laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
(OP)
I am looking into getting a PC laptop that is inexpensive but has a large enough screen and enough oomph for running DraftSight, a free cad program, for 2D only. I'll also need to run Enercalc and a few other more lightweight structural programs. I don't know the first blasted thing about PCs, cause we're a Mac family, so can anyone get me started? I looked at Cnet and PC Mag but it's totally overwhelming.
1. What do/don't I need in terms of memory, etc?
2. Good/bad brands?
3. If you have such a setup, what do you use?
thanks!
1. What do/don't I need in terms of memory, etc?
2. Good/bad brands?
3. If you have such a setup, what do you use?
thanks!





RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
I have no idea about EnerCalc, but I do Heat6 and a couple other 2-D heat transfer programs that are kind of intense, plus eQuest energy modeling that can really get out of hand. The laptop is slower, of course, than my desktop. I don't have a high-dollar workstation at the office, but I do have a pretty good machine that was designed for gamers. A lot of computer power for the buck. Hence, I'd look for a laptop advertised for gamers, and look at the low end.
If it were me, I'd scroll down the list in the link below by price and pick the first one that has 4 GB RAM or more, and the screen size I like. 17" is nice. The Dell Inspiron at $649 really caught my eye...
Gaming Laptops
Best to you,
Goober Dave
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RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
Best to you,
Goober Dave
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RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
I just got a Samsung Chronos, so I'll see how it goes. The Sony is starting to slow down a bit....not sure why, but have had it happen to multiple computers with age. Like me I guess!!
RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
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RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
As for the other stuff, recent Macs are Intel-based, and can run a lot of PC software with PC software emulators, whose cutesy names I forget; I'm not a Mac person.
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boot_Camp_(software)
Since it is a clean boot on intel hardware i would guess it is a stable and fast solution.
Cheers
Greg Locock
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RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
Mike, I tried the DS for mac version first and it was massively annoying. Every piece was a separate window and it froze all the time. The windows one works much better.
Thanks for all your help, folks!
RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
Updates come along as frequently as for Windows, but they don't bring the machine to its knees, can be done in the background, and only kernel updates require a reboot.
I've got another laptop, a still older ThinkPad, that dual boots WinXP and CentOS5. It's a _lot_ faster and much less glitchy when running CentOS.
Were I in your positiion, I'd find a used Thinkpad that can hold at least 4Gb of ram, max out the ram, give it a big new hard drive, transfer XP to half of it, and load Linux on the rest. I'm partial to CentOS, but you may find it easier to install Draftsight under Fedora. I'm not a fan of Ubuntu, but a lot of people like it, so the user community is huge.
... but that's me.
If you prefer newer hardware with Windows, I'd look for something with Win7.
I tried Win8 in a store, and couldn't make sense of it.
Mike Halloran
Pembroke Pines, FL, USA
RE: laptop for 2D drafting, enercalc?
If you are having issues with family members trying to use your computer why don't you buy a tablet and let them use that (although I am not sure that would work with kids)? I bought a tablet for Christmas and it has basically replaced the need for a house computer (I don't have kids yet). I bought my wife a new laptop a year ago and it now rarely is used because she can do most of her computing needs on the tablet.