New computer for an engineering student

I

iamjuliespiano

Limp Gawd
Joined
Oct 9, 2003
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Hey everyone, I'm gonna be studying engineering next year in college (thinking civil or mechanical/aero) and will most likely be upgrading from my current computer. Current system specs are in the sig. I was hoping someone can advise me on which hardware runs engineering software the best.

Not sure between desktop or laptop right now, but if anyone can answer any of these questions:

  • Are Pentiums/Athlons better for CAD?
  • Does CAD software take advantage of hyperthreading?
  • Does any CAD software take advantage of A64's 64-bitness?
  • Would 1MB L2 cache on the Prescott be helpful?
  • Is a higher-end (>$150) 3d gfx card helpful?
  • Are ATI's FireGL cards or nVidia's Quadro cards or any other that I'm ignoring much better than standard video cards?

Thanks a lot
 
I am an Electrical engineering student, and what I have found. My school is still using P3's to run some of the cad/pro-e software stuff. So pretty much anything over 2.5 and 512mg o ram will do you just fine. It'd be different if you were pounding out cad stuff for 8 hours a day like at work, but truth is...you won't need it.

just make sure your system can run the latest games....cuz seriously what are you going to do more!!! Play games? or Use your computer for actual classwork?
 
I'm a computer engineering student at uofm right now, its my senior year and I'm having to pick up a laptop right now. So I would definatly go the laptop route. Just for the fact of presentations and say senior design and such it makes it alot easier. Ive decided to get an IBM T41P. Its a 1.7 mobile eprocessor, 512 but I will upgrade to 1mb, and the video card is a 128mb firegl T2, its the same as a mobility 9600 just that the drivers are set for more buisness type apps. You can even get a 15" flexview lcd but I'm opting for the 14.1 sxga just for sheer size. But from what I've heard they are some kick ass laptops and will definatly be powerfull enough for autocad or whatever your gona throw at it
 
I'm an electrical engineering student, and some of the labs here still use P3 to run simulation software aswell. It seems like any decent set up can run simulation programs.. some systems might take longer than others.. i would say go with a Laptop though.. cause at least for me, i need to take in simulations files and stuff like that to my labs.. I also know that at my school (Univ of florida) mechanical engineers are requiered to have a laptop by their junior year or something..
 
I am a Mechanical Engr student, I have a computer at home for CAD and stuff (in sig) and it runs AutoCAD and similar fine. I just got done building this and now I decided i need a laptop for the fall since I'll be commuting to Univ of Houston and I won't have access to my own computer on campus. I'd say a nice laptop gives you the most options, but if you're living on campus a desktop would probably suit you fine (and be cheaper) , although you wouldn't be able to take notes in class and stuff like that. I'm just going to get a cheap laptop that can run stuff like Autocad 2002 , maple and MATlab and just use that for mainly word proc when i'm down on campus.
 
I have AutoCAD 2004, Autodesk Architectual Desktop 2004 (cool program, it does everything for you), Inventor 8, and Autodesk Mechanical Desktop on my computer and they all run great. I've done a little 3d work, and everything renders fine. But, I'd say get at least 1GB of ram.
 
mm not an engineering student, but a student taking CAD in high school. the lab used to have p2 (or p3) 633 mhz with 384 megs of ram on NT 4.0 SP 6, and autocad 2002 ran decently. we recently upgraded to 2.66 w/ 1 gig of ram and quadro 4's and it runs really nice. I'd say at least a p4 2.4 with a gig of ram. If you do more projects on the larger scale, then i'd say a quadro/firegl would do fine.

i, myself, run autocad2k4 on a radeon 9600np, p4 2.4 and 768 megs of ram and it does rather fine.
 
The most important thing is RAM. Try and at least make it 1GB and you will be set.
 
I currently work doing Civil Engineering (going back to school for CompSci tho), and my workstation at work is a P4 2.2 with 1GB of RAM, AutoCAD 2002 runs beautifully on it (with LDD).
 
if you plan on doing any gaming, just go ahead and get a normal "gaming" oriented video card, it'll do CAD fine. Sure it's not what it was designed for necessarily, but it'll handle it no problem.

There are no insane cpu requirements, and I agree with what others have said, get 1gb ram at least...It definitely helps when you get into larger CAD projects.

Laptops are nice, but I think they are too limited to be the only system used for an engineer. But that's just my opinion...
 
It's not going to matter one single bit for your school work.

