CAD Laptop

w1llyg · 14 Feb 2018 at 10:49

Hi Guys,

Updating one of our CAD laptops which the company have recommended these requirements. Budget is £1800-£1900 + VAT. Obviously something cheaper around £1500 would be ideal but want to future proof too. Any laptop recommendations? would have loved a surface pro but don't think they have good enough graphics card

Preferably 17" screen.

PC selection

Windows 10

Intel i7 Quad core 2.5GHz or higher – this affects the rendering speed

RAM 12-16GB

Graphics card Nvidia GTX Series 1070 or 1080 – note Quardro GPU’s are not supported

Hard Drive no less than 250 GB SSD with 1TB HDD

Monitor 1920 x 1080 or higher

brendy · 14 Feb 2018 at 10:56

Hp Zbooks are doing well in the departments I support.

w1llyg · 14 Feb 2018 at 12:49

Cheers Brenda, I'll have look at their reviews

MrRockliffe · 14 Feb 2018 at 12:58

Most high end gaming laptops are well built and come with quality components.

An Alienware 17 may fit the bill nicely.

Edit: new surface books have decent enough GPUs, but they're out of your price range. A 1050 would suffice for CAD.

w1llyg · 15 Feb 2018 at 13:47

Cheers Mr Rockliffe

I have to ask why do Alienware seem to be that little more pricey compared to other competitors?

MiSJAH · 15 Feb 2018 at 14:03

w1llyg said:
Cheers Mr Rockliffe

I have to ask why do Alienware seem to be that little more pricey compared to other competitors?

Onsite warranty?

D3K · 15 Feb 2018 at 14:12

CAD is an acronym not a product.

The fact quadros arent supported indicates it some kind of mickey mouse CAD.

brendy said:
Hp Zbooks are doing well in the departments I support.

Which CAD system?

MrRockliffe said:
Most high end gaming laptops are well built and come with quality components.

An Alienware 17 may fit the bill nicely.

Edit: new surface books have decent enough GPUs, but they're out of your price range. A 1050 would suffice for CAD.

You don't know the CAD system.

I guess the question is... what is the CAD system?

MrRockliffe · 15 Feb 2018 at 14:31

w1llyg said:
Cheers Mr Rockliffe

I have to ask why do Alienware seem to be that little more pricey compared to other competitors?

They're often built to order, better warranties etc. I had a 15, and cooling was great on it. Comfy keyboard l and lovely screen

4K8KW10 · 15 Feb 2018 at 14:41

Asus GL702ZC-GC179T

17,3", AMD Ryzen 7 1700, Full HD, 16 GB RAM, 1000 GB, 8 GB SSD, AMD Radeon RX580, Microsoft Windows 10, 3 kg

w1llyg · 15 Feb 2018 at 14:58

Cheers for all the help.

D3K said:
CAD is an acronym not a product.

The fact quadros arent supported indicates it some kind of mickey mouse CAD.

Which CAD system?

You don't know the CAD system.

I guess the question is... what is the CAD system?

This is the CAD system.

https://www.stuller.com/matrix

It's for jewellery making... It uses Rhino 5 as the platform.

MrRockliffe · 15 Feb 2018 at 15:05

4K8KW10 said:
Asus GL702ZC-GC179T

17,3", AMD Ryzen 7 1700, Full HD, 16 GB RAM, 1000 GB, 8 GB SSD, AMD Radeon RX580, Microsoft Windows 10, 3 kg

Most CAD applications prefer better single core performance. I think an i7 would be a better choice.

brendy · 15 Feb 2018 at 16:39

D3K said:
Which CAD system?

You don't know the CAD system.

I guess the question is... what is the CAD system?

PTC CREO 1,2 and 3.

4K8KW10 · 15 Feb 2018 at 19:40

MrRockliffe said:
Most CAD applications prefer better single core performance. I think an i7 would be a better choice.

I see these reviews http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-7-1800x-cpu,4951-9.html
The thing is that in CAD applications, indeed Ryzen behaves rather poorly.
But when you use all of your threads simultaneously for several applications, for example, CAD application + streaming + decoding/encoding, etc, the Ryzen system will be miles ahead with its plenty of threads.

MrRockliffe · 16 Feb 2018 at 12:25

4K8KW10 said:
I see these reviews http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-ryzen-7-1800x-cpu,4951-9.html
The thing is that in CAD applications, indeed Ryzen behaves rather poorly.
But when you use all of your threads simultaneously for several applications, for example, CAD application + streaming + decoding/encoding, etc, the Ryzen system will be miles ahead with its plenty of threads.

That's quite an unlikely scenario - when using a piece of CAD software, you're usually keeping an eye on it to make sure it's running smoothly. It's not like a video edit where you can leave it running.

If your CAD software malfunctions, and you don't notice it, you could end up messing up massive assemblies and your work :/