Laptop, educated advice

[Awesome]

So I need a new laptop. The one that I got a few months ago doesn't cut it when I need to bring my work home. AutoCAD 2D electronics design work.

What I have:
nspiron 17 Notebook
Intel Pentium Dual Core T4200 (2.0GHz/800MHz FSB/1MB)
3GB, DDR2, 800MHz 2 Dimm
17.3" HD+ WLED
Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X4500HD
320G 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

Why doesn't this cut it? What do I need at a reasonable price?

Preference for a big screen, 17", weight and size is not an issue.

[Cerberus]

running autocad on a laptop seems.. like you're asking a lot of it.
in general, laptops cost more for their convenience and portability, so you get less for you $.
can't you just have the files be portable and use a desktop?

but, to answer the posed question, the 800MHz FSB is a bit of bottleneck for a memory hog like Acad.
to put that in context, the 800MHz FSB has been around since the pentium III..
the higher the FSB frequency, the fatter the pipeline between the proc and ram

realistically though, it should do the job just fine. you might have a log of garbage apps running in the background tying up the processor with wasted cycles.
and make sure your drivers are all up to date,
that can have a huge effect on rendering performance

[NobodySpecific]

I'm guessing it's the lack of a dedicated video card that is really slowing that machine down, the rest of the specs aren't great, but it should be an adequate machine for what you are doing. Does it run slowly or does the software just not work at all?

[Stegosaurous]

Let me ask you a question that will dictate a lot... How necessary is it to have the computer be a laptop? Could you get a large flash drive and bring the files home to a system in your home and work on it that way? Or is this your primary computer at work as well?

If your are able to bring them home on a flash drive, which i cant see why you couldnt seeing how you already bring them home on a computer, then a desktop is the way to go. A custom built one at that. Personally I could build you a system that would be amazing at a cost under a laptop that would render your models impressively fast and well. I think this is your best route.

The system requirements for AutoCad 2d work are:
CPU type Windows Vista:
Intel® Pentium® 4 or AMD Athlon® Dual Core, 3.0 GHz or higher with SSE2
technology
Windows XP:
Intel Pentium 4 or AMD Athlon Dual Core, 1.6 GHz or higher with SSE2
technology
Memory Windows Vista:
2 GB RAM
Windows XP:
2 GB RAM
Display resolution 1024 x 768 display with True Color
Hard Disk 1 GB free disk space for installation

My educated opinion is there is a lot wrong with your current system causing the problems you have. Ending processes in the background will not alleviate your issues. I will address the issues I see in bold and answer them in regular text after them.
CPU specs
As noted in the requirements a 2.0 is really the bare minimum needed for this program... And that is if your running XP. I assume, and maybe i'm making an ass of myself by assuming, but I think your running Vista. You need a machine with at least 3.0ghz in my opinion. Also the cache on that processor is 1MB... You need something with a L1 and L2 cache, and of substancial size for both. Also laptop CPU's are traditionally low wattage and not as fast as desktop processors.

RAM
While the 800MHz presents a bottleneck of sorts, I couldnt find a requirement on speeds for AutoCad. If your going to run slower memory, i'd suggest running greater amounts. I'm thinking you'd benefit from DDR3, but DDR2 is possible. If your running DDR2 (which even on my system I'm running) you'll want the clock speed to be higher. I think you could easly use DDR2 1066MHz, without a problem. This would save you money and still perform very well.

Video Card
Lack of a dedicated video card is a pretty critical element. Without it you must share the memory and take up CPU cycles feeding the GPU. The lack of a dedicated card will make your 3gb of RAM come down to 2 maybe even less if the rendering is complex or large. You could get away with a dedicated card, but again I'm recommending you use a desktop video card because they can cool quicker, have higher clocks and generally have better performance for less money. I looked up the specs on your card and it has an 800mhz core clock, the problem lies with the fact that there arnt enough stream processing units to do the job your asking with ease.

Hard drive
This is a MONSTER bottleneck. 5400 rpm is really slow and low. It causes the computer to wait while the hard drive seeks the data requested, and I'm sure that AutoCad does not load all of the rendering and such into memory (if there was enough it may) and it uses the pagefile (on the hdd to act as extra memory to your installed physical memory) and also is trying to read data reguarding the rendering. In my opinion i would suggest a basic RAID array using striping to help with access times. Or at least a 7200 - 10000 RPM SATA II Drive. SATA alone is slow and causing the seek/access times to go up, SATA II may help alleviate this issue.

