Using SSD and Autocad on new PC

Has anyone set up Autocad to reside in the SSD that is now becoming the norm in new Pc's and laptops. We have requested 128Gb in our new pc's.

Whilst the OS is recommended to live there as start times are now almost instant.

Would there be advantages in having temporary directories pointed to this drive?

What other Autocad system parameters should point to this drive. ?

Our DWg's reside on a server so that will continue and loading is very fast now.

Any comments would be appreciated.

Yes, my new work rig has one. It has 256gb ssd, lighting fast. It is just about a year old and I am thinking of upgrading to a 512gb drive as I want more space. I installed as normal.

f700es thanks for reply just confirming your Autocad is installed on the SSD drive and what do you have pathed to it also. 128GB will be ok for us as we use a corpoarte server, current pc with everything is 60GB.

When solid state drives were first introduced the recommendation was that only the OS and actual programs should be installed on them while all data files should reside on a normal platter drive. In your case all data files are on the network so I don't see what you are concerned about.

Your case will be a little different than someone with a second HDD drive, since I am sure your company has limits as to what you can put on the network, so maybe your IT should decide on some of what is put where.

How much RAM will you have?

If you have a lot of RAM, you may want to consider eliminating the PageFile or using a USB memory stick for it, most would put that on the HDD. Not that it is a big concern these days on SSDs with lots of RAM, every little bit of room helps.

What other programs will you be loading? If the setup will be similar to what you have now on 60GB, I don't see any concerns for putting it all on the SSD.

Recommendations are to keep 20% free on a SSD, most give a warning at 10%.

So, as long as you have room, I would put everything program wise on the SSD and just store files, etc. on the Network. You may find it advantageous to move larger files to the SSD while working on them.

Lately it seems the consensus is the newer SSDs are much better, not as much concern on Reads and Writes.

Wow, I must be crazy then. I am at about 45% free on mine and I want it to be more. I have all applications on my SSD. I moved all "My Documents" and such over to my standard 1 tb drive. I used to keep current projects and other files in folders on my desktop. These got big from time to time. I moved these to my standard drive and made short cuts on the desktop to point back to them.

Current set up is 256gb ssd, 1 tb platter drive and 16gb ram (full specs under my user id).

Every now and then I will see a slight delay on the write back to the ssd. Still FAR better than the old days.

I guess I should have added, at least 20% free on a SSD, I thought adding the warning at 10% would have indicated that.

I never implied anyone was crazy.

I am sure a little experimenting with what to put where would work for those with an HDD, but the OP only has SSD and Network, so that imposes limits I am sure. As cheap as HDDs have become, you would think they could stick a small one on there.

...

I never implied anyone was crazy.

...

Nor did I, I was making fun of myself

I agree, a tb platter drive is almost free when buying a new system. I bought one for my son's new build for $50. Crazy cheap.

Just a couple of extra comments, we may still end up with a hard drive also as it will come standard with the unit, realisticly we save 99% to the server, the only local use is when I want a quick copy and throw it away if it stuffs up completly, often we get stuck with our road designs and go around in circles trying to get the best fit hence the copy. The obvious the music goes on the local drive. Our server also is backed up twice a day.

From the comments though if we can get SSD then do it. The bean counters don't appreciate the seconds that add up over years.

Thanks guys for the comments.

Nor did I, I was making fun of myself

 

I agree, a tb platter drive is almost free when buying a new system. I bought one for my son's new build for $50. Crazy cheap.

Good, I thought I somehow had offended you, it's all good!!

Interesting though, have you seen a benefit from leaving 40% free space. My home machine I am putting a 120GB SDD in this weekend, thinking of ordering a second as well.

Yep, $50 for a 1T, I am going to order one in a couple of weeks, I don't think they will go much lower anytime soon.

Just a couple of extra comments, we may still end up with a hard drive also as it will come standard with the unit, realisticly we save 99% to the server, the only local use is when I want a quick copy and throw it away if it stuffs up completly, often we get stuck with our road designs and go around in circles trying to get the best fit hence the copy. The obvious the music goes on the local drive. Our server also is backed up twice a day.

 

From the comments though if we can get SSD then do it. The bean counters don't appreciate the seconds that add up over years.

 

Thanks guys for the comments.

