in solidworks and did it to perfect scale inside and out, or possibly a home stereo receiver, maybe a radio controlled buggy or airplae, would you notice a quatto compared to a7600gt or x1800xt? where is the cut off point? i could see if you modeled an entire full size car, but for something smaller is there any benefit?

I have a laughably bad MX400 and it works for medium sized assemblies. I have never had a quadro to compare it against - then again most of the stuff I work on is on the analysis side and not the modeling side.

 

bob4432

Lifer
Sep 6, 2003
11,718
44
91
Originally posted by: Indolent
I'd definitely go for more than 1 gig of ram and a bigger monitor.

?????

RAM: 2x OCZ 1024MB PC4200 DDR2 533MHz $239.98

but i would go a larger monitor - like a 20" - 1680x1050 or something like that
 

Lord Banshee

Golden Member
Sep 8, 2004
1,495
0
0
Quadro and firegl cards some import thing that gamer card do not do ( driver determind what to do as it is 95% the same hardware sometime 100%).

One thing is overlay windows are accelerated: i think this means when you have two windows on top of each other and viewing pieces of both of them they are still use the 3d hardware.

Another and most important for me is the the hardware accelerated wire frame. This is not the same thing as AA like a lot of people new to CAD think. Gamer cards will be A LOT slower in OPENGL wireframe professional version. Here i always notice ati gamer cards are better suited, which mean nvidia place more restriction on the drivers for gamer card :(.

One last thing i cad think off is there are other setting in drivers that speed up overall OpenGL shading performance.

Key points here is "OpenGL" if your cad program work in DirectX your gamer card will be just as fast or faster as gamer cards tend to have no DirectX restrictions and higher clocks and memory settings.

OP if you are on a budget and i am sure you are like we all are lol, stick with the 7900. Otherwise i would get the quadroFX 3500. And i would get a quadrofx 560 over any firegl in the 3xxx series. Also if you are gaming at all on these cards the fx3500 is like a 6800gt and the fx560 is like a 6600 so they are kind of dated in the gaming world but still very fast at OpenGL CAD programs.