REQUEST: Build guidance (AutoCAD, Rhino 3D, SolidWorks etc.)

For a CAD build you should really get a workstation graphics card Quadro or FirePro. The drivers are optimized for professional applications and the performance is much better.

Till22,

My attitude towards workstation system is to imagine the expected performance working on the largest project on the most demanding program. If you require a good performance while architecting navals,on Solidworks, and are not producing a substantial my inclination would be to use a Xeon E5 (LGA2011),, at least 16GB ECC RAM, a Quadro of 2GB or more, and with an SSD. quadros can use the special drivers that are image quality oriented, rather than the image quantity (frame rates) of gaming / consumer cards. Content creation systems are quite different from content consumption systems.

However, a Xeon E5 system is likely to be over your budget. However, a very good system may be configured by using a used Dell Precision of the Tx500 series. Since 2010 I've had as a second system, an obsoloete Dell Precision - I have three of these now dating back to 2006:

Dell Precision T5500 (2011) > Xeon X5680 six -core @ 3.33 / 3.6GHz, 24GB DDR3 ECC 1333 > Quadro 4000 (2GB ) > Samsung 840 250GB /WD RE4 Enterprise 1TB > M-Audio 192 sound card> Linksys WMP600N PCI WiFi > Windows 7 Professional 64> HP 2711x (1920 X 1440)
[ Passmark system rating = 3339 / CPU = 9347 / 2D= 684 / 3D= 2030 / Mem= 1871 / Disk= 2234]

Dell Precision T5400 (2008) > 2X Xeon X5460 quad core @3.16GHz > 16GB DDR2 667 ECC> Quadro FX 4800 (1.5GB) > WD RE4 500GB / Seagate Barracuda 500GB > M-Audio 2496 Sound Card / Linksys WMP600N WiFi > HP 2711X, 27" 1920 X 1080 and Dell 19" LCD > Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit >
[ Passmark system Rating = 1859, CPU = 8528 / 2D= 512 / 3D=1097]

Dell Precision 390 (2006) (Revised): Xeon X3230 quad-core @ 2.67GHz > 8 GB DDR2 ECC 667 > Firepro V4900 (1GB) > 2X WD 320GB >Linksys WMP600N WiFi > Dell 24" > 1920 X 1200 > Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
[ Passmark system rating = 1458, CPU = 3699 / 2D= 431 / 3D=1350 / Mem= 885 / Disk=552]

Three interesting features of these systems:

1. T5500 = $1100 (Purchased for $171 and upgraded)
_ T5400 = $1000 (Purchased for $500 and upgraded)
_ 390 = $125 (This was a gift that I upgraded with Xeon X3230, RAM, and Video card was spare from another system)

2. Even though these systems have run often up to 16-20 hours per day and a few times continutously a week, I've never had a failure of any of the three.

3. Buying these systems saves researching, ordering, waiting for delivery, assembly, configuration, problem solving. In all three cases I could simply load software, get back to work, and gradually upgrade by simply pluggin in new components- never out of use more than an hour or two.

If you can buy from ebay.de, consider:

Dell Precision T3500 > Xeon W3690 6-core @ 3.47 / 3.73GHz, 8GB RAM, Quadro 2000 > EUR 449,00

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Dell-Precision-T3500-HexaCore-Xeon-W3690-3-46-GHz-8-GB-Windows-7-Quadro-2000-/231507681157?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_77&hash=item35e6eedf85

> to which I would change to 24GB RAM, add a 250Gb SSD, 1TB on a 6GB LSI RAID controller,- probably still under EUR 720, and eventually a Quadro K4000 or K2200

or better >

.Dell Precision T5500, Intel Xeon Quad-Core E5630 2.53GHz, 6 GB Ram, 500 GB HDD > EUR 201

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Dell-Precision-T5500-Intel-Xeon-Quad-Core-E5630-2-53GHz-6-GB-Ram-500-GB-HDD-/281558797301?pt=DE_Technik_Computer_Peripherieger%C3%A4te_PC_Systeme&hash=item418e364bf5

> to which I would change to a Xeon X5680 or 5690 6-core (about EUR 220), to which I would change to 24GB RAM, add a 250Gb SSD, 1TB on a 6GB LSI RAID controller and eventually a Quadro K4000 or K2200. The nice feature of this one is that you can also add a 2nd 6-core CPU.

I understand if you are absolutely against a used system, but these are beautifully made, ultra-reliable and performance when upgraded can be in the upper category of current workstations.

Cheers,

BambiBoom

PS: My niece's husband works in the design / drafting office of a shipbuilding firm in the US producing submarines, aircraft carriers, and supertankers, using Catia, also from Dessault.

HP z420 (2015) > Xeon E5-1660 v2 six core @ 3.7 /4.0GHz > 16GB DDR3 ECC 1866 RAM > Quadro K2200 (4GB) > Intel 730 480GB > Western Digital Black WD1003FZEX 1TB> M-Audio 192 sound card > Logitech z2300 > Linksys AE3000 USB WiFi > 2X Dell Ultrasharp U2715H (2560 X 1440) > Windows 7 Professional 64 >
[ Passmark Rating = 4918 > CPU= 13941 / 2D= 823 / 3D=3464 / Mem= 2669 / Disk= 4764]

Till,

Yes, I think 16GB is a good start. My previus system (HP z420, E5-1620) had 24GB (DDR3 ECC 1600) and the new HP z420 (E5-1660 v2) has DDR3 ECC 1866, so I was concerned that I have enough RAM overhead. I started: AutoCad, Revit, Solidworks, Inventor, Infrastructure, Adobe Photoshop CS6, Word, Illustrator CS6, and 3Ds Max. Without files, all these programs were still using less than 8GB RAM. But, as I believe you will be using very large files (3D models of ships) on complex software (Solidworks) eventually, I feel it is important to allow for upgrade to 32GB later, so select RAM modules accordingly. If the motherboard has 4 slots, start with 2X 8GB modules.

