Opinions on new Inventor PC build

[swebster01]

I know there are many posts on Inventor hardware requirements and I think I have a solid build - I just want to try to make sure I haven't missed anything. My hardware background is primarily gaming and home PCs.

Here is what I am about to request from IT. We have a small engineering group of 5 people that runs all the standard Office apps, Inventor 2009. We work with assemblies of up to generally less than 200 components, sometimes up to 4000-5000 components. We're currently running XP 32 bit but I am pushing hard for Win 7 64bit.

Generally the larger assemblies involve importing a assembly from another CAD platform like Unigraphics or NX or ProE or Catia. This takes a long time or is even impossible on our current P4 systems. One thing I couldn't determine is the need for OpenGL support when opening and translating files native to a CAD platform that does require OpenGL. Will the HD4870 be sufficient for this type of activity?

Here's my Hardware list:
SAMSUNG CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223C $25.99
1 Antec Sonata III 500 Black ATX Mid Tower Computer Case EarthWatts 500W Power Supply $109.99
3 Western Digital Caviar Blue WD800AAJS 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive $34.99 each (setup in RAID 0)
1 XFX HD-487A-ZWFC Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video $154.99
1 Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor $288.99
1 Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - OEM $139.99
1 Kingston HyperX 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000 (PC3 16000)
1 GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD3R LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard Combo Price $368.98
Total: $1,193.90

Looking to get 4-5 years out of these. See anything wrong? Possible problems or weaknesses? Overkill or deficiencies anywhere?

[Anonymous]

For the most part the system you are looking at should be adequate for
what you want to do. I would probably take the RAM up to 8GB if you are
importing STEP or IGES files that are as large as you indicate (no such
thing as too much RAM).

I don't have any experience with the ATI cards other than they have
always had a bad reputation with Inventor users in the past. Now that
Inventor is using Direct3D they may be OK, however I don't see any
driver recommendations for the card you selected on the Autodesk site.
I prefer the Quadro FX cards, but would try one of the nVidia GeForce
9800 or 8800 series cards if I couldn't get a Quadro.

Inventor won't care if the CAD system you are importing STEP or IGES
files from was using OpenGL or not, so you really don't have to worry
about that. Having enough RAM to handle all the data will be more
important, so an x64 OS and 8GB or more of RAM will be a necessity. I
have the only seat of Vista x64 in a company of 100+ and have had no
problems getting everything to play nice.

swebster@pekoprecision.com wrote:
> I know there are many posts on Inventor hardware requirements and I think I have a solid build - I just want to try to make sure I haven't missed anything. My hardware background is primarily gaming and home PCs.
>
> Here is what I am about to request from IT. We have a small engineering group of 5 people that runs all the standard Office apps, Inventor 2009. We work with assemblies of up to generally less than 200 components, sometimes up to 4000-5000 components. We're currently running XP 32 bit but I am pushing hard for Win 7 64bit.
>
> Generally the larger assemblies involve importing a assembly from another CAD platform like Unigraphics or NX or ProE or Catia. This takes a long time or is even impossible on our current P4 systems. One thing I couldn't determine is the need for OpenGL support when opening and translating files native to a CAD platform that does require OpenGL. Will the HD4870 be sufficient for this type of activity?
>
> Here's my Hardware list:
> SAMSUNG CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223C $25.99
> 1 Antec Sonata III 500 Black ATX Mid Tower Computer Case EarthWatts 500W Power Supply $109.99
> 3 Western Digital Caviar Blue WD800AAJS 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive $34.99 each (setup in RAID 0)
> 1 XFX HD-487A-ZWFC Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video $154.99
> 1 Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor $288.99
> 1 Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - OEM $139.99
> 1 Kingston HyperX 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000 (PC3 16000)
> 1 GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD3R LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard Combo Price $368.98
> Total: $1,193.90
>
> Looking to get 4-5 years out of these. See anything wrong? Possible problems or weaknesses? Overkill or deficiencies anywhere?

--
Hal Gwin
Mechanical Designer
Caliper LifeSciences

R2009 Pro SP1 D3D10
Vista x64 SP1
Dell Precision T5400
3.00 GHz Xeon 8 GB RAM
Quadro FX 1700
nVidia 7.15.11.8246 w/registry update
Dell UltraSharp 24" Widescreen LCD

[Anonymous]

Everything seems slow and old technology to me. I7-920's are pretty
slow and it would be common to use 10,000 rpm drives such as Western
Digital Velociraptor. 80 GB - you're joking again. 4-5 years use -
politely - you must be joking. Of course they will "work" for 4-5
years but oh so slow...

Solid modelling regardless of the software is probably the most
demanding CAD application.

Do all of the applications you want to run work on Windows 7? Do all
the drivers etc you need to use work on windows 7? windows 7 might be
a little soon/early but you could consider Vista 64 bit with the free
upgrade to 7.

