Installation & update
About program installation and update, hardware, operating systems, setup, etc.

New Laptop - Surface Book 3 or other

psmith
Booster
I have a Surface Book 2. I don't use Archicad all day every day - probably in bursts of 4-5hrs, 3 times a week.

The Surface book is getting a bit slow and looking for a replacement... (particularly compared to our new i9 desktops in the office. I have loved the Surface book - being 13.5", light enough to carry around, but powerful enough. I have been annoyed by the lag when editing and selecting items.

The 13.5" surface book has a i7 1065G7 1.3GHz , 32GB RAM and GeForce® GTX 1650 with Max-Q Design w/4GB GDDR5

Compared to my old surface book with an i7 8650U 1.9GHz 16GB RAM and GForce GTZ 1050.

My questions are:
1. I have read that Archicad cares more about CPU rather than GPU... should I be looking for one with a faster processor... (and not worry so much about the GPU.

2. Has anyone been using Archicad on a Surface book 3 - what is their experience

3. Has anyone compared surface book 3 with surface book 2.

4. Any other recommendations for 13-14" laptops.

I originally though I would use the Surface more as a tablet - but hardly ever have as most windows apps are are not as tuned to pens compared to the ipad.

An alternative for example could be the DELL XPS 13
- 11Gen i71195G7 4.8GHx, 32GB Ram Iris XE Graphics

using Archicad v23 & 24.

Thanks
Director - Smith & Tzannes
Archicad 26

Windows 11
ipadOS
1 REPLY 1
Nader Belal
Mentor
1. ArchiCAD is more about CPU more than GPU, and the more Cores the better. So the more cores and faster cores the better.

2. You should not omit the GPU, you will need it for driving the graphics, and if not found, it may be bottleneck your work.

3. I don't know who have a surface book

4. On my personal taste, I like graphical real state, I would go with 17".

5. If the need for a new laptop isn't that urget, I would wait for CES 2021, new laptops will be shown there, and it's expected that Ryzen 5000 for laptops will make it's debut ...

On the other hand if there isn't nothing interested for you, older models will get a price cut.

6. This page is a good guide to start with for choosing the appropiate settings
https://graphisoft.com/resources-and-support/system-requirements
A good friend of mine have once told me that I´m so brute that I´m capable of creating a GDL script capable of creating GDLs.