CAD Build

BeeP · 28 Nov 2024 at 10:05

Hi,

I'm looking to build 2 or 3 PC workstations to use with Solidworks and EdgeCAM work, my boss asked if I could take a look around as we need to upgrade. I've built quite a few gaming systems over the years but never a workstation.

I was thinking -

i7 14700k- not set....I know nothing about intel so I'm open to AMD suggestions too.
Asus TUF z790 Gaming - not set....I know nothing about intel so I'm open to AMD suggestions too.
64gb 5600 RAM
Nvidia RTX 2000 ada series (seems to be the best fit for what we do)
Phantom Spirit cooler
512gb m.2. boot drive
2tb m.2. storage
1000w corsair PSU
A plain looking case something like Fractal Pop Silent? This is for an office so no RGB needed.

We currently run SW 2016 but will probably upgrade to the new version soon, usage is nothing crazy but loads of rounds and some surfacing is stressing the old PC's we currently have out. EdgeCAM is from 2022 and really needs more grunt for counting all of the toolpaths.

Looking somewhere around £2-2.5k.

Cheers in advance for any help.

Tetras · 28 Nov 2024 at 12:48

BeeP said:
i7 14700k- not set....I know nothing about intel so I'm open to AMD suggestions too.
Asus TUF z790 Gaming - not set....I know nothing about intel so I'm open to AMD suggestions too.

The AMD 9900X is a good all-rounder option with consistently high performance in single and multi threaded apps. The 14700K is not a bad choice except for the fact that we don't know if these CPUs are truly fixed. If you're happy to rely on the 5 year extended warranty then it is not a big deal, though at this point I'd be inclined to get the Ultra 265K if wanting to go Intel, since the major weakness of this CPU (gaming) doesn't apply for your use case.

BeeP said:
Phantom Spirit cooler

You'll likely need to mess with the fan curves and possibly the power limits too (depending on the BIOS used) to get this comfortable with a 14700K.

My basket at OcUK:

1 x Intel Core Ultra 7 265K (Arrow Lake) Socket LGA 1851 Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-INT-03111) = £379.99
1 x Intel Holiday Bundle - Assassin's Creed Shadows + Ubisoft Plus (SKU: DIG-INT-03637) = £0.00
1 x Asrock Z890 Pro-A (LGA 1851) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-ASR-03365) = £179.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan 64GB (2X32GB) DDR5 PC5-51200C40 6400MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (SKU: MEM-TMG-03146) = £179.99
1 x Zotac GeForce RTX 4080 Super Trinity Black 16Gb Graphics Card (SKU: GRA-ZTC-01496) = £959.99
1 x NVIDIA - Indiana Jones and The Great Circle Game Bundle (SKU: DIG-NVI-03769) = £0.00
1 x Crucial T500 1TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01089) = £58.99
1 x Crucial T500 2TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01090) = £99.95
1 x Lian Li Lancool 216 Mid-tower PC case - Black (SKU: CA-7BG-LL) = £89.99
1 x Antec HCG 850 Pro Platinum 850W ATX3.1 Full modular Power Supply (SKU: POW-ATC-02745) = £159.94

1 x Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE Black CPU Air Cooler (SKU: COO-TLR-03291) = £33.95

Total: £2,154.77 (includes delivery: £11.98)

Columbo · 28 Nov 2024 at 13:56

I wouldnt touch a 13th or 14th gen intel chip whne AMD are more than equla to them in CAD and dont have the possibility of frying themselves.
Additionally the RTX2000 cards and similar are just rebadged versions of the gaming card basically, there is so little between you are much better off getting a 4080.

We have AMD 7950x chips and RTX 4080's in machines at work for use with Navis, Autodesk and Sketchup.

BeeP · 28 Nov 2024 at 14:55

Tetras said:
The AMD 9900X is a good all-rounder option with consistently high performance in single and multi threaded apps. The 14700K is not a bad choice except for the fact that we don't know if these CPUs are truly fixed. If you're happy to rely on the 5 year extended warranty then it is not a big deal, though at this point I'd be inclined to get the Ultra 265K if wanting to go Intel, since the major weakness of this CPU (gaming) doesn't apply for your use case.

You'll likely need to mess with the fan curves and possibly the power limits too (depending on the BIOS used) to get this comfortable with a 14700K.

My basket at OcUK:

1 x Intel Core Ultra 7 265K (Arrow Lake) Socket LGA 1851 Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-INT-03111) = £379.99

1 x Intel Holiday Bundle - Assassin's Creed Shadows + Ubisoft Plus (SKU: DIG-INT-03637) = £0.00

1 x Asrock Z890 Pro-A (LGA 1851) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-ASR-03365) = £179.99

1 x TeamGroup Vulcan 64GB (2X32GB) DDR5 PC5-51200C40 6400MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (SKU: MEM-TMG-03146) = £179.99

1 x Zotac GeForce RTX 4080 Super Trinity Black 16Gb Graphics Card (SKU: GRA-ZTC-01496) = £959.99

1 x NVIDIA - Indiana Jones and The Great Circle Game Bundle (SKU: DIG-NVI-03769) = £0.00

1 x Crucial T500 1TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01089) = £58.99

1 x Crucial T500 2TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01090) = £99.95

1 x Lian Li Lancool 216 Mid-tower PC case - Black (SKU: CA-7BG-LL) = £89.99

1 x Antec HCG 850 Pro Platinum 850W ATX3.1 Full modular Power Supply (SKU: POW-ATC-02745) = £159.94

1 x Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE Black CPU Air Cooler (SKU: COO-TLR-03291) = £33.95

Total: £2,154.77 (includes delivery: £11.98)

Like I said I dont have a preference for AMD or Intel, basically not a clue lol. If you were to pick what would you go for especially if Intel might blow up at some point, I can't see me being very popular if that happened. The 9900x sounds pretty good after a quick bit of reading.

