laptop for spice simulations and circuit design

[davidnknight]

I'm trying to find an optimal simulation platform for ltspice for switch mode power supply design. I'll also be doing schematic capture, layout, hdl development, and firmware development. Those tasks should be much less intense than the circuit simulation.


I was doing lots of simulations about a year ago, and it seemed like the hard drive was a bottleneck. I was thinking a laptop with an SSD and/or using a RAM drive might help fix it. something that can be upgraded to 16GB and possibly even 32GB of RAM.

There is a freeware ramdisk program here: http/memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

I've been trying ramdisk out this evening. I installed ltspice to the ramdisk, used the ramdisk to store the ltspice temp files, and also the design files. I expected to see instantaneous simulations. that's not happening. however, i think i'm seeing an increase of speed of 3 orders of magnitude(simulation speed went from a few us/s to 1-2 ms/s) for a flyback converter. does this sound reasonable?

Any thoughts on the subject you have would be much appreciated.

Also, I'll be travelling with the laptop. An SSD would be nice from for the shock resistance during travelling as well as the speed increase.


1. What is your budget? I was hoping to spend around $1200. I'd spend more if needed. It depends on what it takes to get the job done.

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering? 15.6" or 17.3". I also want to drive 2 24" monitors. They might be different resolutions as I have a 1900x1200. I want to buy a second monitor, and 1900x1080 is cheaper.

3. What screen resolution do you want? 1900x1080.

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop? portable would be ideal, but i imagine a system like i'm looking for might be heavy.

5. How much battery life do you need? not too concerned. it'll be plugged in most of the time.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)? i don't intend to play games. i might want to check out a few.

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.) circuit simulation, hdl development, firmware, circuit schematic capture, layout.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need? maybe 512GB.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
amazon, newegg. I'm considering buying used. What are the issues to be aware of when buying used laptops? power connectors could be problematic?

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop? 3-4 years. maybe longer.

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ? not important.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons. asus, msi seem to be good value. i've heard some asus G series have power problems. I don't know if they've been resolved. I've heard ibuypower and cyberpower have quality issues.

13. What country do you live in? USA

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.
I'm pretty sure a engineering grade GPU won't help me. The tasks I'm going to be working on are data intense, not graphics intense. I wouldn't mind a middle to high end gaming card though.


Here are some 17.3" systems I looked at before I realized I might want an SSD.

http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152366



http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230408



http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152366



http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152365



http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230907



http/www.amazon.com/ASUS-G74SX-DH72-17-3-Inch-Gaming-Laptop/dp/B005PAJICG/ref=sr_1_13?m=A2L77EE7U53NWQ&s=merchant&ie=UTF8&qid=1367864581&sr=1-13



http/www.amazon.com/ASUS-G75VW-DS72-17-3-Inch-Laptop-Black/dp/B007R9PWLY/ref=sr_1_9?m=A2L77EE7U53NWQ&s=merchant&ie=UTF8&qid=1367864581&sr=1-9



http/www.amazon.com/ASUS-G75VX-G75VX-BHI7N09-17-3-Inch-Laptop/dp/B00ATZ9IUY/ref=sr_1_3?m=A2L77EE7U53NWQ&s=merchant&ie=UTF8&qid=1367858400&sr=1-3&keywords=G75VW



http/www.amazon.com/Computer-Corp-GT70-0NC-494US-9S7-176212-494/dp/tech-data/B009H8RFA4/ref=de_a_smtd?ie=UTF8&m=A2L77EE7U53NWQ



http/www.amazon.com/MSI-Computer-GT70-0ND-444US-17-3-Inch/dp/B009H8RG0S/ref=sr_1_3?m=A2L77EE7U53NWQ&s=merchant&ie=UTF8&qid=1367862243&sr=1-3#productDetails



http/www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-675MX.82580.0.html



http/www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230994

 

[davidnknight]

to give you an idea, i've run simulations without ram disk or ssd that took hours to complete. i'd really like to shave some serious time off this. if anyone knows of circuit simulation software that's not too expensive and can solve faster than LTSpice, I'd be interested in knowing.