You need to consult the Autodesk webpages for graphics systems for
Inventor and see what is approved. For standard AutoCAD, OpenGL is only
optional and a mid level games D3D card works very well. Nvidia seems to
have the best reputation for drivers for CAD type stuff, but I am biased
in this regard.

Your proposal is not a economically productive solution in my view. The
operator costs ($ per hour) are 10-20 times the computer cost. On the
other hand if you have been using P4 technology without pulling your
hair out or dying of boredom maybe you'd be OK.
--
======================================================
George Drayton CD-CAD Ltd Christchurch New Zealand.

[swebster01]

The processor choice is based on useage/cost. The i7-920 just seems like the best bang for the buck to me. What processor/motherboard combo would you recommend? These boxes are only used for solid modeling approx 15-20% of their used time. Assemblies we design on these are typically less than 200 components. The largest 3000-5000pc assemblies are customer designs that we are not really doing much editing on - only translating and pulling individual parts out of for fixture design and CNC/CMM programming.

In regards to your comments on the choice of harddrives. I've been researching Raid0 on desktops boxes and it seems inadvisable. I think I will recommend the Velociraptors as you suggest. All work is stored on the Network drive and it's all hardwired with fiber so it's pretty quick. A 150GB Velociraptor would be more than enough space on each box. We currently have 60BG drives in each box and they aren't even 1/3 full.

The OS choice may be difficult - our network is something like 200 computers on it, all XP32 except for a few XP64 to run the 3 or 4 NX and ProE boxes. I think it will be difficult to convince IT to go to Win7 64 on these 5 boxes until it's been out there for a year or so. Vista 64 may be possible. I really, really hope I don't end up on XP64. Can anybody provide easy, solid reasons why Vista64 or Win7 64 would obviously be a vast improvement over XP64? Reasons that would appeal to an IT department?

I was trying to stay around $1000. Perhaps you are right - I should shoot higher. My own current box is a P4 1.8G on some crappy generic board, 1.5Gb Ram and XP32. It's horrifically slow. I timed opening/translating/saving a 2000 component assembly the other day and it took nearly 3 hours. I don't do this often but it doesn't take may times/year to add up and I can't do anything else while I'm waiting. When I estimate how much faster a fairly modern box will be I get about a 5-6 week payoff time for a $1000 box. If I shoot for $2000 builds it's still only around a 3 month payoff. I'm just afraid of sticker shock and a response of "Not now, it's too expensive - come back in 6 months or a year". Maybe I'll upgrade the hard drives to Velo's, add big monitors and go for $1500 each. Then in 3 or 4 years I'll go bigger and better.

[Anonymous]

Using a Core i7 means you are getting a system that uses triple channel
memory, not dual channel. If you increase the ram beyond 6 GB, you should
go to 12 GB so that you buy three modules of 4 GB or six modules of 2 GB. I
like to leave open slots for later when I need to expand my memory, so
getting the larger modules now may be the way to go. I believe the
motherboard will have six slots, but best check it out.

Going with a newer version of Inventor on Windows 7, I don't think there are
any advantages to an OpenGL card, but a lot more cost.

One downside to Windows 7 is that while Inventor is on the list of tested
and confirmed Autodesk software, Vault is not. That does not mean it won't
work, but just not tested at this point.
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/ps/dl/item?siteID=123112&id=14053691&linkID=9240697

Brad
C3D 2010 on Vista Business 64 SP 2
LT 2010 on XP Pro SP 3

"Hal Gwin" wrote in message
news:6294917@discussion.autodesk.com...
For the most part the system you are looking at should be adequate for
what you want to do. I would probably take the RAM up to 8GB if you are
importing STEP or IGES files that are as large as you indicate (no such
thing as too much RAM).

I don't have any experience with the ATI cards other than they have
always had a bad reputation with Inventor users in the past. Now that
Inventor is using Direct3D they may be OK, however I don't see any
driver recommendations for the card you selected on the Autodesk site.
I prefer the Quadro FX cards, but would try one of the nVidia GeForce
9800 or 8800 series cards if I couldn't get a Quadro.

