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Light Weight Laptops for SolidWorks use

Page history last edited by Bestow 10 years, 11 months ago
 

 

 This page resulted from the following email inquiry to the list::

 

Hello PD'ers,

 

I have a need.

 

I use SolidWorks a fair amount in my work and would like to get a nice, speedy laptop to be able to evaluate models while traveling, revise small to medium sized assemblies, and run a host of other communications related software. I don't need a huge screen nor do I absolutely have to have 'best in class' rendering/shading capabilities.

 

I also travel internationally for work quite a bit now with at least 4 trips to Asia annually plus other runs coast to coast and to Central America . I refuse to carry a 10 pound brick in my luggage.

 

Most of the 'traveling engineers' I know these days seem to prefer the Dell M Series of portable workstations. For my tastes this machine is too big and in light of a recent experience not all that great.

 

I'd be much appreciative if any of you have recommends for a machine that is in the 5 pounds or less category, that can still run SolidWorks effectively, and is less than say $2500. I do prefer PC's but if someone wants to make the case for Macs I will read it through. Oh, and yes, wouldn't it be nice if the machine was also well designed!!

 

I will post the responses to the PD Wiki as I imagine there are others in my same boat (or in the same seat on a transpacific flight as the case may be).

 

Cheers,

 

Robert M

 

****

I have been trying to make the same selection between travel and size and maintain some oomph.

I have settled on the Dell Latitude D630 T7300 processor (4MB Cache) with the Nvidia graphics option rather than integrated intel graphics.  The Dell 1330 should be capable also if it ever ships....

It may not be on Solidworks approved list but you can always return it if it fails miserably...

I have been using a d630 for proe wiht integrated graphics and it has done surpising well but will be getting the new machine shortly.

Battery life is vastly improved over previous dells, it is light, reasonably thin.

good luck.

 

****

I am a Solidworks heavy user as well, I travel to Asia a lot and I am VERY HAPPY with my Sony Vaio vgn-fe770G. It´s light, speedy, has a 15” screen and it goes for $1000. Also, its keyboard is the best I had ever and it looks very nice, has webcam included, etc.

I bought it in Bestbuy.

 

This one is very similar

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp;jsessionid=ZAHUGDI0OUSIBKC4D3HFAHA?skuId=8356174&st=sony&lp=8&type=product&cp=1&id=1177113305036

 

This one looks really good too, with 1440px wide http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp;jsessionid=ZAHUGDI0OUSIBKC4D3HFAHA?skuId=8388684&st=sony&lp=7&type=product&cp=1&id=1181831776749

 

****

 

Hmm.  5lbs or less.  Hmm. I think mine is right around that.

 

I too think the Dell M's are way too big.  I'm really happy with my Thinkpad t60p (2623-D8U) with 14.1" screen.  I bought it in Feb 2006 so they're a little faster/cheaper now…  The 15" screens or widescreen (WUXGA or something like that) just get too big for my tastes.

 

****

I use SolidWorks 2007 daily on a 15" MacBook Pro running bootcamp, and

am very happy with it. Thin, relatively lightweight, with a graphics

card and processor that are fully up to the task. Don't consider it if

you aren't going to run it with a mouse, or if you aren't willing to

spend the equivalent of about an afternoon configuring to your taste

(i.e. I had to download a program from the microsoft website to remap

the "delete" key). The advantage is having a dual platform that I find

road friendly and in million small ways a real pleasure to use.

 

****

I'm an absolute mac fanatic and use sworks quite extensively on it. With the latest version of Parallels, there is support for hardware graphics, so if you buy a decent machine (MacBook Pro, max out the RAM) it is totally usable and a pleasure to run Windows as a virtual machine, just for CAD and other Win-only stuff.

 

 

Caveats:  if you're not already a Mac person, there is some learning curve which you might not want to deal with right now. Also, Apple hardware support is notably lacking in most foreign countries.

 

 

So if I were you, as a Windows user & traveling for extended periods of time, I would probably be inclined to go for a Lenovo - my sense is they have the most reliable and fastest support abroad. Plus, they are very solidly-built machines to begin with, which hasn't been my experience w/ Dell. I also tend to like Gateway for design, durability and support, not sure about abroad..

 

****

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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