A Good CAD Machine?

wd40 · 25 Mar 2012 at 22:20

Hi,

Would someone be kind enough to peruse the list below and give me some comments re: suitability for a CAD and PCB design machine? I haven't built a PC before.

I'm not a CAD ninja. The idea is that I can use the machine at home to learn and work on designs, which, in the initial stages will be finished by Soildworks professionals. Hopefully I will get to the point where I can finish designs from start-finish on my own, so I guess a little expandibility would be good.

I would prefer to run the machine on XP Pro. A single 27” monitor should be fine for now (if you know a screen that's better value, please say). May add SSD at a later date. May do a little bit of music on it, hence the FW interface for my RME FF400.

Thanks in advance.

Nvidia Quadro 600 £150 (can’t decide if 2000 is worth the extra…)

Startech FW400 card £20

Dell U2711b 27" Monitor – Approx £500

Intel Core i7-2600K 3.40GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor £230

Thermaltake Armor A30 LAN Gaming Case £70

Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache £78

OCZ ZS Series 550W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £47

Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit £76 for 2-off

Sony Optiarc AD-7280S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) – OEM

Asus Royal Knight CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155

edit - am struggling with motherboard ideas. Any suggestions gratefully received.

wd40 · 26 Mar 2012 at 00:25

Makes sense to me - thanks, Beej!

The only reason for XP is that I have some dinosaur (i.e. the companies are now extinct) music software that won't run under 7-Pro. I could build a dual-boot machine, I guess. I prefer 7-Pro anyway.

edit - although I'm right near my budget limit, so I can't afford to be too picky, one thing I will say is that I'd prefer the machine not to sound like I have a 747 in the room. If it needs any tweaks to keep noise at bay, please say.

wd40 · 26 Mar 2012 at 00:32

Nice one!

It was a while back, but I do seem to remember trying the software under virtual XP and it wasn't having it. But maybe things have improved in terms of updated patches since then, so it could be worth a try.

wd40 · 26 Mar 2012 at 00:43

Do you have a suggestion for a board that fits the bill? I'm bound to make the odd strange choice considering I've always used ready-made PCs before.

Thanks!

wd40 · 26 Mar 2012 at 01:10

It's getting better all the time! Thanks.

With that lot I'll be able, as you suggested, to hold back on the graphics card for a while. That means I can save up a bit of dough and go for something with a little more grunt than the 600. As my CAD skills aren't the greatest at this time, it'll give me something to work towards, i.e. the more complex the assemblies, the more I'll need a nice card.

wd40 · 1 Apr 2012 at 11:59

Hi,

As instructed by the helpful members here, I've bought the PC suggested in Post 8 (with Gigabyte mobo).

Can anyone tell me what the procedure is to get it working via Displayport?

I initially got the machine started / loaded with Win7 Ultimate via VGA, but it only wants to install the Dell U2711 Analogue Driver. If I try and update drivers, the only option I get is for analogue.

Can I literally drag + drop the Displayport driver into a folder manually?

If I boot up with Displayport connected, the U2711 tells me 'no VGA connected'. It does the same if I try HDMI as well.

Do I have to go into the Bios and configure Displayport as Primary monitor? I'd like to check here to be careful, as I don't want to disconnect all monitors and end up with a blank screen.

Thanks.