I was going to tack this on to the (several) other threads on the subject that are already available, but what I’m after is a little unusual so I thought the question merits its own thread.
My tank of a Dell CAD laptop is about to slip into a graceful retirement after many years of trouble-free service. It’s got a 17" screen, which is on the limit of what my ageing eyes now consider usable. The trend for new CAD laptops seems to be smaller screens and Ultimate Portability. I’m not worried about it being as light as a feather; I just need to be able to carry it from my mode of transport (usually a car, occasionally a train) to my clients office and when I set it up, for it to feel as close to my office PC as possible. As I’ve got triple screens in the office, I realise I can only take that so far.
The other thing I’ve been playing with recently on a friend’s tablet is Sketchbook Pro, with a digitiser pen. I have to say I’m impressed by it. The (now distant) memories of my knocking out marker and chalk pastel renders came flooding back. So I’ve also been looking at tablets…
It strikes me that I could all too easily end up with a plethora of new gadgets that all have to be kept charged and ready and only ever serve a niche need. Then I saw a review of an Asus 19.5" screen with bespoke digitiser pen. A plan was hatched:
Buy a new, small case for my existing office PC’s ITX motherboard, CPU, memory etc (which are all earmarked for replacement in January anyway), making sure it’s all as light as possible & can house a half-height graphics card. Streacom make something suitable (but expensive); Antec do something similar but a whole lot cheaper. Buy a Quadro K620 to go with it, which seems to be a decent card with low power requirements and it’s pretty quiet too (important when I’m spend long periods at a customer’s premises). Get the Asus screen c/w pen and round it all off with a decent lightweight/compact wireless keyboard and mouse. Get Something like a LAN party bag to put it in and I’m good to go. I can use the same set up at home, with the screen on my lap, reliving the render-maestro dreams of my youth with SBP. All for less money than a bleeding-edge new CAD laptop with a screen the size of a postage stamp.
I very rarely work with Rhino files larger than 150Mb. Hardware technology has caught up with and now exceeds my CAD needs.
Views/comments/alternatives? Does (or will) Rhino have any touchscreen capabilities?