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New Build - PC for Construction Engineer

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    #32
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    tuxy wrote: »

    Is that based on your experience of autocad? Even in adobe premier that makes excellent use of hyperthreading you see a 20% reduction in rendering times for a 50% exta cost premium.

    Sounds like unseenfootage is the only person on here with enough knowledge about autocad to give real advice.

    Its based on 12 years experience with 3dmax, maya, other 3D programs, as I'm a 3D animator ;) rendering in CAD programs is the same setup . With video editing its a different ballgame altogether; you're better off with more RAM there to load more footage into cache. Sure come render time the CPU importance kicks in but they are different fields entirely.

    I would say an i5 ivy gen, 8 gig of ram and a 650ti will get him quite far.


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    #33
    unseenfootage
    Registered Users Posts: 976 ✭✭✭unseenfootage


    There seems to be some confusion about what product he is actually using. Autocad is just one of a stable of products from Autodesk, which also makes Maya (3d animation software) and Inventor which is used for modelling parts in 3D and then assembling them as part of a machine or mechanism.

    People have a tendency to use generic words hence using the word autocad for something wheich may very well be inventor professional or even maya.

    If he is just using autocad then he could get away with an off the shelf desktop. I used it on a pentium 4 with 1gb Ram and it worked great. Even Autodesk lists a Pentium as a base requirement.

    For 3D modelling Tuxy's recommendation here - http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=82143106&postcount=9 is spot on. 8GB should be more than enough though.


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    #34
    tuxy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 14,983 ✭✭✭✭tuxy


    Andy!! wrote: »
    He definitely needs to go with an i7 then to
    Andy!! wrote: »
    I would say an i5 ivy gen,

    This is confusing, if he definitely needs an i7 then how could anything else be an option?


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    #35
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    I stated that if he is going to be able to buy a card within two months he should go with i7. If not, i5 and 650ti.

    That post tuxy posted is indeed grand if all he'll be doing is CAD. But for CUDA/GPU rendering he'll need the card. He did mention that his renders were too slow. If his software supports GPU rendering, a 650ti will make a big difference.


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    #36
    tuxy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 14,983 ✭✭✭✭tuxy


    unseenfootage wrote: »
    There seems to be some confusion about what product he is actually using. Autocad is just one of stable of products from Autodesk, which also makes Maya (3d animation software) and Inventor which is used for modelling parts in 3D and then assembling them as part of a machine or mechanism.

    People have a tendency to use generic words hence using the word autocad for something wheich may very well be inventor professional or even maya.

    This seems to be where the confusion is coming from.
    Some Autodesk software will make use of multi core while others will only use single core. Some will make use of specialised graphics cards while some won't.


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    #37
    tuxy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 14,983 ✭✭✭✭tuxy


    Andy!! wrote: »
    a 650ti will make a big difference.

    So a 650ti is better than a QUADRO 600? The Quadro is only €20 more expensive.
    I know nothing about quadro cards.


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    #38
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    tuxy wrote: »

    This seems to be where the confusion is coming from.
    Some Autodesk software will make use of multi core while others will only use single core. Some will make use of specialised graphics cards while some won't.

    Aye but typically people use several different softwares, at least experiment. Best to set him up for everything related possible.


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    #39
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    tuxy wrote: »

    So a 650ti is better than a QUADRO 600? The Quadro is only €20 more expensive.
    I know nothing about quadro cards.

    Completely different setups. I was not aware Quadros came so cheap these days, Ive always used consumer cards. If hes getting far more cores for 20, and does no gaming, then by all means. It all comes down to the amount of CUDA cores at the end of the day :)


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    #40
    tuxy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 14,983 ✭✭✭✭tuxy


    Andy!! wrote: »
    It all comes down to the amount of CUDA cores at the end of the day :)

    I don't know if it's that simple, apparently the cuda cores in the 600 series run slower than the 500 series. So you can get lower performance even though there are more cores. Does that sound right? I don't know for sure.


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    #41
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    tuxy wrote: »

    I don't know if it's that simple, apparently the cuda cores in the 600 series run slower than the 500 series. So you can get lower performance even though there are more cores. Does that sound right? I don't know for sure.

