On the state of Computer Hardware for Drafting from sddrawings.com
Drafting has come a long way from the old drafting tables and drawing buildings by hand, or cutting out GFCI outlets and pasting them onto a floor plan. I view drafting as part of my artistic endeavors. So when I design something (even if it may never be built), I still consider it to be a piece of art that I would find pride in hanging, on anyones wall.
So if drafting is an art, how far back can we define drafting as it is known today? Surely we can all agree modern CADD drafting falls under this pretense. Using a computer & sitting down to render an object (think ship blueprints, or designs for your 'what-ch-a-ma-call-it') or a building in any shape or form is considered drafting. If we go back further than modern day to 1889 when the Eiffel Tower was erected, the blueprints for the Eiffel tower and the process of creating those plans was considered being 'drafted'. The tools were different, the process was probably a bit more involved, yet the team of Designer's and craftspeople accomplished an amazing structure by drawing it first.
What about further back through the years? Tools and processes continue to change the further back we go in time. Egyptians used reeds and papyrus, wooden boards and hieroglyphic symbols to get their point across. I'm sure the pyramids and cities were thought through prior to just digging down and laying a foundational stone. Same with the Mayans, whom used animal hair and feather quills to write in their codexes. So through the years, drafting has always been a beginning phase of where the Art of building, begins and intercedes with an idea. Infact, that's the entire process of drafting, to get an idea across. To make something so you can make something else, properly.
Using modern equipment involves a computer, a mouse, keyboard, screen and the software to make it all go. I use an Apple MacBook Pro with a Microsoft bluetooth mouse. I've used probably at least a dozen different computers or laptops to make my drawings. I've dealt with printers and plotters, setting up rolls of paper and hand feeding in special printed vellum with title blocks and stamps. In the drafting field, we are so much more lucky to have what we have today versus the tools of the past. We are so disconnected from having to render anything by hand, I'm afraid the 'art' of drawing is going to be lost. One of my last projects 'The Austin', I did sit down and make 3 or 4 pages of hand drawings and sketches. They were rudimentary to the point where I achieved the basic shapes and proportions I felt would look appealing. In fact, I jumped straight to a 3d rendering of this house plan and skipped the standard 2 dimensional floor plan process completely. Then there is my Lake Cabin 1 (3d version) where I never did touch graphite to paper to draw the first line, though I did draw the floor plan in 2d CAD and the 3d renderings last. So my process has been a mix of hand drawing, photography of interesting details, maybe I just saw a bracket I liked and sketched it for later, or sometimes inspiration hits by the ways of a paying client who just wants a floor plan, which was the case with my Lake Cabin 1 (2d version).
Drafting on a laptop has it's ups and downs, I can draw whenever and where ever, though I find using the trackpad unbearable, so my needs necessitate the use of a mouse, mouse pad and table to set up my computer. I prefer to have a secondary screen to just my laptop screen. Having two monitors is a game changer. I can only imagine thinking about the egyptians attempting to draw on half a board, where having two halves would be a huge bonus. Think about your computer set up, could you operate more efficiently by having your tools pallets on one screen and your main drawings on another? Another bonus to this set up is having reference files open on your smaller screen behind your tool pallets. I can open a reference file from a past job, check font types, line weights and then jump straight back to the plan I'm working on currently. I've talked about this in a previous article, How to deal with Learning a New Drafting Style.
As far as computer systems go and monitors, most are interchangeable. If you're new to the drafting world, you're going to become a tech guy once you land a job in the field. Especially if you find a position in a smaller firm. Not only did I draft for an Architect *Cough Steve Mouzon, but I became quiet proficient at removing boards, knowing how to install, reinstall software, rebuild operating systems, setting up local area networks and trouble shooting a myriad of problems. What you'll learn if you don't already know (the younger generation here probably already has it all figured out) is that the ability of certain graphic cards installed in a computer can only push out so much information to a monitor, or vice-a-versa; a monitor can only handle so much while a graphics card may well exceed the screens ability to render at the highest setting. The same goes with computers, ram and hard drive space. While the difference between different setups is usually cost to you the end user (buyer/consumer), the end difference is likely negligible with modern systems.
A question was posed to an online forum of CADD users I frequent, 'What's the difference between 2 computer set ups' one advertising a clock speed of 700 mhz faster than another model. The consensus from the group with this answer: 'About $250 and maybe 15 seconds of lost rendering time a day, IF you're using a highly intense 3d program'. So in a nutshell, yes, time is money and you get what you pay for, but you can still get to the store in a Pinto, as you can a Mustang. I chose a middle of the road rebuilt Apple laptop. Namely because I can travel and work out of the office at remote locations. I didn't want to spend excess money or go into debt to buy the top of the line computer where a used one was only 6 months old. I preferred a built in DVD/CD drive over having to buy an external one to go with the top of the line model. I have made some choices with other hardware. I wanted a bluetooth mouse so I could hook up an external drive to my laptop (the drive uses both USB ports to power it). Had I gone with another brand like a Logitech mouse, I would have lost mouse use or backup use; as those mice require the use of one of your USB ports to power the RF controller so the computer can talk to the mouse. So I would then have to draw with the trackpad, which again, I disdain.
Since we're talking backing up your computer, I see it much like the old Realtor's slogan 'Backup, Backup, Backup'. You can never have enough backups. I keep 4 separate copies of current projects.
*One backup is the hard drive is in my laptop
*Second backup is an external hard drive
*Third hard drive is another external hard drive I back up to about once a month
*Fourth hard drive is a free online backup service (Dropbox)
Older projects are on all of my local external hard drives while I also burn DVD's once a year of my entire system. Losing a hard drive doesn't have to be a problem, if you will just back up.
So on an Apple computer running Powercadd, I chose a setup that works for me. Research your programs to see what will work for you. Buy an external hard drive and setup an incremental backup regiment. Research is easy with a couple of hours and a wideband connection. If you don't have a computer yet, use a friends, or the public library. You don't need the most current computer and your most cost effective way to get a faster system will be to increase RAM. Other parts can be changed out later over time.
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