So is a laptop really necessary? If so look into a gaming laptop. If not, let me know. While your machine is going to do the job currently, I'm sure it isnt optimal by any means nor is it quick.

Stego.

[markbvt]

A desktop machine would make a lot more sense for running Autocad. But if it really has to be a laptop, you might have to bite the bullet and get something high-end, like a 17" MacBook Pro (with Windows installed for running Autocad -- last I heard there's an OS X version on the way, but it doesn't appear to have been released yet). Or some Windows laptop with similar specs, including high-end GPU.

--mark

[a13x]

http://www.alienware.com/microsite/m...px?tab=laptops

Granted they aren't the smallest things out there but they pack serious horsepower. My old college roommate is a Enginerd and computer guru and his Alienware laptop can launch a NASA mission without sweating, so yea, AutoCAD no problem.

[Stegosaurous]

NO NO NO NO ALIENWARE!!! Not to say anything.... but the M15x and M17x both.... leave a lot to be desired. The only pro is the 15x runs an i7 chip... but no dual channel memory BAHAHA!!!! for 1,200$ base price... Invest your $ elsewhere. The 17x is 1700 starting and it ships with... a core 2 duo and 4gb of ram?!?!

Alienware is no longer a solo company focused on high end machines, they are now made by dell. Quality and performance has went down hill. Forget that, overpriced crap is what they are now. When once they were unmatched machines!

Mark - I'm not sure a MAC would be best. Especially since he will need to emulate an environment just to run the software. Back when macs had RISC architecture then yes, now i'm not so sure.

I agree on a gaming laptop, but look into your purchase extensivly before you do it. Memory expandability is usually 0, memory limits are always imposed. Locked multiplier, bios limited, and some video cards suck.

I urge you to figure out if a desktop is a possibility. You could get a nice 23" monitor and I could build you a rock solid machine for well under any alienware, and most other laptops. Plus you would be able to expand in the future and not have to buy a whole new machine. And you can clean them. A laptop clogged with dust will run hot, running hot causes thermal underclocking. The machine slows down to cool down, thus you've lost a good amount of performance.

[a13x]

NO NO NO NO ALIENWARE!!! Not to say anything.... but the M15x and M17x both.... leave a lot to be desired. The only pro is the 15x runs an i7 chip... but no dual channel memory BAHAHA!!!! for 1,200$ base price... Invest your $ elsewhere. The 17x is 1700 starting and it ships with... a core 2 duo and 4gb of ram?!?!

Alienware is no longer a solo company focused on high end machines, they are now made by dell. Quality and performance has went down hill. Forget that, overpriced crap is what they are now. When once they were unmatched machines!

Mark - I'm not sure a MAC would be best. Especially since he will need to emulate an environment just to run the software. Back when macs had RISC architecture then yes, now i'm not so sure.

I agree on a gaming laptop, but look into your purchase extensivly before you do it. Memory expandability is usually 0, memory limits are always imposed. Locked multiplier, bios limited, and some video cards suck.

I urge you to figure out if a desktop is a possibility. You could get a nice 23" monitor and I could build you a rock solid machine for well under any alienware, and most other laptops. Plus you would be able to expand in the future and not have to buy a whole new machine. And you can clean them. A laptop clogged with dust will run hot, running hot causes thermal underclocking. The machine slows down to cool down, thus you've lost a good amount of performance.

I'll let the ub3r geeky dinosaur handle this thread. I gracefully withdraw my previous statement.

[Stegosaurous]

No a13x, opinions are a good thing i'm not trying to shut you down. I'm just saying Alienware was once the computer i wanted more than anything... Now, dell has destroyed them...

I just configured a M15x with minimal specs, really i just added the lowest i7 processor they offered... It came out to $2250. I could build a 4ghz water cooled, 8gb dual channel 1066 ram for that or less no problem.

EDIT: I am uber geeky. There is even some geek speak in my handle here... It's just up to you to find it . I'm A+ hardware certified, and i know my software inside and out... I also have done 4 years of enterprise level networking, numerious computer builds and reconfigurations, and my BA degree in a computer related field I geek out all day every day.

[a13x]

No a13x, opinions are a good thing i'm not trying to shut you down. I'm just saying Alienware was once the computer i wanted more than anything... Now, dell has destroyed them...

I just configured a M15x with minimal specs, really i just added the lowest i7 processor they offered... It came out to $2250. I could build a 4ghz water cooled, 8gb dual channel 1066 ram for that or less no problem.

