Hardware configuration question

[Anonymous]

Dear AutoCad forum users,

for my upcoming thesis project I am looking to replace my current (7 years old) laptop with a new one.

I am an architecture student and I'm doing mainly 2D drawings. But I also need an exterior and interior 3D rendering (not too sophisticated). 

I would very much appreciate your opinion on the following hardware:

It's a Toshiba Satellite L70-C-14N (17") laptop:

Intel Core i5 (i5-6200U) 6. Gen. (Skylake) ( 2.30 GHz)

16 GB DDR3L-RAM 1600 MHz

1000 GB HDD (5.400 U/min) SATA

Nvidia GeForce 930M Optimus™ Technology 2 GB VRAM

My budget is around 1000$. Is there any benefit from having a solid state hard drive (since these machines usually are much more expensive)?

Thank you for any advice,

Matthias

[pendean · Accepted solution]

i5 or i7 clocked at or higher than 3Ghz is best.
You need an SSD drive: 512Gig minimum, dual drives if optional is best and you can afford it.
If you are a student, 2D is not going to be all you do. Ensure your laptop has the ability to turn off the Intel video card that's in there doing the light lifting so that AutoCAD can access your Nvidia card https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/autocad/troubleshooting/caas/sfdcarticles/sfdcarticles/AutoCA...

Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Thank you very much for your advice!

I read about the Optimus issue as well and I am not sure how easy it would be to work around it on this machine. Moreover, the other points you raised also speak against this laptop and convinced me to find another one.

Kind regards,

Matthias