    Judging by my render times vs someone who has a 5 series exact same classification, yes :( word going around is nVidia did some intentional gimping.


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    #42
    Alkers
    Registered Users Posts: 6,819 ✭✭✭Alkers


    ED E wrote: »
    Basically, my phone could run autocad :p That said, if he's working on very big projects/3D work rather than simple 2D plans then it'll ramp up.

    Cant be sure but I suspect any more than 8GB ram might be overkill, unless he's using a load of textures on rendered plans there shouldnt be a lot of data to be loaded from what I can see.

    Any old PC might do fine for running AutoCAD with one drawing open but in an office environment you are likely to have huge AutoCAD files with 100s of XREFs in each drawing and you are likely to have several drawings open at the same time. Also the files may all be stored on the local network rather than on the computer he's running CAD on. I've worked with AutoCAD on an old machine in such an environment and it was a nightmare.


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    #43
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    Sorry for taking so long to get back to you all. Thank you for the time and effort and all your opinions, gives me a really good position to go my brother in law and advise him on what to do.

    I believe the recommendations people strongly believe is that the i5 spec is decent enough and that a gfx card might not be needed.

    One last question he is open to a gfx card and if he did want one the recommendation is to go with a quadro gfx card example on thread was http://lb.hardwareversand.de/1024+MB/48721/PNY+QUADRO+600+1024MB+DDR3+BULK.article.

    thanks all


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    #44
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    Sorry posting again so soon, was just talking to him again and he has advised that he is using Revit, when i checked the spec pages online it looks like its advises using multi-core processor for heavy use.

    I dont know how much he is using but would i be safe advising him to purchase an i7 if he is doing allot of rendering?


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    #45
    marco_polo
    Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 10,079 Mod ✭✭✭✭marco_polo


    GPU is not important for 2D autocad at all, so i wouldn't waste money on the quatro.

    http://www.cadcamperformance.com/2011/06/discrete-or-integrated-for-2d-tasks/

    Revit in the other Hand seems to love a powerful multicore CPU but again GPU appears to not be a factor at all here. Seems to hypertthreading may help in some scenarios for Revit so i7 may be back on the table, especially as it seems there is no need for a dedicated gpu.

    Excellent Revit CPU thread here on official forum.

    http://www.revitforum.org/hardware-infrastructure/74-revit-hardware-cpu.html


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    #46
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    thank you :), let me have a looksie. I have emailed him pretty much advising him that he needs to set realistic expectations of what he wants to do and how much he wants to spend.

    He seems to be of the opinion that he wants it all to run "fast" but i have no idea what it is he does with it in detail. So basically put it to him he needs to be realistic on usage and budget and we will build him something around that.


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    #47
    Andy!!
    Site Banned Posts: 1,678 ✭✭✭Andy!!


    Calhoun wrote: »
    Sorry posting again so soon, was just talking to him again and he has advised that he is using Revit, when i checked the spec pages online it looks like its advises using multi-core processor for heavy use.

    I dont know how much he is using but would i be safe advising him to purchase an i7 if he is doing allot of rendering?

    Yep sounds like my suggestion of i7 now GPU later will do him grand :)


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    #48
    cherryghost
    Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 17,133 Mod ✭✭✭✭cherryghost


    As an AutoCAD and Revit user (not in the last year mind you) also, the difference between i5 and i7 performance on the program is neglible in AutoCAD (most of the time the i5 was actually faster), but for Revit the i7 is about 20-30% faster than the i5.

    Sold my i5 regardless as I game and do video encoding as well, but I recommend at least a top i5 CPU and perhaps an i7 if he has the budget to do so.

    For GPU I reckon he's using AutoCAD for 2D and Revit for 3D rendering. Something along the lines of a 6670 or perhaps a 7750 would do fine as it's not intensive enough for the need high end GPUs.

    tl;dr, fast CPU, GPU around the 70-100 euro mark.


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    #49
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    lol thanks again, good food for thought i will explain it to him. This needs to be done strategically and i need to allow him make the decision otherwise ill be doing tech support on this forever :)


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