[SOLVED] CAD/CAM/FEM/CFD/Render WS setup

[Sajti]

Dear fellas,

I would need some solid advice on a workstation setup that I would like to use for the following purposes:

• CAD: Solidworks/Inventor, nothing too big, just regular mech.eng. usage, no 1k+parts
• CAM: I guess this is not the bottleneck
• FEM: minimal FEM (mostly for validation)
• CFD: same
• Render: 3Ds Max + corona (eng. visualisation). I don't have too many projects for this, and renderfarms are not really my thing, I would like to have local CPU power for reasonable speeds.

Background: I am a small one-stop shop for a complete design cycle, sketch-to-cradle, hence the diversity of softwares involved. I am fed up that everything "kind-of" works, I would like a more beefy WS, that can get me through all these random projects with relative ease. 10 years ago I would have been able to make my own, but sadly, I have not been following PC tech so closely, so I have no idea what config I should even think about.

My 2 cents on the thing would go somewhere here:

• some kind of 16/32/64 core ryzen (I think a similar power at intel is probably out of budget)
• one of the new GPU powerhouses (the ones out of stock for the better part of last year)
• the rest: 1 TB SSD, some kind of 2TB HDD config for RAID (speed, not redundancy), 2 identical (or 3 if it fits the budget) 23-25" Screens, RAM, tower, PSU etc, the whole thing.

I tried to look at various prebuilt configs, but to be fair, I am not a fan of any of those, they seem to be overpriced by quite a margin as opposed to the components, and I fail to see what kind of optimisation they can provide that makes a WS better (naturally, had bad XP with a solidworks workstation). But I'm open to anything, as I said: I have no idea.

Budget: absolute maximum 7500 EUR (~8500 USD) (I wouldn't mind if it was 7000, as I will need to appease my favourite dragon after I tell her how much I've spent on this)
Location: CE EU

Thanks a lot for your help in advance

 

[kanewolf]

Dear fellas,

I would need some solid advice on a workstation setup that I would like to use for the following purposes:

• CAD: Solidworks/Inventor, nothing too big, just regular mech.eng. usage, no 1k+parts
• CAM: I guess this is not the bottleneck
• FEM: minimal FEM (mostly for validation)
• CFD: same
• Render: 3Ds Max + corona (eng. visualisation). I don't have too many projects for this, and renderfarms are not really my thing, I would like to have local CPU power for reasonable speeds.

Background: I am a small one-stop shop for a complete design cycle, sketch-to-cradle, hence the diversity of softwares involved. I am fed up that everything "kind-of" works, I would like a more beefy WS, that can get me through all these random projects with relative ease. 10 years ago I would have been able to make my own, but sadly, I have not been following PC tech so closely, so I have no idea what config I should even think about.

My 2 cents on the thing would go somewhere here:

• some kind of 16/32/64 core ryzen (I think a similar power at intel is probably out of budget)
• one of the new GPU powerhouses (the ones out of stock for the better part of last year)
• the rest: 1 TB SSD, some kind of 2TB HDD config for RAID (speed, not redundancy), 2 identical (or 3 if it fits the budget) 23-25" Screens, RAM, tower, PSU etc, the whole thing.

I tried to look at various prebuilt configs, but to be fair, I am not a fan of any of those, they seem to be overpriced by quite a margin as opposed to the components, and I fail to see what kind of optimisation they can provide that makes a WS better (naturally, had bad XP with a solidworks workstation). But I'm open to anything, as I said: I have no idea.

Budget: absolute maximum 7500 EUR (~8500 USD) (I wouldn't mind if it was 7000, as I will need to appease my favourite dragon after I tell her how much I've spent on this)
Location: CE EU

Thanks a lot for your help in advance

Have you looked at Puget Systems articles -- https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Best-Workstation-PC-for-SOLIDWORKS-Summer-2020-1830/
They have lots of comparisons doing your job.

 

[Sajti]

I have looked at puget and other "standard" local solidworks WS vendors, but tbh the everyday-usage experience of the standard Quadro-approach yielded somewhat lackluster results. I'm sure it's OK for most out there, I just haven't seen the advantage that a Quadro has over another GPU in my line of work, especially looking at the easily 2x price tag. Also, solidworks' simulation package is practically a joke stability-wise, when compared to ANSYS or even NASTRAN, even at the "low-level" validation simulations, so the tests that are referred to hold not much value in my eyes. I would be happy with a higher-end gaming(?) PC that is somewhat geared towards WS quality components (EC memory, better PSU, etc.).
Thank you for your answer though!

