CAD Software

Q: I have an IT assignment and was hoping someone could help or tell me good places to look for appropriate information. I need to write a fictional report recommending two computers (one minimal and cheap, the other state of the art) including software, for a company which manufactures highly specialised mountaineering equipment. I'm ok with the hardware and I can handle the software for most things. Where my knowledge falls short is: "the company wants to make use of a computer for designing new products using CAD." So, does anyone here have recommendations for software which would be suitable for this function? Recommendations for both minimalist and "the best of the best" would be helpful. Also, any suggestions for specialised hardware would be helpful.

A: -One the one end you could use InteliCAD which is a free download from http://www.cadopia.com . Its similar in looks and operation to AutoCAD but without 3Dand rendering. To the upper end I would imagine such a company would use perhaps Inventor or Mechanical Desktop from http://www.autodesk.com (the company that makes AutoCAD). -If the CAD-system

is intended to be linked to production you really can't do without solid modelling. The same goes if CAD is used to produce pictures and presentations for the end user. A CAD workstation benefits most of lots of RAM (speed and stability) and a large monitor with a high end graphics card (to preserve the users eyes and nerves). If the system is connected to a network then the overall performance of the network connections needs to be very high. Normal hub-connections that are sufficient for administration needs soon prove to be bottlenecks for CAD. After that you can spend the money that is left on processor speed. Most CAD software does not benefit from dual processors.