sdf69,
I think it's possible to get very good results in an $800 CAD station>
BambiBoom PixelPusher CadarificGraphiBlaze iWork Amdisty 8000 £®©™?^(SM)©_$800_REV 11.2.13
1. AMD FX-8350 Vishera 4.0GHz (4.2GHz Turbo) Socket AM3+ 125W Eight-Core Desktop Processor FD8350FRHKBOX > $200
2. GIGABYTE GA-970A-DS3P AM3+ AMD 970 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard > $85
3. 8GB Kingston HyperX Blu 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model KHX1600C9D3B1K2/8GX > $57
4. EVGA 01G-P4-2650-KR GeForce GTX 650 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready Video Card > $110.
5. WD Blue 1 TB Desktop Hard Drive: 3.5 Inch, 7200 RPM, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64 MB Cache - WD10EZEX > $65
6. SeaSonic S12II 430B 430W ATX12V V2.3/EPS12V 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC Power Supply > $60
7. LIAN LI PC-7B plus II Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Computer Case > $80
8. Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit (Full Version) - OEM $140
_________________________________________
TOTAL = $797.
Prices are all from Newegg.
In my view the 8350 CPU is AMD's best and the GTX650 is one of the better graphics card values. The 650 is not a screamer in the gaming world, but would be "reasonable" and will certainly shift the pixels in CAD. The new WD Blue with a 1TB single platter has a slower access time, but in some respects is said to be faster than the WD Black FAEX.
Cheers,
BambiBoom
1. Dell Precision T5400 (2009)> 2X Xeon X5460 quad core @3.16GHz > 16GB ECC 667> Quadro FX 4800 (1.5GB) > WD RE4 / Segt Brcda 500GB > Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit > HP 2711x 27" 1920 x 1080 > AutoCad, Revit, Solidworks, Sketchup Pro, Corel Technical Designer, Adobe CS MC, WordP Office, MS Office > architecture, industrial design, graphic design, rendering, writing
2. HP z420 (2013)> Xeon E5-1620 quad core @ 3.6 / 3.8GHz > 24GB ECC 1600 RAM > Quadro 4000 > Samsung 840 SSD 250GB / Seagate Barracuda 500GB > M-Audio 192 sound card > AE3000 USB WiFi // Windows 7 Professional 64 > AutoCad, Revit, Inventor, Maya (2011), Solidworks 2010, Adobe CS4, Corel Technical Design X-5, Sketchup Pro, WordP Office X-5, MS Office