Inventor won't care if the CAD system you are importing STEP or IGES
files from was using OpenGL or not, so you really don't have to worry
about that. Having enough RAM to handle all the data will be more
important, so an x64 OS and 8GB or more of RAM will be a necessity. I
have the only seat of Vista x64 in a company of 100+ and have had no
problems getting everything to play nice.

swebster@pekoprecision.com wrote:
> I know there are many posts on Inventor hardware requirements and I think
> I have a solid build - I just want to try to make sure I haven't missed
> anything. My hardware background is primarily gaming and home PCs.
>
> Here is what I am about to request from IT. We have a small engineering
> group of 5 people that runs all the standard Office apps, Inventor 2009.
> We work with assemblies of up to generally less than 200 components,
> sometimes up to 4000-5000 components. We're currently running XP 32 bit
> but I am pushing hard for Win 7 64bit.
>
> Generally the larger assemblies involve importing a assembly from another
> CAD platform like Unigraphics or NX or ProE or Catia. This takes a long
> time or is even impossible on our current P4 systems. One thing I couldn't
> determine is the need for OpenGL support when opening and translating
> files native to a CAD platform that does require OpenGL. Will the HD4870
> be sufficient for this type of activity?
>
> Here's my Hardware list:
> SAMSUNG CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223C $25.99
> 1 Antec Sonata III 500 Black ATX Mid Tower Computer Case EarthWatts 500W
> Power Supply $109.99
> 3 Western Digital Caviar Blue WD800AAJS 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5"
> Internal Hard Drive $34.99 each (setup in RAID 0)
> 1 XFX HD-487A-ZWFC Radeon HD 4870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16
> Video $154.99
> 1 Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor
> $288.99
> 1 Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders - OEM
> $139.99
> 1 Kingston HyperX 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2000 (PC3 16000)
> 1 GIGABYTE GA-EX58-UD3R LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard Combo
> Price $368.98
> Total: $1,193.90
>
> Looking to get 4-5 years out of these. See anything wrong? Possible
> problems or weaknesses? Overkill or deficiencies anywhere?

--
Hal Gwin
Mechanical Designer
Caliper LifeSciences

R2009 Pro SP1 D3D10
Vista x64 SP1
Dell Precision T5400
3.00 GHz Xeon 8 GB RAM
Quadro FX 1700
nVidia 7.15.11.8246 w/registry update
Dell UltraSharp 24" Widescreen LCD

[swebster01]

Thanks to everybody for their advice. Here's what it looks like I've settled on:

CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223C
Antec NSK 4480 II ATX Mid Tower Computer Case EarthWatts 380W Power Supply
VelociRaptor WD1500HLFS 150GB 10,000 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
EVGA GeForce GTX 275 896MB 448-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card
Crucial Ballistix 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 1333 Desktop Memory (upgrade path is 6x2GB)
Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders
Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80601920
ASRock X58 Extreme LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard
23-24" LCD Monitor TBD.

Approx price: $1,253.92 without the monitor.

Thanks everybody for your advice. Now I get to see what the reaction is. I can't see much room for negotiation though. Edited by: swebster01 on Nov 30, 2009 5:24 PM

[Anonymous]

The small power supply may burn you in the end. Will the gtx 275 even
work with that power supply? The upgrade cost to the next level should
be minimal, and if you can't get any price concessions, maybe you can
get them to bump that up in lieu of a cost break that they won't give you.

swebster01 wrote:
> Thanks to everybody for their advice. Here's what it looks like I've settled on:
>
> CD/DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223C
> Antec NSK 4480 II ATX Mid Tower Computer Case EarthWatts 380W Power Supply
> VelociRaptor WD1500HLFS 150GB 10,000 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
> EVGA GeForce GTX 275 896MB 448-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Video Card
> Crucial Ballistix 6GB (3 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 1333 Desktop Memory (upgrade path is 6x2GB)
> Microsoft Windows 7 Professional 64-bit 1-Pack for System Builders
> Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield 2.66GHz LGA 1366 130W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80601920
> ASRock X58 Extreme LGA 1366 Intel X58 ATX Intel Motherboard
> 23-24" LCD Monitor TBD.
>
> Approx price: $1,253.92 without the monitor.
>
> Thanks everybody for your advice. Now I get to see what the reaction is. I can't see much room for negotiation though.
>
> Edited by: swebster01 on Nov 30, 2009 5:24 PM

[Anonymous]

You didn't list your input devices. With a programmable mouse and keyboard
you can greatly improve your efficiency by assigning keypresses, macros and
more to your mouse and keyboard.

I am using a a logitech G15 gaming keyboard and G500 mouse. The keyboard has
6 extra customizable buttons that you can program to perfrom user defined
keystrokes or macros. You can create mulitiple profiles for the keyboard,
each with 3 sets of quick settings for the 6 keys. So in effect you can
create profiles for different applications or for different tasks within an
application and customize the keys to perform frequent tasks such as
workspace changes, etc.

The G500 mouse has 10 programmable buttons which you can customize to your
liking. It too can store multiple profiles. What is really nice about the
Setpoint software is you can assign a profile to an application and the
mouse will automatically load the profile you assign whenenever you switch
to the application window. Thus you could create a profile for Autocad and
whenever you are in Autocad the mouse will switch it's button functions to
your custom settings for Autocad. The same would apply to your web browser,
database and whatever applications you set up.

It is definitely something to consider.



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