Architectural Designs

I need a PC to do the following: Architectural design, photos, www etc. What is best for these activities? Ta

I am thinking of getting involved in architecture, town planning advice and drawings as a one man band. My drawing skills are not overly fantastic and want to rely on a new PC. Beyond this I want to store photos and music. What what be the ideal specifications for a PC or laptop to enable me to carry out my work. What are the best machines out at the moment and if anybody else is involved in the same thing, what is the recommended software to work with for architectural drawings showing floor plans and layouts etc. I nearly bought an Acer 5601 on Monday but was turned off by poor graphics and lightweight software bundle. Now thinking of desktop. Have seen good looking Mesh, Eclipse, Fujitsu-Siemens and Evesham PCs. I dont really want to spend a lot of money for something that really isnt up to the job mechanically or is not a good machine. Cheers Many thanks

Public Comments

1. get a sweet system customized by you with dell, give them a call, see what you can get with your price range. have fun i love customizing sweet a$$ systems with them!
2. Mac is the answer mate, it is number one for graphic designing, editing almost anything that has to do with art Mac is the answer without a doubt
3. Desktop is best. And a mac is the best of the best. It can be pretty expensive but they have loads of programs for that.
4. To comput graphical applications, you will need a good processor, and here, is where dual core, actually pays off. You need to look for, not a fast gigahertz (processor) but a workable processor bundle, that is, the chip, and its cache, and front side bus, (all components, on the mother board). I would recommend, a "serious" pc, not a gaming one, as its not those sort of graphics your after. A dual core, with a big fsb, a gig of cache, and four gigs of RAM. Dont worry about hard disk, as you may also surf, infect, and need to re format, so offline storage, is now the thing. a 250 gig hard drive is now cheap, and common, and ok for storage, generally, but to store your work...Never do it on the same physical disk, you surf with. You can get a separate business system, a rack of hard drives, linked up, to store tetra bytes of stuff on. The bigger and more old fashioned, the cheaper. Old office stuff! they were an arrar of hard drives, linked up. The software, is generally termed CAD.
5. i do al this an desktop publishing, ive got a 2.8ghz, with 200gb, and 512mb ram...and a ati rage pro graphics card...with cd/rw dvd/rw... cost around 200 quid, or less. unless your designnig st pauls, and the m25 overpass, or playing the latest super fast games, its more than adequate, i also run autocad 13, coz im a structural fabricator by trade...and a scrawl on the back of a rizla packet suddenly isnt good enough! and im still running windows ME, but rather than put any more of my hard earned into bill gates pocket, ive just started to use Linux XP 2007 (see Ebay) it cost less than £5, its stable and to all intents and purposes it behaves like windows..without the virul attacks, the blue screen of death, and indetrminate hangs... followed by a complete reboot... l i live in coventry and have used eclipse, that 2.8ghz i mentioned, came from there, building them is a doddle..part A goes to Part B its that simple... in fact the only hard part is getting the power onto the motherboard...you need a good magnifying glass.. but i built it 3 years ago..and its still working 18 hours a day..without a hiccup...(you watch itll go bang next week) just dont get sucked int the salesmans patter..know what you want, and what you want it to do for you.. software development is at least 3 years behind hardware...
6. Absolutely no question you need a MAC. They are built for graphics and iTunes is MAC anyway. The UNIX based O/S is rock solid and virus free. You still need a Firewall to deter hackers but most of that nonsense is aimed at PCs anyway. The GUI is very intuitive and the modern Intel processor machines with Parallel software added allow you to load and run Windows so you don't lose access to your existing files. The MS office versions for Mac are more sophisticated than those for PCs I have friends who are in Graphic Design and use nothing but MACS.. You may spend a little more up-front but you will think it cheap money in .the long run.
7. Do NOT NOT NOT get a Mac! They are a waste of money in this case. They are entertainment machines for home users, with little processing power and a limited amount of software for it. Windows XP is a must. I agree with the user who said you could use a decent processor for handling drawing and graphics packages, and a decent sized hard disk (depending on the amount of photos/music you want to store, go for (ideally) anything between 150GB and 200GB and certainly no less than 100GB). It may also be a good idea to invest in a large monitor (19" ideally) and possible a graphics tablet (this is optional and depends on your needs). Plotters are also used in place of printers by professional architects/designers, but if you are just starting out at home, a good inkjet or a laser printer (if you plan to print a lot, lasers are cheaper to maintain (i.e. buy toner), but have a high initial cost. Inkjets are initially cheaper than laser printers, ink costs are overall higher to maintain). A good quality optical mouse (preferably wireless to stop the cable getting in the way and generally p*ssing you off) is crucial, any old keyboard will do. Sound card is not too important unless you plan to play some hardcore games with all the 3D sounds. Same for video cards; you certainly won't need one of the top-spec ones that do so much processing they require an additional fan: they are for gamers. A good quality scanner is a good idea as well if you will be doing graphic/design work: trust me, you will find a use for it. Alternatively, an all-in-one printer/scanner/copier could be a good option for you: saves desk space, allows you to print your designs, scan other drawings, and copy your drawings/designs for other people. You would also want to make sure there is room for a network adaptor or enough USB slots so you can also have a broadband connection to the internet for any research you need to do for your designing. I apologise if you simply wanted me to state the name of one PC that suites your needs; I instead listed all of the things you needed. If you wish to save a bit of money, you wouldn't want to go for a major brand name like Dell (which I personally advise you to avoid anyway: they are not upgradable/expandable and there are rumours of poor customer support), but on saying that, you would not want to go for some little scamming company that makes poor quality computers. Go for a brand that is heard of, but not massive.