I see the A2000 ada card for £624 online so going to a 4080 seems like a bit of a leap price wise, gaming on these will be absolutely zero.

The spirit cooler was just because I use one at home and have been impressed with it on my 7800x3d, again if there is a better way please feel free to say as I don't want to muck this up.

Thank you both so much for your comments and help so far, it is very much appreciated.

Tetras · 28 Nov 2024 at 15:25

BeeP said:
Like I said I dont have a preference for AMD or Intel, basically not a clue lol. If you were to pick what would you go for especially if Intel might blow up at some point, I can't see me being very popular if that happened. The 9900x sounds pretty good after a quick bit of reading.

Personally I would just avoid the 13th-14th gen CPUs, since there's no need to take the risk. The Core Ultra CPUs are fine, so far as we know.

Something like the AMD 9900X is a good choice, no worries there.

The 265K is roughly comparable to the 9900X in most workloads, so if you prefer Intel that would work. I'd just take whatever has a good price, but the AMD AM5 platform is more mature and performance is more consistent. Intel is going to need some BIOS/software updates (they've said they are coming) to smooth out the rough edges.

BeeP said:
The spirit cooler was just because I use one at home and have been impressed with it on my 7800x3d, again if there is a better way please feel free to say as I don't want to muck this up.

There's nothing with buying a peerless assassin/phantom spirit, but you might have to fiddle with it, that's all.

BeeP · 28 Nov 2024 at 15:27

Sorry to be a pain, what would you spec as a 9900x build then please?

Tetras · 28 Nov 2024 at 15:31

BeeP said:
Sorry to be a pain, what would you spec as a 9900x build then please?

Something like this:

My basket at OcUK:

1 x AMD Ryzen 9 9900X Twelve Core 5.60GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-AMD-02675) = £449.99
1 x Asrock X870 Pro RS WIFI (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-ASR-03308) = £209.99
1 x Kingston FURY Beast EXPO 64GB (2x32GB) DDR5 PC5-44800C30 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit (SKU: MEM-KNG-03707) = £194.98
1 x Zotac GeForce RTX 4080 Super Trinity Black 16Gb Graphics Card (SKU: GRA-ZTC-01496) = £959.99
1 x NVIDIA - Indiana Jones and The Great Circle Game Bundle (SKU: DIG-NVI-03769) = £0.00
1 x Crucial T500 1TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01089) = £58.99
1 x Crucial T500 2TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01090) = £99.95
1 x B Grade Phanteks Eclipse P600S Silent Midi Tower Case - Black (SKU: BG-05M-PT) = £89.99
1 x CORSAIR RM850x Gold ATX 3.1 PCIe 5.1 Fully Modular Power Supply (SKU: POW-CRS-02466) = £109.99
1 x Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE Black CPU Air Cooler (SKU: COO-TLR-03291) = £33.95

Total: £2,219.81 (includes delivery: £11.98)

There are cheaper boards if you don't care about PCI-E 5.0/USB4.

BeeP · 28 Nov 2024 at 15:40

Magic, thank you so much. At least I have a few options to throw at them on Monday.

Would the cooler be ok on the AMD chip, guessing it is just the Intel one that runs hot at full tilt?

Tetras · 28 Nov 2024 at 15:43

BeeP said:
Would the cooler be ok on the AMD chip, guessing it is just the Intel one that runs hot at full tilt?

I'd expect a bit of tweaking to be necessary with either CPU, since in TPU's review their power profile was pretty similar and if anything the Intel ran a bit cooler:

Intel Core Ultra 7 265K Review

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K offers eight strong Lion Cove cores, just like the 285K, and merely four E-Cores fewer, for an almost 50% price difference. Despite the "Ultra 7" branding it offers plenty of application performance that can beat even the Ryzen 9 9900X. Things don't look so good in...

www.techpowerup.com

BeeP · 5 Dec 2024 at 10:13

Tetras said:
I'd expect a bit of tweaking to be necessary with either CPU, since in TPU's review their power profile was pretty similar and if anything the Intel ran a bit cooler:

Intel Core Ultra 7 265K Review

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K offers eight strong Lion Cove cores, just like the 285K, and merely four E-Cores fewer, for an almost 50% price difference. Despite the "Ultra 7" branding it offers plenty of application performance that can beat even the Ryzen 9 9900X. Things don't look so good in...

www.techpowerup.com

Well I put the two builds forward and it looks like we are going 9900x.

Thanks again so much for the help, it is appreciated so keep up the great work.