All good man. I self-admittedly don't know much about this realm, hence bowing out I offered up my extremely limited information on this based off observational experiences. No worries.

[markbvt]

Mark - I'm not sure a MAC would be best. Especially since he will need to emulate an environment just to run the software. Back when macs had RISC architecture then yes, now i'm not so sure.

No emulation required. Macs have Intel processors now and run Windows natively. They can dual-boot OS X and Windows.

--mark

[R1]

I have been using Altium Designer on an HP dv6t and other than the 3D rendering running a little sluggish it works fine

in 2D mode it runs smoothly with no real issues.

I got this computer over christmas so new.

but +1 on the MAC if $$$ is not an issue.

if OSX is a concern erase it and run just Windows.

3D rendering runs flawlessly on my MAC

[Awesome]

While I appreciate the advice. Let me reiterate. I'm buying a new computer. It is going to be a laptop. I need to know what to get as in a full build. If I could pick and choose everything I want in it, this thread wouldn't be here.

Now, yes, I need a dedicated video card. I want to max out the ram, likely 8gig DDR3. 17-17.3 inch screen. 16 maybe if the rest of the system is there. I need to know more on processors and their differences. Hard drive, 7200, amount of space isn't a major issue. Solid state drive would be great, but the price is not worth it. I'm hesitant on alienware. I bought a voodoo years ago and it was all the rave, accept it was a piece of shit and didn't even last 8 months. The people building them were morons too. They buy a laptop base, throw a paintjob on it and charge more than 5 times the price, and don't know shit about them.

Dell is where I've been looking so far. Their systems last, their support is great, and the company is dependable. The XPS, studio 17, and maybe alienware have my attention so far. I don't want to drop 3000 either. I just shelled out 700 for the inspiron, I want to make sure I'm getting my money's worth on the next system.

[Stegosaurous]

Okay with your last post in mind my opinion for you is to get an XPS. They are great machines, very powerful and not marked up like alienware. As far as processors, go for a fast dual core. Quad cores are very rarely optimized at all, and most software is just becomming dual core optimized. The quad core will cost more, and benifits wont be there. It is money you can spend on other parts of your computer. You could always look into a RAID 0 array using say 160gb disks and that would make the load on your HDD less and the benifit is huge.

You can pick and choose what you want, why not just custom build a XPS machine at dell.com? What do you want to know about processors, there is a lot out there, but i'm not sure where to begin as i dont know your questions/concerns...

[Awesome]

Okay with your last post in mind my opinion for you is to get an XPS. They are great machines, very powerful and not marked up like alienware. As far as processors, go for a fast dual core. Quad cores are very rarely optimized at all, and most software is just becomming dual core optimized. The quad core will cost more, and benifits wont be there. It is money you can spend on other parts of your computer. You could always look into a RAID 0 array using say 160gb disks and that would make the load on your HDD less and the benifit is huge.

You can pick and choose what you want, why not just custom build a XPS machine at dell.com? What do you want to know about processors, there is a lot out there, but i'm not sure where to begin as i dont know your questions/concerns...

A custom built XPS tops nearly 4 grand and doesn't have nearly the components as a simple google search, like an ASUS G73JH-A1, with 16 gigs of ram for almost half the price. So why would I get the XPS in your opinion?

[Stegosaurous]

You said you were looking at dells... I just went with the theme.

[Awesome]

I understand that the intigrated graphics card is a major issue with the current system. No matter what I do with it it's not going to do the job, so I don't think I need to analyze it really. Unless that's going to tell me what I need to get. A dedicated graphics card with 1Gig DDR3 is a given.

This looks like a pretty monster system. I still don't know how to gauge the cost of upgrades though. Like what kind of noticable difference am i going to see between the i7 1.6/1.73/extreme. Am I paying because it's the new cool thing or am I going to use it?
https://www.powernotebooks.com/specs...-notebooks.php

[Stegosaurous]

XPS 16... Total price as configured - $1714... No idea where you got 4k for an XPS, you musta been looking at a different site than i am. Then again i went with what you'll need vs maxing out every option like i'm thinking you did.

SYSTEM COLOR Obsidian Black High Gloss Finish edit
PROCESSOR Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8800 (3MB cache/2.66GHz/1066Mhz FSB) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® 7 Professional, 64bit, English edit
OFFICE SOFTWARE Microsoft Works edit
Dell Recommends
Office Home & Student.

