Need Laptop and General Advice

[huskermcdoogle]

So, not to beat this subject to death, need some advice. Been reading around, and have successfully done nothing but confuse myself.

 

My daily driver (corporation owned boat anchor) was and will be again a Dell M6600 (just go stolen from my car). It had a quadro card with 2gb ram, slow poke HD, and 12 gigs of slow ram. Running win 7 64 bit, and x6 MU3 I have been doing some side work programming some 6 axis routers to make some gun stocks. Fun work.

 

Anyway, with the above config the main multisurf toolpath takes about 50 minutes or so to regen at an acceptable stepover (2.5mm) and an along distance of .5mm. This produces almost enough points for some very smooth tool motion. I have found the more code you can throw at the machine, the better it does. Usually ends up somewhere around a 30Mb nci file. or about 8mb of nc code all said and done for about an 8 -10 minute run time.

 

This regen time is completely unacceptable from a productivity standpoint. I can't do anything with X6 while this path is regenerating.

 

Questions:

 

1. If we pay the maintenance and get up to date(will probably do this anyway), will the multiaxis paths regenerate in the back ground in X7 or X8?

 

2. How much faster would one think this would regen with a solid state drive and say 16-32 gigs of ram?

 

3. Does anyone have a particular go to laptop that they would go buy for this work, or at least be able to point me in the direction of exactly what specs not to cheap out on, or how to get them without shelling out an arm and a leg?

 

 

I have not decided what my budget is, but considering I am working a second job consulting, that is cash I don't need per say to pay bills, I don't mind throwing a very good chunk of my first check from my first customer into a proper tool to get work done more efficiently. This might help me sleep more at night... I was thinking, more hoping, not to exceed $3000 after a few monitors, dock and peripherals to make me more productive at home. I would be willing to spend more, if, I can get some hard facts on how $ turns into regen times.

 

I can send out sample files when I get around to making some that won't violate my NDA, will be simple to make, just need my work machine back to benchmark it on. Currently trying to make benchmark file for a friend on my old desktop i used to use and have been waiting an hour for a low tolerance opened up file to regen with no success. Guess I won't be using this machine, and know what won't work...

 

Thanks,

 

Husker

[Chris Rizzo]

http://www.sagernotebook.com/

 

These guys will build you exactly what you want, with no unneeded crap, and be extremely great at support and customer service. You can call them on the phone. They are in Cali. Someone will answer in two or three rings. That person will generally know technical, service, and sales info. Wow.

 

quadro card, 32gb ram, and whatever combo of ssd (raid or non-raid) you can get from them custom built for well less than a dell. . Also they come with a super clean windows build, and none whatsoever bloatware. oh, the 17" models are monster huge. I'd recommend 15" ish.

 

No I'm not on their payroll, I've just gone through laptops of just about every major brandname, and they are far superior in building exactly what I want (and nothing else) and supporting it.

 

If you're not familar with the company and curious how they obtain parts in relation to the big brands (dell, hp, etc).

 

http://en.wikipedia....ebook_Computers

 

 

m2c

[jeff]

+1 for Sager... very good product

[betts]

These guys will build you exactly what you want, with no unneeded crap, and be extremely great at support and customer service. You can call them on the phone. They are in Cali. Someone will answer in two or three rings. That person will generally know technical, service, and sales info. Wow.

 

I will also second Chris. I bought a Sager in ~'03 and used it as a MCX workstation for several years until ~'08 and everything he says is true. When I bought that one the cool running chip-sets weren't really out and it produced massive heat so you really couldn't use it on your "lap". Great machine and it got relegated to home use until just last year when I replaced my home box. So I haven't used one of their newer products but I would sure look at them if I was going to do self employed work as you are.

[Fred @ Slate Industries]

I used a spiffy brand new Dell 6600 and it choked on MC with massive Regen times just like you said

No matter what I did

(OS switch, blah,blah,blah gave it to my reseller to monkey with etc.) , it Hated MC.

Then I got a Sagor I could convert a 50+ meg.Step to a .X_T in SW while regening .002 stepover toolpaths in MC

It has that kind of Power. Big Bucks.

I ran a higher end Lenovo in 2012 ($2,000) and it was twice as fast as the Dell Precision with X6 !?!

But I coudn't run UG CAD and crunch toolpaths in MC at the same time.

