Can someone tell me the best laptop I can get for cheap to work with solidworks?
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Question 1: Does it have to be Solidworks specifically? Other CAD platforms, like Onshape, may open up more options.
Question 2: Does it have to be a laptop? Desktops tend to have more performance per dollar, obviously at the expense of portability.
Question 3: What’s your budget? No sense speccing out a $8,000 laptop if your budget is $500.
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Here are the computer specs that Solidworks recommends on their website. Compared to my own laptop they seem a bit overkill because my laptop with a 2.30 GHz i5, 8GB RAM, and SSD runs Solidworks beautifully.
Question 4: What are you planning to do in whatever CAD software you use, and how long do you expect to use the computer for? What computer you should get changes based on this.
If you are a student planning on using the same computer for FRC stuff and also later in college for more mechanical engineering stuff, you may want a better computer than someone who is just doing FRC CAD (FRC assemblies tend to not be as large and therefore intensive as many complex CAD assemblies in industry).
I had pretty much the same specs on an ultrabook (slightly higher base clock) and SW was basically unusable.
I’d poke around the computers your teammates have, doing some normal CAD stuffs with task manager open (especially the performance tab). I’d highly recommend going for at least 16 gb of ram, or at least an upgrade path to that (one dim slot with 8gb and an open slot for expansion). SW can be a little all over the place depending on what you’re doing. Ideally, something with a Quadro for compatibility, but those have a nice “professional premium” tacked on. A 1060 and the i7 range should be enough for most students.
My 1060 and 7700 machine has been slipping, but we include a lot of generally unnecessary detail. It’s been more than enough for college; a lot of that CAD work is kind of a joke compared to some FRC stuff, even when you get into senior projects.
8gb RAM is minimum, 16gb preferred. i7 processor or better is good. Graphics card may or may not add performance. 512GB SSD is good for robustness and the large installation size of CAD/games/etc. 15" screen is good.
Check your local Craigslist for deals. You can often find good deals and just swap an HDD for an SSD and be done.
I have a Thinkpad p52 that runs Inventor (and Solidworks) beautifully. It’s definitely overspecced for FRC CAD, but a bit of future proofing is nice.
Specs
i7 8750h
16 gb ram
Quadro p1000
512 gb sad
15" 1080p60 screen
Cost: ~$1250 when I bought it on sale
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I recently bought a Samsung Notebook 9 Pen, with the requirements I can do CAD + Video Editing on it with no problem. Does both flawlessly. Retail it sells for $1800, but if you search the ‘Used’ section of Amazon you can find some sweet deals on return items. Got mine for $1100 brand new, plus you get Amazon Warehouse’s 30 day return policy if there are any issues.
One thing to consider about Solidworks is that it runs primarily off of a single core, so I would prioritize core strength over number of cores. I use a Dell Inspiron 5570 with 24gb of ram and an additional 500gb m.2 ssd. It has worked really well for me so far.
From an Network and Systems engineer getting his ME degree… This is the answer if you can afford it.
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I’ve been working with the same dell Inspiron since 2014, 6gb of ram, Intel i5, and I use it for FSAE and to run ansys, sometimes can take a while but works really well
(Last four cars open at the same time and rendered)
if you have the budget, get something nice, but I’ve managed to do pretty well on 8gb of ram and a i5 6100q 🤷. The ThinkPad mentioned above is a pretty rocking deal though… I think the price I saw was $1300, and that’s about as much horsepower as you’ll need for any desktop application.
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I personally use the inspiron i7559 and its exactly what I need. Dell has released an updated version, and it’s worth every single penny in my opinion, just swap the 8 gigs of ram for 16. It’s a pretty solid mix of money and power.
Look no further than the ZBook Workstation " THE MOST AFFORDABLE MOBILE WORKSTATION " (this thing is actually designed for CAD work but it can still handle games and stuff): https://www8.hp.com/us/en/workstations/zbook-15v.html?jumpid=in_r12139_us/en/psg/mobile_workstations/15v/learn-more
We learned this lesson the hard way. We got two very nice gaming PCs donated to the team last year to use for CAD. 32gb RAM, quad cord ~5GHz CPU, 512 GB SSD, good graphics card, etc etc. It is significantly faster than the computers in the school’s robotics lab, but it still freezes every few hours. When you check the task manager, one of the CPU cores is running at max speed while the other three are doing almost nothing.
Edit: I’ve been informed by one of my students that they actually have a Ryzen 7 3700X processor (8 core 4.4 GHz) and Ryzen 7 3700X GPU (8GB VRAM)
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That’s just my favorite part of CAD programs. They’re mostly single-threaded, so you’d want to prioritize single core performance over all else on the CPU side. Both AMD and Intel offer chips that are essentially the same as lower tier chips but with double the # of cores. Given the option, you can save a few hundred in some cases by going a bit deeper into CPU specs.
I currently use a Lenovo Ideapad 330s. i5, SSD
(i was under the impression that my laptop was a HDD)
Onshape works alright with me, if theres any issues, it’s most likely with my internet and not the laptop itself. I dont have anything for Solidworks yet since i dont have an account yet.
Update: i was just on Onshape with 2337’s robot and it was running slow. I think it’s got to do with ne not fully shutting down my laptop for 12 days now.
Since nobody else has mentioned it yet: I strongly recommend looking into refurbished laptops, typically a generation or two old. If you buy ones with the right specs, they’ll work fine for any sort of CAD work, and you’re likely to save a pretty penny compared to buying brand new.
I also would be mindful of upgradeable parts. Many laptops have ram soldered to the motherboard. Do not automatically assume you can save some money by upgrading it yourself.
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I think people often overestimate what they need in a PC to run CAD programs for FRC robot models. I use Inventor, not SolidWorks, but I doubt the hardware requirements are wildly different. I can tell you that an i5 6200U processor and 8 GB ram with SSD gets the job done just fine. My laptop has GeForce 940MX graphics, but just to test I turned that off and ran on the Intel 520 graphics, and it still runs fine with a full robot model.
Like others have said, the single core speed matters most, so you get little marginal value from the extra cost of an i7 processor. If you study processor benchmarks, you’ll find that an i3 processor’s single thread rating can compete pretty well with a comparable i5 or i7.
SSD definitely speeds you up compared to a regular hard drive. 16 GB of RAM is nice to have, but 8 GB gets you by most of the time. I’ve loaded step files from Robotnauts and such with 8 GB of RAM and done fine.