Lets you create great-looking documents, spreadsheets and presentations quickly.
Upgrade to Microsoft® Office Home and Student 2007 - Word, Excel + PowerPoint [add $99 or $3/month1]


WARRANTY AND SERVICE 1 Year Basic Service Plan edit
Dell Recommends
Keep your investment protected for as long as you'll own it with a 2 year Basic Service Plan
Upgrade to 2 Year Basic Service Plan [add $199 or $6/month1]


In-Home Service after Remote Diagnosis: for issues covered by Limited Hardware Warranty, technician and/or part will be dispatched, if necessary, usually in 1 or 2 business days following Remote Diagnosis. During Remote Diagnosis, you may be asked to access the inside of your system (where safe to do so) or to participate in troubleshooting until a cause can be isolated.
SECURITY SOFTWARE McAfee SecurityCenter, 15-Months edit
Dell Recommends

CAUTION ! You have not upgraded your security protection to the maximum available for your new Dell.
Add McAfee SecurityCenter pre-loaded today! Help protect against viruses, hackers, identity theft, and more from the moment you turn on your PC.
Upgrade to McAfee SecurityCenter, 36-Months [add $40 or $1/month1]


HD DISPLAY Edge-to-Edge FHD Widescreen 15.6 inch WLED LCD (1920x1080) W/2.0 MP edit
MEMORY 6GB DDR3 SDRAM at 1067MHz (2 Dimms) edit
HARD DRIVE 500GB 7200 RPM SATA Hard Drive edit
INTERNAL OPTICAL DRIVE 8X Slot Load CD/DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive) edit
VIDEO CARD ATI Mobility RADEON™ HD 4670 – 1GB edit
WIRELESS CARDS Dell Wireless 1520 802.11n Half Mini-Card edit
BATTERY 6-cell Battery edit
SOUND OPTIONS Soundblaster X-Fi Hi Def Audio - Software Enabled edit

[nefarious]

M6400 its what I use for work.

Comes with either a quadraFX 2700 or 3700 which should both be Autodesk/CAD certified. It runs 3ds MAX effortlessly. Room for 2 HDs and a real nice display.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/business/n...-m6400_anav2~~

power supply is a beast though

[Awesome]

M6400 its what I use for work.

Comes with either a quadraFX 2700 or 3700 which should both be Autodesk/CAD certified. It runs 3ds MAX effortlessly. Room for 2 HDs and a real nice display.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/business/n...-m6400_anav2~~

power supply is a beast though

That's one that had my eye, but isn't that a high price for 1 gig of ram and 80gb hard drive?

[Awesome]

That Asus looks sick. I'm not a fan of the processor but the rest of it is great on paper and should handle anything you throw at it (esp. with raid0).

99% of users would not see a performance increase going to a quadcore over a dualcore. In many instances you would actually see a performance decrease because many apps aren't designed for multi-threaded processing, and more cores tends to offer lower speed per core. I'd go with the fastest dual-core you can get, vs a quadcore.

So I want to steer away from the I7 chip and systems with it or find out if Autocad makes use of it? Is there a way I can find out if autoCAD does optimize the mutli threading tech? What is raid1/0/disabled?

That asus does have my attention. I'd customize with the base CPU, max out 16gigs DDR3, 500gig primary drive, would an 80 gig solid state second drive be noticeably better performance? Just store the performance intensive files on that drive?

[Stegosaurous]

The i7 would be worth it in so many ways. This will be a short post by me as i'm going to eat now but here is my schpeel.

Yes sometimes newer processors like the i7 may have a lower clock speed, but they make up for it by having a much much higher FSB. This allows the cpu to process and push so much more data through it than an older faster processor. Just for reference, the new i7's that i've been looking at for you have 1333MHz FSB. This even with a lower clock speed will kill in applications and you should look into it if it is in your budget. AutoCad will support it, and i can say this because there is nothign unique about the i7. It has more pins on it, and there is the dual core option. Steer clear of the quad cores IMO. The i7's will also have a larger CACHE on average and allow the most commonly used codes, or frequently accessed, also aid's in processor forcasting (or look ahead or prefetch). This memory is orders of magnitude faster than any other memory in a system and having a decent cache is worth it. The more expensive the chip, the more cache and better quality the wafer and construction is...

