Laptop recommendations

[Kristof2]

My brother needs a laptop to run some 3D construction estimating software.He would like to spend about $1000, but I told him it might be more because of the memory and 3D capabilities needed to run the software. What do you guys recommend? Keep in mind it would be helpful if it is kind of rugged as he might need to take it to a jobsite and use it.

ps. just so you know I will be installing FAH on it as well. lol
Kristof2

[tmh88]

what will he be using it for (work, college, home ect...)

[Kristof2]

what will he be using it for (work, college, home ect...)

He will probably mostly be using it for his small business accounting type stuff. But I was mainly worried about the 3D aspect of the construction estimating software he will be running. It should also have wireless internet built in.


Kristof2

[reelbigfish]

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7625732&type=product&productCategoryId=cat15107&id=1130986316572

This laptop is a good deal. It's right over $1000, has 1GB of RAM, an AMD Turion and has a good video card that will help with 2D graphics. My co-worker just got one and it's a pretty sweet machine.

[jradmin]

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7625732&type=product&productCategoryId=cat15107&id=1130986316572

This laptop is a good deal. It's right over $1000, has 1GB of RAM, an AMD Turion and has a good video card that will help with 2D graphics. My co-worker just got one and it's a pretty sweet machine.


You mean 3D graphics? ;)

[reelbigfish]

it's gotta be better at 2D than a normal video card, right? lol It will do 3D plenty fine.

[jradmin]

Whoop, ya. My bad missreading your reply on that. That lappy should work well enough =D

[RWB]

Maybe I am wrong, but th ATI RADEON XPRESS 200M that it comes with isn't gonna do professional CAD work too well.

[RWB]

http://powernotebooks.com/category.php?catId=78#id677

That would be much better deal than the aforementioned lappy. I just configured it for 1GB of memory and the price came out at $1,288.

Has a much faster card, and if I recall NVidia cards are just better at CAD work anyways.
Has a better screen.

Only problem is no OS, but I see that as a good thing.

Battery life is like 3 to 4 hours.

You could check out other laptops at that site, I only looked at the one laptop.

[jradmin]

I'm not really up on the CAD thing. 3D estimation software is CAD style stuff? I don't think they make any kind of lappy Quadro card or anything like that. I would think any diecent card with enough GDDR would be good enough? Maybe a laptop with the "Go" series of Nvidia mobile GPUs? Go 6600, 6800GT, 7800GT, 7800GTX for instance. I would say Go 6800GT would be the middle end of that bunch.

[RWB]

I would recomend that if it's cad work that they use an NVidia card based on the price needed of this laptop.