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Our engineering department needs advice on system upgrades

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Message 1 of 4
mayj1973
675 Views, 3 Replies

Our engineering department needs advice on system upgrades

Hello and Thank You,

                We are in the process of converting over from ACAD to Inventor and have the Design Suite Premium 2013 ready for install. The majority of our engineering systems are 32 bit and are running XP Pro. This works well for ACAD but from my experience not so much for Inventor. Please give me your opinions on the ideal system to replace all of these prior to the install.

                Our models will be medium to large in size using Parts, Sub-Assemblies, iParts, iAssemblies, and shrink-wrapped parts and assemblies. We currently have 3 hp Z400 systems (I will attach my system info file) that seem to run fairly well with the exception of some video issues. We seem to experience dialogue boxes either partially or completely disappearing as well as colors occasionally going wacky. I need to come up with some recommendations for our IT department for replacement of the remaining 14 systems. Our goal is to have at least 2 new systems by the end of June so please help.

 

Jason Mayes

Design Engineer/CAD Manager

Deister Machine Co.

3 REPLIES 3
Message 2 of 4
RaoulM
in reply to: mayj1973

Hello mayj1973,

 

if you now are using the hp Z400 workstations and you were all lucky with them until today, perhaps it will be a good choice to keep a viewing eye on the hp Z800 or related to the "medium till large" sizing parts also to the Z820.

 

With the "Design Suite Premium 2013" you mean the "Autodesk Product Design Suite"? Not the "Building Suite I mean"

or better related to the named company in your signature. 

 

Do you import files from Inventor to 3ds Max? 

I only ask for having a better overview.

 

If you  are using 3ds Max also, do you need to render the files? 

So perhaps better with the Z820 and a nVIDIA maximus setup.

 

I know those hardware is damed hard to pay, but on the other side your workstations will not so fast be outdated

and you are not buying power, you are buying time! And Autodesk is offering since the 2013 Suite´s also with 3ds Max the render engine mental ray with a pipe to iray, this brings you up work "render" on your favorite choice and you need nothing else to buy if rendering 3ds max is a must be.

 

Ok else where, the major thing you should know how large are the file from Inventor to 3ds Max, if it is so and than better also to know how many or much memory from the graphic cards those files need.

 

So you can better estimate how many or much memory the graphic cards should better have.

If I ask dr. google about the company, that was placed by you in your signature, I think you need this to construct

new machines. is this right? If it is so, in my opinion this machines are very complex  and can producing very large files, so perhaps at last change the OS from 32 Bit to 64 and use please Windows 7 professional, ultimate or enterprice, pointed to the capability of RAM you will perhaps need. Also a pointing device likes the 3D connexion

mices can be interessting for you. 

 

I hope this was helping you a little bit and good luck for yours company.

 

Let the colors shine.
Message 3 of 4
mayj1973
in reply to: mayj1973

We are using product design suite 2013. We will have 1 system running this as well as rendering in 3ds Max and 2 systems that will be running this along with simulation 2013. Please more input from users on new systems. Thanks, Jason.

Message 4 of 4
OMCUSNR
in reply to: mayj1973

Jason,

 

What kind of budget do you have, how many machines are  you looking to upgrade?  Last year, I put the system in my sig together for $1,400, purchasing all the parts from Newegg.com  I added a card reader & dvd burner to the parts in the sig.  For me the I5 was a nice balence between cost/performance with medium sized civil projects (say 100 lot subdivision or so).  I'm learning Inventornow & using the 2012 version have not had a problem with it or solidworks in smaller assemblies (haven't got to anything major yet).

 

I'd deffinately look at building your won box, or having a local build the systems for you.  That way you can spec what YOU want, not what big box wants to sell you to keep their profit margin up.

 

One area that's always been a speed restrictor is the hard drive.  Now you want to look for a system MB that supports SATA 6. & USB 3.0.  Most people go gaga over terabyte drives, but I have yet to get anywhere near that.  I opted for the Western Digital Velociraptor as the fastest, most stable HD availble now.  BUT- SSD's are coming down in price, and many are using 128 or 256 gig SSD's as the C: drive & a good stable HD for storage.

 

HTH, and good luck with your search!

 

Reid

Homebuilt box: I5-2500k, MSI P67A-GD65, 12gig DDR3 1600 ram, ASUS ENGTX460 Video card, WD Velociraptor WD4500HLHX HD, Win 7 64 pro.

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