[ozzythewise]

Hi all,

Looking to build a new computer that I will need to use for some CFD work. My budget for this build is around $700-800, less is obviously better but I'm pretty flexible with it. My upcoming CFD work will be involving supersonic 2D flow on both OpenFOAM and Fluent. I'll need transient results with a pretty small elapsed time and REALLY small time intervals. Since it's 2D I won't need a ridiculous amount of cells so I don't think I'll have to go crazy with the RAM (but that's always easy to change if I notice I'm lacking). I'll also be using this for some CAD work, but that will be on my own time so I'm not too worried about optimizing the machine for that. I don't really game but I might be more inclined to if I have a decent machine for it. Here is what I have so far for my build:

Case:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16811119068

PSU:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16817139008

HD:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16822136497

Mobo:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16813130275

GPU:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16814102829

RAM:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16820211364

CPU:
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16819103706


If you have any suggestions I would really appreciate them all. Thanks a ton in advance!

[tcarrigan]

Hi,

I managed to purchase a pretty beastly machine for my simulations for around $1000. I've listed the specs below:

- ASUS P7P55D PRO LGA 1156 Intel P55 ATX Intel Motherboard
- Antec EarthWatts EA650 650W Power Supply
- Intel Core i5-750 2.66GHz Quad Core --->> Overclocked to 4.0GHz!!!
- CORSAIR XMS3 8GB (4 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM 1600MHz
- EVGA GeForce GTX 260 896MB 448-bit DDR3 Video Card
- Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200 RPM Hard Drive --->> CentOS 5.5 and Windows 7
- LG DVD Burner Black SATA

So this system is around $1000, and it works great. I've overclocked the i5 to 4GHz stable and replaced the stock cooler with a nice Coolermaster. I partitioned the hard drive and put CentOS and Windows 7 on it. I also managed to pick up dual 22" Acer monitors for an additional $340.

I'm continuously running Fluent simulations on all 4 cores and it never seems to get hot even with the overclock.

[JohnMichaelKane]

Hello,

I am not sure you are still looking for suggestions, however. I posted a parts list that might be of use.

PSU: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005

Case: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16811233041

HDD: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16822136284

MotherBoard: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16813157188

Ram: http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16820231278

CPU:http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...82E16819103808

Total without shipping cost. $661.85

[JSuresh]

Hi,

Thanks for your time. I'm looking at buying a laptop for grad school in astrophysics, and I'll probably be doing mainly matlab/mathematica work with some CFD-type calculations (accretion phenomena, galaxy evolution, etc.). [I'll have access to supercompter clusters for large-scale simulations]

The main laptop I am looking at now is a Dell Latitude E6410, with the following specs:
Processor - Intel Core i7-620M (2.66 GHz 4M cache)
Memory - 8 GB DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM
Graphics - 512 NVIDIA NVS 3100M

The main thing I am worried about is the strength of that NVIDIA GPU. I am pretty inexperienced when it comes to buying a science-oriented laptop, but it seems like the Processor and Memory versus the GPU are a bit unbalanced? Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks

[JBeilke]

The NVS is not that bad. Even the NVS 295 (desktop card) is fast enough for usual cfd work and it is quiet (fanless).