The FIRST Choice Value Coefficient

[seg9585]

I was especially looking forward to FIRST Choice this year because I was intrigued with the fact that the retail (or perceived) dollar value vs point cost of items varied greatly. Needless to say, other teams catch on to this and the products with the highest value-to-cost items are sold out first.

This intrigued me to assign a FIRST Choice Value Coefficient (FCVC) to know which items to spring for first. On the other hand, even with a high FCVC some of the products wouldn't come as in handy as others (ie if you already have a part and don't need multiples).

In your opinion, which products this year had the highest FCVC?

For example:
Talon SC $59 / 9 points = 6.56
Geforce GTX 560: $190 / 5 points = 38.8
Rubber Latex Tube 5': $2 / 3 points = 0.67
Foam Basketballs $7.99 / 8 points = 1
12V Battery: $40 / 10 points = 4

[dcarr]

cRIO must be pretty high up there - however, I don't know what the true value of the 8-slot unit is. The 4 slot is $285 by itself from NI.

[seg9585]

The 8-slot cRio also has a slightly older processor, just a bit slower (this is a factor for image processing). And it's chassis is of course heavier. HAving said that, its probably similar in value.

Playing by Moneyball rules, I wonder if anyone maximized their FCVC by seriously purchasing 20 Geforce GTX 560's.

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by seg9585

The 8-slot cRio also has a slightly older processor, just a bit slower (this is a factor for image processing). And it's chassis is of course heavier. HAving said that, its probably similar in value.

Playing by Moneyball rules, I wonder if anyone maximized their FCVC by seriously purchasing 20 Geforce GTX 560's.

sanddrag over in the FIRST Choice thread ended up doing this because everything was out of stock at the time he ordered. I'm assuming to unlock the value the team will need to sell the cards, which, while feasible, is an extra hassle and not really the intention of how FIRST Choice is supposed to work.

[McGurky]

Originally Posted by dcarr

sanddrag over in the FIRST Choice thread ended up doing this because everything was out of stock at the time he ordered. I'm assuming to unlock the value the team will need to sell the cards, which, while feasible, is an extra hassle and not really the intention of how FIRST Choice is supposed to work.

While I cannot speak on his behalf, he is a teacher, and as most schools IT budgets are not the best, he could outfit an entire lab with much improved Graphics with those!

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by McGurky

While I cannot speak on his behalf, he is a teacher, and as most schools IT budgets are not the best, he could outfit an entire lab with much improved Graphics with those!

That would be pretty sweet (assuming the PSU's can all handle it). A full lab of capable CAD machines.

When NVidia handed out the GTX-480's a while back we put together a CAD machine for the classroom we work in, it was nice to have the most expensive component taken care of.

[sanddrag]

The GTX 560 is a nice card, but not a CAD card and not certified for Inventor.

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

The GTX 560 is a nice card, but not a CAD card and not certified for Inventor.

I've seen Inventor running smoothly on our GTX 480. For the uninformed (read: I'm a programmer, not a CAD guy), what qualifies a "certified" card for Inventor?

If it's anything like the Adobe products (Premiere, After Effects, CS6) they only certify a few cards but changing one line in a configuration file enables acceleration on most recent NVidia cards. .

[connor.worley]

Originally Posted by dcarr

what qualifies a "certified" card for Inventor?

Looks like Quadro and FirePro cards.

[dcarr]

Originally Posted by connor.worley

Looks like Quadro and FirePro cards.

Does that mean that Inventor won't touch the GPU otherwise? I find that impossible to believe based on my own observations of it running on different systems.

[Moriarty]

Originally Posted by dcarr

Does that mean that Inventor won't touch the GPU otherwise? I find that impossible to believe based on my own observations of it running on different systems.

I run Inventor fine on my 3 year old dell laptop with an ATI Mobility Radeon. I think it is likely just approved vendors / specifically tested using those cards.

[MichaelBick]

Originally Posted by dcarr

Does that mean that Inventor won't touch the GPU otherwise? I find that impossible to believe based on my own observations of it running on different systems.

It's based on what your doing. Inventor won't touch the GPU regardless if you are actually CADding a part. Especially for inventor, only the CPU speed matters. However the GPU matters for renderings. Inventor will touch the GPU, however the GPU is not made for renderings. The GTX cards are for video games, which require high fps(frames per second). The quadro and firepro cards are oriented towards actual renderings, which don't need high fps.

[Moriarty]

For our team personally, the graphics card was a perfect item on our wishlist! In previous years we have run completely off of 5 or 6 year old dell laptops that have no battery life and take 10 minutes to boot.

We had just decided on building a basic desktop to handle tasks within the team, and FIRST Choice offering a decent graphics card was the perfect opportunity -- This goes to show that choice and value is team specific and I think is the purpose of FIRST Choice -- to put these donated things out there in case they match the specific needs of a team

[Moriarty]

Also -- Is it legal to resell things taken off of FIRST Choice? We had some friends that were willing to buy the graphics cards off of us at a reduced price, and we were contemplating making the deal because our team is very low on pure cash (especially useful because purchase orders from our school-run bank account are especially sluggish)

[F22Rapture]

Originally Posted by Moriarty

Also -- Is it legal to resell things taken off of FIRST Choice? We had some friends that were willing to buy the graphics cards off of us at a reduced price, and we were contemplating making the deal because our team is very low on pure cash (especially useful because purchase orders from our school-run bank account are especially sluggish)

AFAIK it's highly frowned upon, but I don't think there's an actual rule against it.