Test recommendation, or custom test to simulate CAD processes

[Grot]

Afternoon Folks,

Can anyone recommend a test that comes with "PerformanceTest" to simulate CAD processes or has anyone created a custom CAD test that they are willing to share?

Thanks for your time,

[David (PassMark)]

Their are a number of different CAD programs on the market. Their load characteristic would be different depending on how the software was coded and the project you are working on. For example one developer of CAD software might have heavy used multi-threading, while another one might be mostly single threaded. One might be using OpenGL, another one might be DirectX12, another one might be GDI+.

So the best benchmark would be to run the actual CAD program that you plan to use on a collection of hardware using a number of different project files. Otherwise, if that isn't possible, study the characteristics of that particular CAD program that you want to use, then make an informed decision as to the best benchmark.

[Grot]

Thank you for your reply David,

Looking through the "Help" file I'm not sure where I should look for instruction on how would I go about testing say Bentley InRoads Select Series 2 with everything local, data and program? Could you point me in the right direction, please?

Thanks again,

[David (PassMark)]

The vendor of the software should be able to provide so guidance as to the hardware requirements. (e.g. is is highly threaded, does it depend on RAM speed or disk speed or is it more CPU bound, is there GPU hardware acceleration in use......)

Otherwise you can do your own basic profiling from task manager. Start up some long running job in the software (the type of job you typically work on) then monitor CPU, GPU & Disk usage while the job is running. If the busy time for the hard drive is high, then you need a fast hard drive. If no more than 1 or 2 CPU cores are loaded, then you need high single thread performance., etc...

If you are buying multiple machines and there is significant cost involved we can offer a (paid) consulting service to profile the software on various hardware, then recommend the best hardware platform.

[Grot]

Morning David,

If i was to work on a CAD project with PerformanceTest running in the background can PerformanceTest record RAM usage, disk speed, CPU activity, the stuff Task Manager pay attention too?

Thanks for all the info,

[David (PassMark)]

Task manager is a better resource monitoring tool.

[Grot]

Right-O,

Thanks David, have a good weekend,