Looking at the benchmark scores recorded by the 3XS P67 it is easy to forget that this is an entry-level machine. Setting records in our CAD, CAM and CAE benchmarks, it’s incredible that you can get these levels of compute performance from a £1,125 workstation.
In order to achieve this Scan has overclocked the Core i7-2600K to a whopping 4.5GHz. The Bolton-based manufacturer says it could go faster, even with air cooling, but stability is always the most important consideration in a professional workstation.
For 3D graphics Scan has opted for a less remarkable piece of hardware. The Nvidia Quadro 600 is an entry-level board, but should still give a good account of itself inside most CAD software.
Despite the entry-level price point of the 3XS P67, Scan has still managed to include a high-performance hard drive. The 120GB OCZ Solid State Drive (SSD) is used for operating system, applications and short term data and boasts respective read and write speeds of 285MB/s and 275MB/s. This is supplemented by a 1TB Western Digital mechanical drive for storage.
In terms of raw processing power the 3XS P67 re-writes the record books for entry-level workstations. It’s a hugely impressive machine, the only downside being its two year warranty instead of three.
Greg Corke
Meanwhile to find out more on Sandy Bridge here’s our review
Intel ‘Sandy Bridge’
And here’s some links to some other Sandy Bridge workstations
InterPro Workstations IPW-Ci5
Workstation Specialists WS1410
To view the benchmark scores please click here
For details of all of our application-specific CAD/CAM/CAE benchmarks click here
Specifications
» Intel Core i7-2600K (3.40GHz – overclocked to 4.5GHz) Quad Core CPU
» 8GB (2x 4GB) PC3-12800 (1600) memory
» Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD4 motherboard
» PNY Nvidia Quadro 600 (1GB) graphics card
» 120GB OCZ Vertex 2E 2.5” Sandforce SSD + 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black SATA
» Windows Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
» 1st year onsite warranty, 2nd year return to base
Benchmarks
Graphics (frames per second – bigger is better)
» CAD (SolidWorks 2010) – 24
CPU (secs – smaller is better)
» CAD (SolidWorks 2010) – 202
» CAM (Delcam PowerMill 2010) – 1) 139 2) 215 3) 293
» CAE (SolidWorks Simulation 2010) – 81
» Rendering (3ds Max Design 2011) – 229
Intel Core i7-2600K (3.40GHz – overclocked to 4.5GHz) Quad Core CPU
8GB (2x 4GB) PC3-12800 (1600) memory
PNY Nvidia Quadro 600 (1GB)
Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD4 motherboard
120GB OCZ Vertex 2E 2.5” Sandforce SSD + 1TB Western Digital Caviar Black SATA
1st year onsite warranty, 2nd year return to base
202
139
215
293
81
229
24