 

That's it Good Luck

[Guest]

My system specs are as follows;

Dell M6800

Intel® Core™ i7-4930MX CPU @ 3.00GHz - 1024 L2 Cache

32GB RAM

256 GB SSD HD

NVidia Quadro K5100M @ 8GB

 

and it runs the Benchmark file in 2:48.825 (2 minutes 48 point 825 seconds)

 

CATIA V5R21 starts and is ready to work in 30 seconds.

 

Mastercam X8 starts and is ready to work in about 12-13 seconds.

 

It would boot faster but we have a bunch of network stuff that slows it down. Other than that, it's fast.

 

I prefer Sager rigs but our company's IT solution provider is a Dell Partner so I have a Dell. It's not a bad rig. It does get very good battery life considering...

 

As for what it cost... no idea. I specified what I wanted and I got pretty much everything. Though I asked for thee Extreme CPU, got the same clock speed just not extreme. It should do for a few years. My last laptop (Sager) lasted 3 years until it was stolen. Two trips to Asia, hundreds of thousands of air miles and countless shops and training hours.

[CJep]

1. If we pay the maintenance and get up to date(will probably do this anyway), will the multiaxis paths regenerate in the back ground in X7 or X8?

 

2. How much faster would one think this would regen with a solid state drive and say 16-32 gigs of ram?

 

3. Does anyone have a particular go to laptop that they would go buy for this work, or at least be able to point me in the direction of exactly what specs not to cheap out on, or how to get them without shelling out an arm and a leg?

 

The multiaxis tpaths do not multi-thread like the highspeed tpaths ( it would be badaze if they did,.. )

 

16 vs 32 gig of ram, how do you extract more hp from an engine? Let it breath, the 32 gig of ram will help the processor breath, so to speak.

We're running Dells because we tend to purchase them a crapton at a time, all of the tech computers are laptops and recently changed out the drives for SSDs, the thing I most impressed with was how smoothly the transfer of data was from original drive to the new SSD.

 

Don't forget though with horsepower comes heat, I can have the biggest badassed monster, supercharged -n- fuel injected making a craptonage of hp but,.. if you can't dissipate the heat it's gonna be a long day.

 

$0.02

 

oh, the 17" models are monster huge. I'd recommend 15" ish.

 

I run a 17, it fits rather nicely in a 5.11 messenger bag.

[Guest]

...the 17" models are monster huge. I'd recommend 15" ish.

 

15"???? For a CAD/CAM workstation? :o You 're usually giving good advise Rizzo, but I must say that;s BAD advise. I understand portability and whatnot but 15"... that's just microscopic.

 

JM2CFWIW

[Chris Rizzo]

I know I know James, I'm always one for performance over convenience; but the 17" Sagers are huge. Big, thick, heavy and meaty. It was marginally portable, barely fit in the biggest laptop bag, and must have weighed 25lbs. .The power supply is the size of a brick. Literally the size of a brick. I'm not exaggerating. It was almost a joke. I used one for a month, sent it back for a 15.5", no questions asked. That was about 18 months ago. Maybe they have a better form factor now for the 17"s, but it was unusable on an airplane. Didn't fit on the tray (I fly coach, not 1rst class James ) Plus I need room on my tray for a few cocktails.

 

It's apparent that Sager saves $$ by not using the slickest designed components, but puts the $$ into quality hardware, thus the clunky-ness of things but overall great performance. I had a 17" Sony, and it was nicely designed, big yet portable. However the whole computer turned into a brick after a year, and service was incompetent.

 

Seems most corporate folks go dell for IT management sake and life-cycle replacement schedules, which makes sense. Dell knows they have a captive customer and price accordingly. If you're spending your own $$$, you'll get way more for way less with a sager...I also feel good about supporting an excellent small company that deserves it.

 

more m2c

[CJep]

I know I know James, I'm always one for performance over convenience; but the 17" Sagers are huge. Big, thick, heavy and meaty. It was marginally portable, barely fit in the biggest laptop bag, and must have weighed 25lbs. .The power supply is the size of a brick. Literally the size of a brick. I'm not exaggerating. It was almost a joke. I used one for a month, sent it back for a 15.5", no questions asked. That was about 18 months ago. Maybe they have a better form factor now for the 17"s, but it was unusable on an airplane. Didn't fit on the tray (I fly coach, not 1rst class James ) Plus I need room on my tray for a few cocktails.

 

It looks like they have some other slimmer cases to build on. Being able to customize the build to the extent they do is very attractive, how ever I haven't yet optioned up one for less than $3000 in the build it section.

