If you’re just beginning your career as a designer or drafter, starting a new project which calls for Autodesk AutoCAD, or your hardware simply needs upgrading, you should consider a few key things before you purchase a CAD workstation for AutoCAD.
As AutoCAD is used to design any 2D drawing as well as 3D models or construction digitally rather than by hand, it requires significant power on hardware. It was created to assist drafters and designers create their ideas faster, so what use would it be to run the program on a CAD machine that would slow the program? How do you determine which hardware to choose in the midst of all the choices available?
Here are a few points to keep in mind when selecting an CAD workstation to use with AutoCAD:
1. Understand your workloads
The first step for deciding on the correct CAD software for you is to take into consideration what you will be using the software for. For instance, if you’ll use AutoCAD to draw two-dimensional drawings or small 3D models you’ll not require a computer as highly specified as someone who will use AutoCAD to create big 3D models.
2. Consider other programs or software you may require
In the event that AutoCAD is the software you will use regularly for draughting however, you may require rendering your model in 3dsMax It is essential to search for a CAD software which can run the program with the same efficiency. Although the design that you are importing into 3dsMax isn’t too large, the specifications to simply run the software alone are significantly higher than what is required for a small amount of work AutoCAD.
3. Think about a machine that has a lot of storage space on the disk
Although this might appear to be an obvious thing to do, it is something that is quite often not studied in depth. For instance the latest version AutoCAD (AutoCAD 2021) takes up seven GB on the Windows operating system. It doesn’t comprise specific tools, large datasets like point clouds, point clouds or 3D models which could be built up over time as well as the install of different software like 3ds Max etc. This is why it’s important to reserve more storage space on your disk than you think you’ll need.
4. Invest in a high-end graphics card
While AutoCAD offers the option to switch on software graphics acceleration, such as computing the graphics that are displayed using the CPU only but the performance would be rather poor and slow. Particularly if you’re working with 3D models or using multiple monitors or a monitor with 4K resolution. The software is graphically heavy, so it’s sensible to help the software with a CAD computer equipped with a top-quality graphics card for optimal performance.
5. Choose the right CPU & specifications for RAM
When you are deciding on CPU and RAM specifications, there are lots of variables to take into account based on the software you’re employing as well as how much you will use them for your workload. Both are equally important. One complements the other by providing overall speed. The volume of tasks CPUs can manage is mostly dependent on the amount of RAM available since it will hold the data that the CPU process and allow more programs to be open simultaneously.
Autodesk tends to build its products around Xeon CPU’s, rather than i7’s and i9’s because of the larger memory and larger calculations. We prefer Xeons to be used in an enterprise CAD application especially when rendering is utilized extensively. In addition, the best computer For AutoCAD offers reliability and system longevity as it’s a professional grade processor.