A RAID array will save you $$ on expensive SSD drives and with the current technology in computers, unless your dropping your laptop or shaking it like a crying baby when it is on and accessing the disk, the hard drives will outlive the computer by far. RAID 0 will do striping as frankenstein pointed out. Yes there is no fault tollerance with this setup, but a proper backup scheme or keeping vital information on an external or flash drive will negate this risk. (My primary array is 1.36TB in RAID 0, on Western Digital RAID Edition 3 drives)

Raid 1 is mirrored disks, which are slower to write (than a single disk) but faster to read (usually, this depends more on the disk controller).

I dont believe this at all. The writing your correct with. The reading, i've never read any information or documentation supporting this. WHY? Because your still using just one disk at a time. Using 2 as one will almost always guarantee faster access in every manor. Also RAID 1 has the HIGHEST overhead of ANY RAID level. I just dont think this is acceptable for here. RAID LEVELS Look there, under RAID 1 it is not a high bandwidth option by any means. Also look at the next link for RAID levels compared Summary

Is an SSD needed? No not in my eyes. I'll run performance tests on my RAID 0 if you want and give you #'s but the limitations are not my HDD's when it comes to reading or writing from my system. I also use 4gb of RAM and run into no issues. I think 16GB of ram may be overkill. Run AutoCad and see how high the memory usage goes. I bet you can get away with 8GB in dual channel. 16GB is starting to border a virtualization machine (one that hosts virtualized boxes)

In my opinion, that dell M6400, is way WAY overpriced and you would be in the same situation you are now. It is very likely that the 1GB of RAM is the max that you will be able to add and thus your expandability is SHOT. I use Win 7, and currently am using 1.58GB of my physical RAM just to run the OS, IE (10 tabs) AIM, notepad, utorrent, and task manager) I have 61 total processes. 1GB is not enough in my experience. using XP and VISTA will greatly support my statement.

The Asus as built from factory would be sutiable IMO. I'd just enable the RAID and rock out. Maybe i'd upgrade my OS to Windows 7 ultimate but other than that... NBD.

So much for a quick post. Off to eat.

[Punjistick]

Does AutoCAD or whatever you are using allow you to use a seperate partition for temp files? I'm pretty sure Adobe Photoshop and many other graphics and multimedia editing programs that work with very large files experience a substantial performance benefit from having a separate, defined scratch partition.

[nefarious]

The i7 would be worth it in so many ways. This will be a short post by me as i'm going to eat now but here is my schpeel.

In my opinion, that dell M6400, is way WAY overpriced and you would be in the same situation you are now. It is very likely that the 1GB of RAM is the max that you will be able to add and thus your expandability is SHOT. I use Win 7, and currently am using 1.58GB of my physical RAM just to run the OS, IE (10 tabs) AIM, notepad, utorrent, and task manager) I have 61 total processes. 1GB is not enough in my experience. using XP and VISTA will greatly support my statement.

The Asus as built from factory would be sutiable IMO. I'd just enable the RAID and rock out. Maybe i'd upgrade my OS to Windows 7 ultimate but other than that... NBD.

So much for a quick post. Off to eat.

Not sure where you got your info on the m6400 but..

# Up to 16GB of fast 1066MHz DDR3 memory for large data sets
# Up to 1GB of dedicated professional graphics memory

Anyway unless the video card in the Asus is one of the ones that can be firmware moded to a FireGL I would stay away from trying to do any real CAD work on a card designed for gaming, the drivers and firmware are just not optimized.

Feel free to take mine for a test spin.

[Stegosaurous]

Sure you can upgrade the RAM lets look at the cost:
2.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS [add $40]
4.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [add $175]
4.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS [add $200]
8.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [add $400]
8.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 2 DIMMS [add $1,250]
May delay your Dell Precision Workstation M6400 64bit ship date
12.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [add $1,301]
May delay your Dell Precision Workstation M6400 64bit ship date
16.0GB, DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM, 4 DIMMS [add $2,521]
May delay your Dell Precision Workstation M6400 64bit ship date


LOL!!! 2500$ for 16GB. Good call sounds very cost effective to me...

Video card:
NVIDIA Quadro FX 3700M, 1.0GB Discrete [add $349]
May delay your Dell Precision Workstation M6400 64bit ship date
ATI FirePro M7740, 1.0GB [add $100]

Add 350.

So far for your RAM of 16GB and a good video card, your looking at a 3k machine. Also some machines if you do not customize and order the RAM amount you want from factory then you will be limited by it in the end. Maybe not with this machine IDK but that's the way most laptops i've worked on are. But the m6400 seems very very overpriced from factory.