PC sales have reversed the decline seen over the past several years of tablet popularity, while workstation sales have reached $7 billion and are expected to climb to more than $9 billion within the next couple of years. Meanwhile, gaming machines are growing by 39 percent. What does all this add up to? There's a growing need for better graphics performance and more powerful CPUs. Until recently, Nvidia (as well as AMD) have effectively made Intel feel like an un-favored, red-headed stepchild. Is that changing?

Topics: Graphics Card, Graphics Cards, AMD, Intel

The most compelling reason to install multiple GPUs is to drive multiple high-resolution displays. The secret's out that "multi-mon" is the single best way to improve your productivity. Anyone who's gone to two displays (or three — or more!) will tell you they could never go back to one. And more graphics cards can display more pixels across more monitors.

Topics: Workstations, Hardware, Displays, Graphics Card, GPU, Graphics Cards, Eyefinity, AMD, Video Cards, Display, CAD

Topics: Workstations, Hardware, Graphics Card, Processors, GPU, Graphics Cards, AMD, CAD

Topics: Workstations, Autodesk, RAM, Hardware, Graphics Card, Hard Drive, Processors, GPU, Memory, Graphics Cards, AMD, Connectivity, Video Cards, Intel, CAD

It's about time. After a hiatus from its role as a viable alternative to Intel for workstation-class CPUs, AMD is back. Instead of its traditional server/workstation focused Opteron line, this time the company is — quite wisely — choosing to target the market with a combination CPU/GPU part, what AMD refers to as an Accelerated Processing Unit, or APU.

Topics: Workstations, Graphics Card, GPU, Graphics Cards, AMD, Dell Workstations, CAD

Topics: Workstations, Hardware, Displays, Graphics Card, Processors, GPU, Graphics Cards, Eyefinity, AMD, Video Cards, CAD

Topics: Workstations, Displays, Graphics Card, GPU, Graphics Cards, Eyefinity, Mobile Workstations, AMD, CAD

Reality capture is a boom business for the building industry. With roughly 5 million existing commercial buildings in the United States alone, it’s easy to understand why. Laser-scanner-based reality capture is the dominant methodology used today to accurately capture the 3D state of an existing building. However, the typical laser-scan-based point cloud is in the hundreds of millions of 3D points, sometimes even going into the billions of points. With this additional data overhead on top of an already dense Building Information Model, it’s important to optimize your workstation hardware to deliver a productive user experience.

Topics: Workstations, Autodesk, RAM, Hardware, Graphics Card, Hard Drive, Processors, Revit, SSD Drive, GPU, Memory, Graphics Cards, Connectivity, Backup System, Video Cards, CAD

Last week, I talked about why Intel's latest generations of graphics-enabled CPUs might make CAD professionals think twice about paying extra dollars for a discrete graphics card on their next workstations.

Topics: Dell Business Workstation, Workstations, Hardware, Graphics Card, GPU, Graphics Cards, AMD, Intel, Dell Workstations, CAD

Intel had been promising that its latest generations of graphics-enabled CPUs would make CAD professionals think twice about paying extra dollars for a discrete graphics card on their next workstations. And it appears those promises are holding true … not in dramatic fashion, but valid nonetheless.

Topics: Dell Business Workstation, Workstations, Hardware, Graphics Card, GPU, Graphics Cards, AMD, Intel, Dell Workstations, CAD