Solidworks on Ryzen 5 2400G iGPU

[Energycore]

A friend of mine is looking at an entry level workstation for SolidWorks and MasterCAM, and after trying my hardest I convinced him to go desktop for the value.

 

What I've been wondering is whether the iGPU on the 2400G, which you could say is around RX 550 in performance, will run that software.

 

I've looked at Google and found a couple instances of people using the iGPU on their workstations:

 

https://www.thegeekyhippo.com/configurations/workstations/workstation-config1

 

 

 

However, I haven't found anything specific to the software my friend wants. Here at LTT we have experts from basically every field, so I wonder, does anyone have any experience using the APU on SolidWorks or MasterCAM?

 

As usual, thanks for the help!

[Fasauceome]

6 minutes ago, Energycore said:

the iGPU on the 2400G, which you could say is around RX 550 in performance,

I don't believe this is the case, as the 2400G and 2200G are beaten by the lowly GT 1030

[Princess Luna]

What I can say about Solid Works is that it does love OpenCL based hardware acceleration which AMD Radeon is known to excel at and a Polaris card like a RX570 can already provide you great results.

 

It may be stretching a bit too much though with an APU as you get less cache, VRAM is system memory shared and the quadcore ain't the best thing in the world.

 

In the lights of current pricing don't you think it might be doable to make (even if second hand) a ryzen 5 1600 + RX470 or similar sort of build? I can't give you % numer difference without looking it up but I do know it's very significant.

[steelo]

A 2400g probably wouldn't be able to cut it with its limited amount of vram nor would the gpu itself be powerful enough. I believe benchmarks show a GT 1030 to be about 5-10% faster (depending on whether you overclock) than a 2400g and I seriously doubt a GT 1030 would run that software well (if at all)

 

Don't get me wrong, the igpu surprised many when it first came out - You can't beat a quad core CPU + a very powerful igpu for $100-$120. However, they still aren't quite to the point to where they can compete with mid grade dedicated graphics cards and I believe that would be the minimum for what you need.

 

I'd see if you can find a cheap RX 570 - that should give you very good results.

[Jurrunio]

How entry level? My classmates got through first 2 years with 3 year old Macbooks so it's not demanding if you're just learning

[Energycore]

11 hours ago, Jurrunio said:

How entry level? My classmates got through first 2 years with 3 year old Macbooks so it's not demanding if you're just learning

He's only using it for learning, won't run any heavy simulations honestly. The only thing I want the computer to do is not lag while manipulating the designs. I'm pretty sure for his use case it'll be fine, and I can probably convince him to buy a used 290/390 for like, 100 bucks.

12 hours ago, Princess Luna said:

What I can say about Solid Works is that it does love OpenCL based hardware acceleration which AMD Radeon is known to excel at and a Polaris card like a RX570 can already provide you great results.

 

It may be stretching a bit too much though with an APU as you get less cache, VRAM is system memory shared and the quadcore ain't the best thing in the world.

 

In the lights of current pricing don't you think it might be doable to make (even if second hand) a ryzen 5 1600 + RX470 or similar sort of build? I can't give you % numer difference without looking it up but I do know it's very significant.

I'll run used hardware by him. I bet we can make something happen with used, and I'm more reliable than warranty

12 hours ago, Fasauceome said:

I don't believe this is the case, as the 2400G and 2200G are beaten by the lowly GT 1030

My bad. I forgot the 550 is above the 1030.

12 hours ago, steelo said:

A 2400g probably wouldn't be able to cut it with its limited amount of vram

To be fair, I can allocate additional RAM from the system to the Vega iGPU through the BIOS. 4GB on it and 12 for the system should be more than enough.

 

Oh shit, I just realized the 2400G is only 4C/8T. I really thought it was a 6 core. Bummer.

 

So far great food for thought guys.

[steelo]

14 hours ago, Energycore said:

He's only using it for learning, won't run any heavy simulations honestly. The only thing I want the computer to do is not lag while manipulating the designs. I'm pretty sure for his use case it'll be fine, and I can probably convince him to buy a used 290/390 for like, 100 bucks.

I'll run used hardware by him. I bet we can make something happen with used, and I'm more reliable than warranty

My bad. I forgot the 550 is above the 1030.

To be fair, I can allocate additional RAM from the system to the Vega iGPU through the BIOS. 4GB on it and 12 for the system should be more than enough.

 

Oh shit, I just realized the 2400G is only 4C/8T. I really thought it was a 6 core. Bummer.

 

So far great food for thought guys.

I could very much be wrong but I believe you can only allocate 2 GB of RAM for the 2400g igpu. Remember though, if you have 8 GB of ram and dedicate 2 GB as vram, Windows only has 6 gbs it is allowed to use...that's not a whole lot

 

I have a 2400g with a RX 570 and so far the 4c/8t has been plenty for 1080/VR gaming. I've never come across an issue where the CPU isn't enough...

[Energycore]

On 10/12/2019 at 2:12 PM, steelo said:

I could very much be wrong but I believe you can only allocate 2 GB of RAM for the 2400g igpu. Remember though, if you have 8 GB of ram and dedicate 2 GB as vram, Windows only has 6 gbs it is allowed to use...that's not a whole lot

 

I have a 2400g with a RX 570 and so far the 4c/8t has been plenty for 1080/VR gaming. I've never come across an issue where the CPU isn't enough...