 

[Why_Me]

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90812022
Lian Li LANCOOL II Mesh Performance Mid-Tower €98,79

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90778298
Seasonic Focus GX-650 80+ Gold 650W Modular Power Supply €79,41

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90848804
GIGABYTE Z690 AORUS ELITE DDR4 €227,98

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90849229
Intel Core i9 12900K €531,51

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90785406
Arctic Liquid Freezer II 280 AIO €71,34

https://www.arctic.de/us/LGA1700-Mounting-Kit-Liquid-Freezer-II-Series/MPSAS00891A
LGA1700 Mounting Kit - Liquid Freezer II Series

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90792636
Crucial Ballistix Black DDR4 3200MHz 64GB (2x32GB) CL16 €257,29

or ...

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90792142
Crucial Ballistix Black 32GB DDR4 3600MHz (2x16GB) CL16 €100,83

Windows storage.

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90748129
Samsung SSD 970 Evo Plus M.2 PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe 500GB SSD €62,10

Storage.

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90803834
Samsung SSD 870 QVO 2TB SATA 2.5'' SSD €145,32

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90834354
GIGABYTE AORUS GeForce RTX 3060 ELITE LHR 12GB €714,28

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/Z690-AORUS-ELITE-DDR4-rev-10#kf

Lancool-II-Mesh-Performance

<h2>Born to push the limits</h2> LANCOOL II MESH Performance features a mesh front panel and mesh bottom left shroud panel, honeycomb vent design and built-in PWM fans, ensuring bountiful airflow delivered to your components while the system runs at peak performance. <span...

lian-li.com

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...2900k-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-20-ghz.html

Review of that cpu with benchmarks.

https://www.tomshardware.com/review...re-i5-12600k-review-retaking-the-gaming-crown

 

[Sajti]

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90812022
Lian Li LANCOOL II Mesh Performance Mid-Tower €98,79

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90778298
Seasonic Focus GX-650 80+ Gold 650W Modular Power Supply €79,41

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90848804
GIGABYTE Z690 AORUS ELITE DDR4 €227,98

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90849229
Intel Core i9 12900K €531,51

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90785406
Arctic Liquid Freezer II 280 AIO €71,34

https://www.arctic.de/us/LGA1700-Mounting-Kit-Liquid-Freezer-II-Series/MPSAS00891A
LGA1700 Mounting Kit - Liquid Freezer II Series

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90792636
Crucial Ballistix Black DDR4 3200MHz 64GB (2x32GB) CL16 €257,29

or ...

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90792142
Crucial Ballistix Black 32GB DDR4 3600MHz (2x16GB) CL16 €100,83

Windows storage.

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90748129
Samsung SSD 970 Evo Plus M.2 PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe 500GB SSD €62,10

Storage.

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90803834
Samsung SSD 870 QVO 2TB SATA 2.5'' SSD €145,32

https://www.computeruniverse.net/en/p/90834354
GIGABYTE AORUS GeForce RTX 3060 ELITE LHR 12GB €714,28

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/Z690-AORUS-ELITE-DDR4-rev-10#kf

Lancool-II-Mesh-Performance

<h2>Born to push the limits</h2> LANCOOL II MESH Performance features a mesh front panel and mesh bottom left shroud panel, honeycomb vent design and built-in PWM fans, ensuring bountiful airflow delivered to your components while the system runs at peak performance. <span...

lian-li.com

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/u...2900k-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-20-ghz.html

Review of that cpu with benchmarks.

https://www.tomshardware.com/review...re-i5-12600k-review-retaking-the-gaming-crown

Thanks a lot for this!

I'm going to have a look at these. Would you be able to tell me why you have suggested the Intel/Nvidia instead of Ryzen/RX? I know it's an age old question, but is there something specific FOR intel+Nvidia or AGAINST AMD+RX in terms of my CAD approach? Thanks again for the exhaustive list!

 

[Why_Me]

Thanks a lot for this!

I'm going to have a look at these. Would you be able to tell me why you have suggested the Intel/Nvidia instead of Ryzen/RX? I know it's an age old question, but is there something specific FOR intel+Nvidia or AGAINST AMD+RX in terms of my CAD approach? Thanks again for the exhaustive list!

I was going by the benchmarks but AMD Threadripper might be a better solution.