A few more options if the HDDs stay, you can put rarely used programs and programs that benefit less on the HDD if you find you need the room, though sounds like you will have plenty of room.

Of coarse, I still remember my professor in college expressing disbelief in the need for a Personal computer with a 100MB HDD, that was when the common size was 40-50MB. He exclaimed out loud "You could never fill that thing up". LOL!

Of coarse, at the time it was true for most people, files and programs were much smaller.

Do you have a personal Network drive as well? At work I have a Local HDD, a Personal Network Drive and then there is a few corporate Network drives, with one being the main drive I save common files to.

Interesting though, have you seen a benefit from leaving 40% free space. My home machine I am putting a 120GB SDD in this weekend, thinking of ordering a second as well.

Yep, $50 for a 1T, I am going to order one in a couple of weeks, I don't think they will go much lower anytime soon.

Not sure on any benefit other than me being paranoid about space A 120 ssd for home would not work for me. Way too small. A 512 would work but I'd have to have another drive for file storage.

Newegg currently has refurb 2TB drive for under $60 :crazy:

I have a single 80GB HDD now and run Windows XP on 20GB partition and the rest is storage and Ubuntu Studio and about 30GB free right now, I'm adding a 1TB later and maybe another 120GB SSD, I have RAID, so can run them like a 240GB and for what I see on benchmarks, 2 120GB in RAID 0 are a little better than a single 256GB (at least for the Audio/Video work I do).

Just installed a new processor (Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 Quad-Core Processor, 2.6 GHz) and maxed the RAM at 8GB, it is running very good right now, I got the Computer for $200 a few years ago (it was Intel Core 2 Duo, 1.87Ghz with 2GB RAM) and the Processor and Ram were about $100. So not willing to put much more into it, though the HDDs and SSDs can be moved to a new Computer, so that money is well spent.

I don't AutoCAD at home, but, I need more room so I can do Photo, Audio and Video editing and store the files, I need to get back to working with Blender as well, so 1 or 2 120GB SSDs and a 1T HDD are more than I need now. That refurb 2TB sounds like an option as well, I'll check that out.

Still debating on an upgrade to Windows 7 Pro or 8.1 Pro, I just rarely use Windows at home.

If I need more I'll get a new computer.

What are you doing at home that needs so much space?

Can you RAID the 2 SSDs?

Yes ........

I currently run Windows 8.1x64 and IDSP 2015 on 2 x 240 GB Samsung EVO SSD in RAID 0 (OS, backed up to network), 1 x 240 GB SSD (Disaster Recovery), and have a 1 TB Western Digital 10K RPM Velociraptor HDD (Data, Client Hyper-V VMs, etc). See my computer details for the rest.

I previously ran on single SSD (non-RAID, now my disaster recovery drive), and have seen substantial gains in application performance.

More information here: http://forums.augi.com/showthread.php?155766-Graphics-Card-Recommendation-AutoCAD-2014-15

Cheers

What happaned when u actually load dwg from a netwok drive?

Loads just as fast as if it was from a local drive. Or it does for me.

What happaned when u actually load dwg from a netwok drive?

That depends on both your workstation's specs, your office's network infrastructure, the drawing you're attempting to open, and where your server physically resides.

If your workstation has SSD (regardless of RAID), and your office is on a gigabit network - full gigabit capable switch(s) (i.e., not 10/100 for only 46 ports, and gigabit [10/100/1000] for the last 2 ports, etc.), and your physical/virtual file server resides within your office's physical location & is equipped with at least 1 (virtual?) gigabit NIC (or uses NIC Teaming; for Server 2012 R2, see Server Manager, Local Server tab, Properties pane, NIC Teaming) - then you're likely to have great performance.

Cheers

Not exactly sure about our network specs but around 1000 users the back bone is fibre optic to each building, loading autocad dwg's has never been a problem. But we have a dedicated team to make it hummmmm.

Of coarse, I still remember my professor in college expressing disbelief in the need for a Personal computer with a 100MB HDD, that was when the common size was 40-50MB. He exclaimed out loud "You could never fill that thing up". LOL!

 

Of coarse, at the time it was true for most people, files and programs were much smaller.

My first computer had a 1Kb memory and programs where on a casette deck, I need to get into this SSD thing, but presently I have about 12TB dotted about 4 machines at home, I have most things stored on at least 2 disks.