Laptops are overrated as well.
 
a) You're probably going to change your major in the first 2yr. If any of the engineering classes you're going to take in your first 2yr rely on you working with some sort of software, you're not going to be doing complex enough examples for it to really matter what you run it on.

b) if you're still in it in 2yr, the computer you buy today will be obsolete.

c) a lot of engineering software is ridiculously expensive, and the free/cheap student versions tends to be crippled

d) Working in the labs is a great social thing; people who work (even loosely together) in groups are generally going to do better than those that work at home, alone, on faster hardware.



Get the computer you want and don't worry so much about hwo well it handles engineering apps; it'll probably be more than enough for what you'd do as an undergrad. You probably won't ever seriously tax your system as an undergrad (with the possible exception of a senior project; even then you should be safe). My biggest reccomendation would be to make sure that it'll run Linux well, incase you switch over to CS ;)


One data point : in the labs here (EE/CompE dept), we have machines with pretty much the same specs as yours in one room, and P4s and XP2500+s with 512MB in another. The slower machines get used more because they're closer to the printer; they're plenty fast enough for most things.
 
I work at an A&E firm, and the computer they gave me to use (a 500Mhz w/ 128Mb RAM....I'm new....) runs autoCAD 2000i just fine. The biggest our file sizes are is ~ 1 meg.

a little off the subject, does anyone know of a good site to help learn autodesk? thanks.
 
Hell, at work last summer I was using AutoCAD on a Pentium... ok so that was a bit unenjoyable, but it worked. Bottomline is that any modern system today will be adequate. Even if you don't have that gig of RAM everybody here suggested.

Don't get a laptop. Everyone says all this bs about going to class and taking notes, and at least at my school NOBODY DOES THAT. It just isn't as productive or as easy as taking notes by hand. Unless your school has campus-wide* wifi, a laptop isn't worthwhile. Even if my school got a campus-wide wifi LAN, I'd stick with a desktop, and maybe just get a nice little PPC for playing around on the wifi LAN- not work, just for fun. Forget any illusions you have about bringing your laptop to the engineering building, your buddies gather around your laptop and you all do your work there. Then after you're finished you sit outside on a bench, the weather is beautiful, and you enjoy the wifi LAN with your laptop, and your integrated 802.11g turns you into a huge chick magnet. Forget it, but it just doesn't work like that, at least not for me. ;)

* I stress that just because lots of schools brag about having wifi when it just means that they have it in 1 or 2 buildings.

BTW I'm majoring in ME.
 
Paully's5.0 said:
I am an Electrical engineering student, and what I have found. My school is still using P3's to run some of the cad/pro-e software stuff. So pretty much anything over 2.5 and 512mg o ram will do you just fine. It'd be different if you were pounding out cad stuff for 8 hours a day like at work, but truth is...you won't need it.

just make sure your system can run the latest games....cuz seriously what are you going to do more!!! Play games? or Use your computer for actual classwork?
Click to expand...

a point you might not immediately consider is that, if you do get a top shelf solution now, it will still be relevant apon graduation, when financial assitance and disposable income might be far tighter than the "assistance" level he might have now ;)

my sig is a relatively good example of a "power" workstation
and its complete overkill for modeling (3D\CAD)
but very relevent for rendering, especially a very detailed high poly scene
do you need it to learn?
Hell no, but if you can swing it, that might be advantageous in the long run
might look at these http://www.boxxtech.com/asp/1workstations.asp

the real question would be do you forsee that need to render? and on a regular basis?
there are also hardware rendering solutions that might be a better fit in the long run as well
http://www.artvps.com/products.ihtml?page=pureoverview

any decent gaming box will do a more than fair job, and that extra bit that pushes it into the workstation level, is damn expensive, so it really comes down to the budget
it can take quite awhile to render a scene, and that is where that "next level" comes in
 
1) ignore any literature you get sent from your college/uni about buying a computer with specific specs.

2) dont get a laptop unless your sure it has a decent graphics chipset and is cheap- you wont take it to lectures as its easier to take notes by hand and people will take the piss out of you if you do.

3) build a decent gaming desktop and install all your favourite LAN games on it and hope the ppl you live with like games too- then every day is a mini LAN party :D

4) discover your top-notch gaming system gets great FPS and runs all your CAD programs just fine ;) - first comp in sig runs proE and unigraphics NX just fine, pc's in labs here are 2.4p4's with 64mb ati 9200's and they run fine too :)

5) have a great time at uni. it rocks :cool:
 
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