New Computers

[Jaelin]

Hey guys and gals, as I mentioned in a previous post I am putting together quotes for 3 new PC's for our drafting department. We have a tight budget of $1600 per PC. This is the best I can come up with but wanted to get some insight on this. Will these PC's last 3-4 years to handle what AutoCAD has to throw at it?? What's your thoughts. I guess first an idea of what were doing with them is in hand. The company is a surveying firm. We deal mainly with linework with the greatest computer workload coming from topographical digital terrain models. We deal with some huge 4-laning projects so DTM size can get pretty large. Anyways, here's the specs.

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (2.4 Ghz) 64-Bit
4GB DDR2 667 Mhz Memory
250 GB SATA Hard Drive
PNY Quadro FX1700 512MB Video Card
Windows Vista Business/XP Professional SP3 downgrade (Will probably be using the XP Professional downgrade for a while)

Total Price around $1500 everything said and done

Thoughts??

[ReMark]

What's an average file size of a digital terrain model? I would guess that your hard drive spins at 7200 rpm right?

I think the computers might serve you well for the next two or three years (max).

[ReMark]

Have you checked these specs against those recommended by AutoDesk for your particular software?

[Jaelin]

Kinda hard to give you a size of just the model as we tend to keep all of our boundary line, points, etc grouped in the same file as the DTM points, lines, etc. The largest file we've ever DTM'd was around 10,000 points with the corresponding linework. The hard drive is 7200 RPM.

Yes I have checked them at AutoDesk.

[ReMark]

I'm interested in the actual file size not the number of points. But thanks for the additional info.

[Jaelin]

Ok, well as far as the actual .dwg file size, it ranges 20-30 MB. Now bear in mind were still using Land Desktop Companion so it does not have Civil 3D's capabilities of combining most of the information into the .dwg itself but rather divides all the information out into different files that the .dwg accesses. So if you take that into consideration I'm looking at 60-80 MB files.

[StykFacE]

Hey guys and gals, as I mentioned in a previous post I am putting together quotes for 3 new PC's for our drafting department. We have a tight budget of $1600 per PC. This is the best I can come up with but wanted to get some insight on this. Will these PC's last 3-4 years to handle what AutoCAD has to throw at it?? What's your thoughts. I guess first an idea of what were doing with them is in hand. The company is a surveying firm. We deal mainly with linework with the greatest computer workload coming from topographical digital terrain models. We deal with some huge 4-laning projects so DTM size can get pretty large. Anyways, here's the specs.

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (2.4 Ghz) 64-Bit
4GB DDR2 667 Mhz Memory
250 GB SATA Hard Drive
PNY Quadro FX1700 512MB Video Card
Windows Vista Business/XP Professional SP3 downgrade (Will probably be using the XP Professional downgrade for a while)

Total Price around $1500 everything said and done

Thoughts??
Great system. I would definitely pick it up.

[Lazer]

Good system that, same graphics card as the one I ordered for work and
it arrives on Tuesday:)

[hugha]

Spend the $100 change on a larger hard disk or a second, matching hard disk?

[Jaelin]

Spend the $100 change on a larger hard disk or a second, matching hard disk?

We work everything off of a server so there is no storage needed on our hard drives.

Kind of an update here, the boss said to scrap that idea and rather than building 3 systems look at getting 2 much bigger systems. (Which I'm cool with :D )

This is what he approved:

Workstation:
Intel Core 2 Extreme 3.00 Ghz
NVIDIA Quadro FX3700 512 MB Video Card
4GB (2x2 upgradable to 8GB) DDR2-800 RAM
250GB SATA 7200 RPM Harddrive

Laptop: (Mine :D )
Intel Quad Extreme 2.53 Ghz
NVIDIA Quadro FX3700M 1 GB Video Card
4GB (1X1 upgradable to 8GB) DDR2-800 RAM
250GB SATA 7200 RPM Harddrive

Reasoning I went with only 4GB in each is because were running XP Pro off of these so no use upgrading past that till we move to Windows 7.

What ya think??

[StykFacE]

dude, both of those are awesome systems. Get those ordered today before he changes his mind. :)

EDIT: And since both systems are running that much RAM, don't forget about the 3GB Switch: See here http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx

[Jaelin]

dude, both of those are awesome systems. Get those ordered today before he changes his mind. :)

That's my intent. :D

I've been having problems with the 3GB switch. Can't get it to work on my current system (which I'm running 4GB in). I get the blue screen of death. I'm thinking maybe a video issue but stupid IT has all the driver updates blocked and it's a pain to get them out here to release it for us.