 

I don't fly,... I got crewcab so there's more room to spread out. No stewardess though,... (oops "Flight Attendants")

[Guest]

I know I know James, I'm always one for performance over convenience; but the 17" Sagers are huge. Big, thick, heavy and meaty.

They have new ones that are a LOT slimmer. The power supplies are a lot smaller. You can still get the Portable Workstations but you can also get smaller ones.

 

Didn't fit on the tray (I fly coach, not 1rst class James ) Plus I need room on my tray for a few cocktails.

I use my iPad (with a Bluetooth keyboard) on planes and it barely fits on the tray with a drink and pretzels. I fly coach to friend. On occasion I get a free bump to 1st but that's rare. Normally I fly Southwest. International is Business Class though because I normally have to work on the way there to help stay awake.

 

If you're spending your own $$$, you'll get way more for way less with a sager...I also feel good about supporting an excellent small company that deserves it.

 

more m2c

My wife has a Sager. She loves it. She does all of her Photoshop stuff on it. Got her 24GB of RAM on it. One time she had so much open that it just froze, Photoshop, hundreds of RAW pictures open... Asked me why it was acting funny and was getting mad. She had more stuff open than available RAM. So I took her from 8GB to 24GB. No more problems.

 

Anyway, when it's my money, I buy Sager. Besides, they are 20min from my house. Can't beat that support with a stick.

[Mick]

 

15"???? For a CAD/CAM workstation? :o You 're usually giving good advise Rizzo, but I must say that;s BAD advise. I understand portability and whatnot but 15"... that's just microscopic.

 

JM2CFWIW

 

I used to run 17" notebooks. I got sick of carting the heavier weight (bigger notebook = bigger power brick), and went to 15", and never looked back. Invariably, I am either plugging it into a monitor on site, or a projector. At home, and the office I have identical setups, using a docking station and dual 24's. Works peachy

[huskermcdoogle]

Guys,

 

Thanks a lot for the advice. I certainly do appreciate everyone's comments and opinions. We all know how difficult it is to decide what to buy when it is our money and our time we are playing with. When doing research before I had not really put much thought in to Sager. Thanks for reiterating them. One can definitely get much more for the money. Before I pull the trigger... The only sticky point I have with purchasing a sager is a docking station. I really like the dell docks, they just plain work, no questions asked, pop it in there, set your resolutions and whatnot and you are good to go. So I ask of all you Sager users, what have you done dock-wise when you are working in the office? What docks work well, and aren't finicky? How are they connected?

 

At the moment I am at about the $3000 mark for a pretty kick butt laptop.

 

Appreciate it in advance.

 

Husker

[Guest]

I have not used a docking station in quite a while. No recent experience.

 

Sorry.

[crazy^millman]

I have not used a docking station in quite a while. No recent experience.

 

Sorry.

 

I never have and run 2 24" from my Dell 6600 and my 4600 with no problems. I have a keyboard and mouse a plug in. Next comb will be a single USB, but in time. I have a 17" under laptop cooler and good to go. On those jobs where I am on site for a week the whole thing travels with me. Ask TK it gets the job done.

[Guest]

I've been plugging in a 22" at work and one I have at home with in issues. I don't travel with it. I should sometimes, but I travel light. Have not checked so bag except on vacation in years.

[Fred @ Slate Industries]

Never Docked a Sagor or knew if you even could ?, The Dell Precision DID dock very well.

I need Power a.k.a. CAD and CAM all crunching at the same time with multiple sessions open in each.

Only Sagor could do this.

[Chris Rizzo]

Heck, give the Sager guys a call and see what they have to say. They'll be straight up.

[gcode]

99% of laptop chassis come from 3 Asian manufacturers.

I used to own a no name laptop that was identical to a Dell Latitude.

Dell docking stations and parts fit it with no issues.

It shouldn't be too hard to find a docking station that fits a Sager

[Jayson Kramer]

I used the sagers before I to found them to be to big and hot. but this was years ago. I stick with my Dell Precision laptops. As for 17" or 15" I like the 17" but I have both and some time working for a little while on it is fine. I also own 3 of there docking station and going to get another as I plan on buying another 15" this year. I can not beat there warranty and I feel they work great as a workstation. I would like to see one of Sagers newer laptops and the thinner one to see how it works.

[m98custom1212]

I use a surface pro 3. I'm a rebel