Machine Performance - Inventor Routed Systems

[philbrown]

We are looking at specifying new machines and are concidering far cheaper i7 models to hopefully get more bangs per buck.

It has been suggested that as they do not support EEC memory that they are not recommended and will not be supported by Autodesk. Is this true ?

We have benchmarked a pack and go file on a 800 quid  Dell XPS L702X i72630QM. The result was 70% increase in speed, even a 400 quid Aldi AMD Phenom II X4 820 gave a similar performance to my workstation, whats going on ??

Does anyone have experience of using i7s are 970/80/90s far better than 2600s.?

What spec would you recommend for a budget of 1500 quid per machine ?

We use Routed Systems that seems to be very processor intensive and slow.

Thanks

Phil

Xeon E5507 2.2ghz

12 Gb RAM

Win 7 64

[mcgyvr]

Its all about processor speed (and graphics cards). Find one in the 3.0+ GHZ range and spec in an NVIDIA graphics card. (Why NVIDIA? because their drivers are better suited for Inventor) From the results of a recent benchmark post all NVIDIA cards outperformed any ATI card hands down. There is no need for a quadro as a quadro and a regular NVIDIA gaming type card showed almost identical performance.

And Autodesk will support ANY computer setup. They just have their own list of "recommended" systems that are proven to perform but by NO means must you use them.

And yes the higher I7 9 series CPU's are really nice. I got the 920 but my intent was to overclock to get into the 3.0+GHZ range... (just haven't had time to do that yet) If you don't want to bother with upgraded heatsinks/overclocking pick a 9 series in the 3.0Ghz range already and have fun. The 2600 is a great processor too. I'm sure you can find many benchmarks on i7 vs 2600 CPU's all over the internet.

[VinodBalasubramanian]

We don't recommend by hardware configuration by different vendors. However here are some articles that can guide you to run Inventor with optimal performance.

1. Certified graphic card driver,

http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/cert?siteID=123112&id=16391880

2. Working with Large assemblies - Improving Inventor performance,

http://wikihelp.autodesk.com/Inventor/enu/2012/Help/0073-Autodesk73/0460-Assembli460/Work_with_Large...

Hope it helps. 

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[sam_m]

1) don't worry about EEC ram, this is the 1st time I've heard that you need it to be supported by Autodesk, so think someone is twisting your arm to try and get you to spend a little more...  At no point on the system requirements does it say you need EEC, so (politely) tell them to do one.

2) cpu - go for an i7 2600 or i5 2500 over then older 9## series.  The 2### chips are 2nd generation "sandy bridge" and quite a bit quicker (both single and mult threaded).  Inventor is a single-threaded application so there should be little difference between the i5 2500 and i7 2600 (as the main difference betweent he chips is hyperthreading on the i7 - and Inventor will only use this for rendering - so down to you as to how much rendering you do).

know it's not Inventor but here's the best single-threaded benchmark table I can quickly find:

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/desktop-cpu-charts-2010/Cinebench-11.5-Single-threaded,2406.html

This is probably the closest cpu-to-cpu benchmark you'll get for general Inventor use - notice how far behind the 9## chips are compared to the 2600 and 2500.  (eg the 920 is about 2/3 the speed of the 2600).

Now, overclocking was mentioned in passing, these sandy bridge chips can o/c like a mother, so can get even more oomph out of them, if you so wish.

3) use a gaming Nvidia card 😉  GeForce 560Ti would be ideal performance/price.

4) generally ignore the certified drivers and use the latest (unless you have a problem with the latest Nvidia release) - this has been talked about a lot before.  Certified drivers went out with OpenGL and it's a little unfair/wrong of ppl to keep pushing them (and the Quadro cards) as if they're the only drivers/setup that will work.

5) if you're looking at Dell pc (and you use quid so guessing you're from UK too) - check out the Dell outlet website, loads of bargains to be had 😉

[Ronnie_m]

Go for the 2600's they are easily overclocked to 4.5Ghz and are easily the best value for money just now.

If your in the Uk give IP Workstations a call I just bought 5 workstations the prices range from £1700-£1900 depending on your configuration.

I went for the following

2600- O/Clocked to 4.5Ghz spec

16Gb Ram DDR-3

Quadro 2000 (GTX580 was the same price)

Intel 510 SSD (250Gb)

1Tb SATA3

Antec Kuhler H20 920CPU Cooler

I was tempted by the GTX580 but have had my fair share of driver issues with Geforce cards before.

Our previous machines were Core 2 CPU's Overclocked to 4.2Ghz and the new systems with the SSD's are quite a step up.

[sam_m]

If you're planning to overclock make sure you get the "K" version of the chips (i5 2500K or i7 2600K) - they're the unlocked chips which allow overclocking.