[Zac]

Originally Posted by Cory

This is not correct. CPU is far more important. Any Solidworks certified GPU will get the job done. Best CPU you can afford is by far the number one key to performance in Solidworks.

To piggy back off of this, it is my understanding that "best" in the case of CAD refers to single core performance, as CAD is in most cases a linear process. This means that the software can't take full advantage of having several cores. This is important to keep in mind as the market becomes filled with highly rated CPUs that offer up lots of cores, with low clock speeds. These CPUs are more desirable for things like rendering where the workload can be distributed across the cores.

~Zac