Unless you have extremely tight space restrictions I would suggest a mid tower and using a full ATX format motherboard. or example:

ASUS P9D-X ATX Server Motherboard LGA 1150 DDR3 1600/1333 > $160

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131999

This has several important advantages: 1. A larger motherboard may have more PCIe slots, more RAM slots, more SATA connections and 2. A larger case is easier to assemble and work on, has much better air flow / cooling, space for a larger GPU, more PCIe and PCI slots, and room for more drives. This is more expensive but forward-looking and delaying changing systems a year or two makes it less expensive per year.

This system would be larger, but even this can have benefits. I don't like to be disturbed by computer noise, so I always put the system on the floor under the desk at a place where it is easy to use disks, plug in flash drives and so on. At the moment I have two systems under the desk, the HP z420 and Dell Precision T5500 and I can not hear them- well the T5500 is slightly noticeable. Being on the floor also means it's in the coolest air in the room.

Cheers,

Bamiboom

Till,

It does look like a very good specification and I like very much the idea of the specially made wooden case.

A couple of comments:

1. You might look into the newer version of the E3-1230 v3 which is called the E3-1231 v3. This is +100MHz and in the U.S. at least about the same price as the E3-1230 v3 .

2. I like AMD GPU's very much, but for about the same cost to the W4100 ($155 in the U.S.) you can buy the Quadro K620 (2GB)- which is $160. On the Passmark test, a W4100 has a top 3D score of 1592 while the K620 top score is 2385. Also, Autodesk and Solidworks work espeically on Quadros. I think for your work, if the budget is sufficient, the K620 would be a better choice.

I would enjoy knowing how the system works!

Cheers,

BambiBoom

The difference between a workstation card and a gaming card is very simple (and complex at the same time).

Similarities:
1. Workstation cards use the exact same hardware as gaming cards -- they are the same hardware capable of performance just as fast as the other.
2. In order to make more money, both Nvidia and ATI charge an insane amount of money for workstation cards (despite having the same hardware).

Differences:
1. Unlike AMD, Nvidia deliberately cripples the double precision floating point performance on their gaming cards. Nvidia's workstation cards have faster double floating point performance only because the gaming cards are crippled, not because it's different hardware.
2. Both AMD and Nvidia include specialized drivers for workstation cards. They include things like more precise OpenGL rendering (perhaps by utilizing the double precision floating point that was crippled on gaming cards??).
3. A number of high profile software companies have partnered with Nvidia and AMD to gouge the customer by optimizing their software specifically (and ONLY) for the workstation card's drivers. This means that in some programs the workstation cards will perform significally better than a gaming card... but only because these companies have worked together to cheat you. [Note: a secondary reason for this is the crippled double precison floating point.]
4. Alternatively, if you find a program that is not from a big name company, there is a good chance it may actually perform significantly better on a gaming card (especially one from AMD without the double precision floating point crippled) because you can often afford a much faster gaming card for much less money than you can a workstation card. [of course it all depends on the double precision floating point]



Long story short. If you have to use one of the programs specifically designed to only perform well on workstation cards, then you have no choice but to get a workstation card. The only way to know for sure is to find real world benchmarks comparing workstation and gaming cards for a particular program you want to use. Unfortunately, this kind of information is difficult to find.


September Notes:
An update for anyone who might read this:
There seems to be another difference as well:
* Workstation cards may use ECC (error correction) memory, while gaming cards may not
* The lower floating point performance on gaming cards seems to be the main (if not only) other key difference.

Here are some actual benchmarks comparing the performance of a workstation and a gaming card in different programs:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/amd-f...

Conclusion?
Compare performance:
* Check the gaming vs workstation benchmarks for your program.
* If you can't find a benchmark, try to find out if the program relies heavily on double precision floating point or was made to only work on a workstation card.
When to get a workstation card for image quality or precision reasons:
* using the video card to render video or 3d scenes ... where the use of floating point may affect the final quality. Since you are saving the rendered results, this might be an important reason.
* viewing things in 3D where minor accuracy issues in the model (due to double precision floating point) may matter; in general, this really doesn't matter most of the time.
* ... or more generally, if you are doing some form of rendering AND the program relies on double precision floating point for accuracy in the results AND the program runs in single precision (less accurate) on a gaming card, then you may want a workstation card
* if you are doing highly sensitive calculations (where every bit of accuracy matters and you need the correct result the first time and every time), you may want a workstation card with ECC memory
* maybe to get support for more super high resolution monitors than on a gaming card (I'm not 100% sure about this; gaming cards support many monitors too, but I'm unsure about super high resolutions (like 4K) on many monitors at the same time. This also varies between models and brands and is likely to vary as new cards are made..) For example, the Firepro W9100 does support "six 4K monitors"[source].