Work laptop??

TheBadBadger

Hi all,

just a quick query! I am in the market for a laptop (work use only) .

Machine will be running CAD, Amtech, IES along with the usual programs like office etc..

Can anyone recommend a durable fast laptop, budget round 600 -800 quid!!

Offy

TheBadBadger wrote: »

Hi all,

just a quick query! I am in the market for a laptop (work use only) .

Machine will be running CAD, Amtech, IES along with the usual programs like office etc..

Can anyone recommend a durable fast laptop, budget round 600 -800 quid!!

On that budget your not likely to get a machine that runs 3d CAD. What CAD system do you want to run?

TheBadBadger

Offy wrote: »

TheBadBadger wrote: »

Hi all,

just a quick query! I am in the market for a laptop (work use only) .

Machine will be running CAD, Amtech, IES along with the usual programs like office etc..

Can anyone recommend a durable fast laptop, budget round 600 -800 quid!!

On that budget your not likely to get a machine that runs 3d CAD. What CAD system do you want to run?

Offy,

Thanks for quick reply, no I just use 2d CAD for elec layouts, schematics...

REVIT is becoming popular so I would like to have the capacity to run this in the future, not essential tho.

Budget can change if necessary.

Offy

TheBadBadger wrote: »

Offy,

Thanks for quick reply, no I just use 2d CAD for elec layouts, schematics...

REVIT is becoming popular so I would like to have the capacity to run this in the future, not essential tho.

Budget can change if necessary.

After a quick look at the system requirements Id say that you need to up your budget if you want to use Revit. 3d CAD packages require a lot of graphical processing. I got a new machine in work last week to run ProE, it cost £2.5k GBP. Most of that wa spend on the graphics card and ram.
If you run without Revit then any decent machine will do what you want. When your buying it put as much money as you can afford into the graphics card.

Volovo

Higher End Dells are usually a good choice. You can customise them to how you want at their online store. ie. Graphics card, ram etc.

Irish_Elect_Eng

It really depends on the level of CAD that you are going to do and the key element will be the GPU: I reccooent the Nvidia Quadro Series.

Here is a link to a wide range of different spec laptops that use Quadro GPUs.

Personally I use a HP EliteBook 8760w

You will need to scale your budget to your needs.

TheBadBadger

Thanks for all the advice so far lads, much appreciated. It's narrowed my search down 10 fold!!

nogoodnamesleft

Volovo wrote: »

Higher End Dells are usually a good choice. You can customise them to how you want at their online store. ie. Graphics card, ram etc.

I personally wouldnt go near Dell for a laptop have a bad reputation for reliability and their customer support is outsourced to India as AFAIK.

HP are decent enough although their reliability in recent years has dipped somewhat. I had a HP work laptop which was on its second battery and second keyboard in 3 years. From speaking with our IT dept it was worth their while getting a extended warranty on them as a number of engineers laptops had the same issues.

I was looking for a laptop about 6months ago and was giving serious consideration to the HP elitebook range but decided against it as I felt it was over priced for what I was getting.

I settled on a Lenovo Thinkpad E420s for 990euro delivered. Customised to suit my needs on their website. Its higher spec than the equivalent HP and its cheaper. Lenovo have an extremely solid reputation for reliability.

So far In 6months I only had one issue with it which was minor just a driver update for the integrated microphone. Regards software slight bugs exist for CAD software Im using PSpice and PSCAD as the support doesnt seem to be there at the moment for 64bit Win7.

If your employer is purchasing the laptop they will be getting it ex VAT and depending on their account with supplier they might get it cheaper.

Volovo

nogoodnamesleft wrote: »

I personally wouldnt go near Dell for a laptop have a bad reputation for reliability and their customer support is outsourced to India as AFAIK.

I settled on a Lenovo Thinkpad E420s for 990euro delivered. Customised to suit my needs on their website. Its higher spec than the equivalent HP and its cheaper. Lenovo have an extremely solid reputation for reliability.

Well, we'll agree to disagree then. I have had terrible experiences with Lenovo laptops in duarability, reliability and software issues. And that was with a laptop worth over a grand. My colleagues have had the same experiences with the same laptop model, we all agree - never again!

Lower end dells tend to be rubbish but I believe you get what you pay for in a dell. Just my two cents. Currently I have a HP pavilion dv7 and it is an excellent laptop for my needs, 3d cad and general computing.

Offy

Ive had Dells, IBM's and HP's. Dell was poor quality for the price, HP didnt include a restore disk which meant any time something went wrong it had to be sent to HP and IBM was only OK. I dont look at names anymore, just whats inside the box.

TheBadBadger

Thus far, taking into account different views and preferences, I suppose I have its a choice between

1. High end HP's
2. High end Dell
3.lenova w or t series.

Anything to be said for toshiba?

Turbulent Bill

OP, see thread here on CAD laptop buying.

I'd echo the rest, think your budget is too low. You want durable, fast and cheap but it'll be a case of pick any two from three.

nogoodnamesleft

TheBadBadger wrote: »

Thus far, taking into account different views and preferences, I suppose I have its a choice between

1. High end HP's
2. High end Dell
3.lenova w or t series.

Anything to be said for toshiba?

Toshiba have a decent reputation for reliability. Might be worth your while conducting some background research into reliability indexes of different manufacturers. Here is just a quick link:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384243,00.asp