Speccing a CAD workstation for my client - advice please

WalderX · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:11

Hi Guys n Gals,

I'm meeting a client today to discuss pricing on a workstation to run AutoCAD LT 2014 and Revit 3D. There is no budget per se but of course I have to sell it to the client and they are a small 3 many company so budgets are limited as always. I have never really specced a 'proper' workstation - what do we think on the below (I'm running with ex.VAT prices as it's a business quote:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Xeon E5-2609v2 2.50GHz 4-Core (Socket 2011) - Retail £199.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UD3 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £121.66
1 x PNY Nvidia Quadro 410 Graphics Card - 512MB - GDDR3 SDRAM £104.16
1 x Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM (WN7-00614) £62.49
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis 8GB (4x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual/Quad Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3K4/8GX) £59.99
1 x Kingston 120GB SSDNow V300 Drive SATA 6Gb/s 3 2.5" (7mm height) Solid State Hard Drive - (SV300S37A/120G) £49.99
1 x SuperFlower Amazon 550W "80 Plus Bronze" Power Supply £41.66
1 x BitFenix Comrade Midi-Tower - Black £24.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £14.99
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.16
Total : £694.08 + VAT

Perhaps I could save on the PSU, or would an i7 build with cheaper mobo be just as good?

TIA

WalderX · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:28

OR

i7, dual channel RAM, AMD FirePro (more RAM, DDR5 rather than DDR3 in the Nvidia card)

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-4771 3.50GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £191.66
1 x AMD FirePro V4900 Professional Graphics Card - 1GB - GDDR5 SDRAM £116.66
1 x Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM (WN7-00614) £62.49
1 x Gigabyte H87-HD3 Intel H87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £59.99
1 x Kingston 120GB SSDNow V300 Drive SATA 6Gb/s 3 2.5" (7mm height) Solid State Hard Drive - (SV300S37A/120G) £49.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £46.66
1 x SuperFlower Amazon 550W "80 Plus Bronze" Power Supply £41.66
1 x BitFenix Comrade Midi-Tower - Black £24.99
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.16
Total : £608.26 + VAT

ExRayTed · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:32

I would drop the Xeon for a fast Haswell; AutoCAD and Revit both love a fast cpu. The only benefit with Xeons are they can run in multi-CPU motherboards and they can use EEC memory (with a compatible board).

WalderX · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:35

ExRayTed said:
I would drop the Xeon for a fast Haswell; AutoCAD and Revit both love a fast cpu. The only benefit with Xeons are they can run in multi-CPU motherboards and they can use EEC memory (with a compatible board).

Thanks for input dude. One thing I was considering with the Xeon is that as it is a socket 2011 one we will get the benefit of quad channel memory, although I'm sure my end-user won't really notice difference between that and the speeds of dual-channel mem?

ExRayTed · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:36

Really won't make a difference. I'd possibly consider 16gb rather than 8gb if he's rendering lots.

WalderX · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:40

ExRayTed said:
Really won't make a difference. I'd possibly consider 16gb rather than 8gb if he's rendering lots.

I thought this too. Howbout this then:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-4771 3.50GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £191.66
1 x AMD FirePro V4900 Professional Graphics Card - 1GB - GDDR5 SDRAM £116.66
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan GOLD 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLYD316G2133HC11ADC01) £108.29
1 x Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM (WN7-00614) £62.49
1 x Gigabyte H87-HD3 Intel H87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £59.99
1 x Kingston 120GB SSDNow V300 Drive SATA 6Gb/s 3 2.5" (7mm height) Solid State Hard Drive - (SV300S37A/120G) £49.99
1 x SuperFlower Amazon 550W "80 Plus Bronze" Power Supply £41.66
1 x BitFenix Comrade Midi-Tower - Black £24.99
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.16
Total : £669.89

ExRayTed · 28 Feb 2014 at 09:46

Yup, all looks good.

My personal preference has always been with Nvidia cards for workstation stuff, simply because they've always 'just worked' where-as the AMD offerings have suffered with glitchy drivers. AMD have caught up now though and are a viable alternative; I just can't bring myself to recommend their cards though.

EDIT - Just seen you've added in an SSD. Get the Samsung drive for £20 more. Much better controller, better read / write speeds and it has a 256mb buffer

WalderX · 28 Feb 2014 at 11:33

Thanks for your help, client has gone ahead along with a 24" screen so good news

I will try squeeze the Samsung SSD in, but Kingston ones are still great for business users and gotta think of the profit margins

Bear in mind he is going from a dual-core Intel Core2 2GHz with 2GB ram, running on Windows XP on a mechanical sata1 hard drive! - he really really isn't going to know what hit him!