I bet the CPU is going to be fine. I'm a little bummed it's 4/8 because I gave my friend the argument that it's 50% more cores than his current i5 8200U laptop (which is also 4/8).

 

The ryzen should still win out because that i5 does not turbo anywhere near its max 3.4GHz when fully loaded. But still, the additional core count was an easy sell.

 

Honestly I don't know how threaded Solidworks and MasterCAM are. I'll look into it.

[steelo]

9 hours ago, Energycore said:

I bet the CPU is going to be fine. I'm a little bummed it's 4/8 because I gave my friend the argument that it's 50% more cores than his current i5 8200U laptop (which is also 4/8).

 

The ryzen should still win out because that i5 does not turbo anywhere near its max 3.4GHz when fully loaded. But still, the additional core count was an easy sell.

 

Honestly I don't know how threaded Solidworks and MasterCAM are. I'll look into it.

The CPU itself should be plenty adequate...what I'd be concerned about is the igpu...it's powerful for integrated graphics but you probably want at least a mid range dedicated graphics card.

[Xkillerpn]

R5 1600 + b450 + Vega 64 with HBCC on to 12g + 16g of ram cl 16 3200 any cheap kit will do. 

 

very powerfull combo to work. The vegas go around 200 now on ebay in the uk.

[Energycore]

9 hours ago, Xkillerpn said:

R5 1600 + b450 + Vega 64 with HBCC on to 12g + 16g of ram cl 16 3200 any cheap kit will do. 

 

very powerfull combo to work. The vegas go around 200 now on ebay in the uk.

2 questions though. How much is that and is it less than the target $500 for the full system and how will my non-gamer friend benefit from a Vega 64.

 

Wait, that was three questions

 

9 hours ago, steelo said:

The CPU itself should be plenty adequate...what I'd be concerned about is the igpu...it's powerful for integrated graphics but you probably want at least a mid range dedicated graphics card.

My friend told me yesterday he'd be buying around December. So I'm going to make a final build plan 2 weeks before he buys, and by then I hope I'll have more information on the GPU needs of his light Solidworks usage. Plus tech loses value fast, hopefully by then the entire build costs less than currently.

[steelo]

1 hour ago, Energycore said:

 

[steelo]

A RX570 can be often found for under $120. I really dont believe the 2400g's igpu will cut it with solidworks.

 

https://community.amd.com/thread/233796

[Energycore]

2 hours ago, steelo said:

A RX570 can be often found for under $120. I really dont believe the 2400g's igpu will cut it with solidworks.

 

https://community.amd.com/thread/233796

I actually looked into that article before and it seemed like a driver / silicon issue more than a performance issue, so I wasn't quick to use it as definitive proof that every Ryzen 2400G is going to have that problem.

 

I think one way to do it might be to ask a friend or acquaintance with a Ryzen 2400G to try the program out. I'll see what I can procure.

[steelo]

13 hours ago, Energycore said:

I actually looked into that article before and it seemed like a driver / silicon issue more than a performance issue, so I wasn't quick to use it as definitive proof that every Ryzen 2400G is going to have that problem.

 

I think one way to do it might be to ask a friend or acquaintance with a Ryzen 2400G to try the program out. I'll see what I can procure.

Didn't even think of that...LOL.

 

I have a 2400g and can try it tonight to see how it runs. I know nothing about CAD programs though...

[Energycore]

1 minute ago, steelo said:

Didn't even think of that...LOL.

 

I have a 2400g and can try it tonight to see how it runs. I know nothing about CAD programs though...

I'd be in your debt!

 

Thing is, my friend is going to work with very basic models. So I surmise that running through the tutorial should be a good enough gauge.

[steelo]

Just now, Energycore said:

I'd be in your debt!

 

Thing is, my friend is going to work with very basic models. So I surmise that running through the tutorial should be a good enough gauge.

I will give it a go! I have no idea how to create even the most basic of models, so I'll rely on demos and the tutorial.

[steelo]

20 hours ago, Energycore said:

I'd be in your debt!

 

Thing is, my friend is going to work with very basic models. So I surmise that running through the tutorial should be a good enough gauge.

Okay, so I was able to download the student trial version and I spent about an hour running through the tutorial. Keep in mind, with my very limited knowledge, I  only created the most basic 3D models, which included pivoting and resizing them. Even though I really had no idea what I was doing, everything seemed snappy and responsive. I'm not sure if the guy in the article had bad drivers or a defective igpu, but I experienced none of his symptoms. This was using my 2400g igpu and NOT my RX570. I ensured that my monitor was directly connected to the MB's VGA port and my RX570 GPU was disabled in the UEFI. I do have my CPU modestly overclocked to 3.8ghz on all 4 cores but I am limited with 8 GB of RAM.

 

Overall, I was surprised at the result and experienced no issues. However, again you must also take into account the tutorial 3D models I created were about as basic as they can get. I'm sure things will slow down proportionally with more intricate models.