Converted the Office/Server Requirements

[edaniels]

Found out just this last week that I, a Revit convert, have convinced my boss to not buy AutoCAD, or ADT, but to get Revit. We are a startup Arch firm that has been evaluating ADT for a while, and have found it just a stupid piece of software. So add another 4 to the count of Revit seats sold. (not yet been ordered but getting the quotes in)

Question:
We have been talking with someone who knows a lot about Revit at a local reseller, and he told us, which I think are outragous req for the server, dual processor, with 6-8 gigs of ram, dual network cards. Are these req outragous, or just right? (Note: The biggest project to date in the office is the first phase of a 60 unit condo development (first 18 units), 4 person office but growing fast.)

[beegee]

Welcome aboard !
Wise choice. ( Did you expect me to say different ? )

REVIT PREFEERED REQUIREMENTS as opposed to minimum requirements are :-
A. Pentium 4 chip or Athlon Chip with 2.8 GHz.

B. 1024MB DDR RAM

C. ELISA Gloria II ( 64 MB ) / Diamond Fire GL2 ( 64 Mb ) Video cards. - There are lots of cards supported and some not. Search the threads here for more info, or ask about a specific card

D. 19" Flat screen Monitor.

E. 60 GB C Drive Local Hard Drive. 250 MB Min free space.

F. 54 K baud Network Card.

G. Internet connection required.

[hand471037]

So on the server side, was the 'revit expert' guy's concern in the size of the Revit models? And/or number of user's connected to said server? This guy doesn't sell servers does he? ;)

Sorry, but while that's a great sounding server, I wonder where he's coming from, for our main server here, for fifty people (not all on Revit, some on AutoCAD too, but also running an Exchange server as well as file server & Active Directory) isn't even close to the specs you're talking about there. Also 6-8 gigs of Ram? Unless he's talking about you using Linux on the server w/a 64 bit AMD processor, or a new G5 Mac, he's talking out his ***, for current 32-bit Windows machines can't take advatage of more than 4 gigs of Ram, and actually only really uses 2 gigs effectively at a time; heck I can't even think of a commercial, non-custom or super high-end machine other than the new apple G5's that even *allows* for more then 2-4 gigs on the motherboard...

Just take it with a grain of salt. If you guys are a start-up, you should be trying to save costs, which buying some IT guy's wet dream of a server is definately not doing. There are some people here that are more experanced about having many Revit users sharing files via Worksets on the same server, and they would be able to answer your questions better than I. But my gut tells me that those server specs are crazy, and you'd be better off looking for a cheaper solution. Heck, a current P-III running a cheap RAID disk system (or even a software RAID system) & Linux would run you under a thousand, and would probably do everything you needed, unless you're looking to have an exchange server...