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Best PC Config for Revit - the Best System for Revit

Whether you are working in an office workstation, or on your laptop, you have to make sure you got the right hardware in the machine capable of running Revit. This is doubly important because Revit is a quite resource-hungry software. So, today we will talk about the best PC config for Revit.

Revit is a 3D rendering software, and as such it requires heavily on all RAM, the Graphics Card, and the Processor for rendering and calculating the complex architectural or mechanical design you are working on. This increases in complexity as you work on bigger models, or work on multiple models at once.

The problem is, Revit is already an expensive software, and the hardware resources it demands is not cheap either. Therefore, cost is a major issue in building the best computer for Revit! The more powerful hardware you pack, the more you have to shell out ? and if you try to save the bucks, Revit might stutter or not run at all.

To properly figure out the best PC config for Revit, you have to consider the following aspects:

1. Physical system size and type
2. Best processor for Revit
3. Best graphics card for Revit
4. How much RAM is enough for Revit
5. Hard drive type and space for Revit

Physical system type and size for Revit

Laptops

Most people these days think of a laptop when they think of a PC. And for good reason too. Laptops are mobile systems you can set up anywhere even without power, they work right out-of-the-box, and you don't have to worry about every component separately.

However, all that has many big disadvantages as well. First of all, miniaturizing that much power doesn't come cheap at all. Even a decent office laptop would cost you enough to buy a couple standard study desktops. Secondly, since everything is packed together, you don't have much way to upgrade or change the components in the laptop ? you're forever stuck with what you've bought, or replace with a new hardware.

Plus, you can miniaturize only so much power ? laptops have tech ceilings. No to mention the small, single screen you are limited to work in. So, if your copy of Revit doesn't need too much power and your work is light but mobility is important, only then buy a good laptop for Revit.

Desktops

A desktop, on the other hand, is assembled piece by piece, so you have the complete freedom of getting what you want. (We are, of course, talking about tower PCs, not AIO desktops.) You can get powerful processors, bombastic graphics cards, large arrays of fast RAMs, multiple big monitors hooked up to the tower, a pretty-looking cabinet ? and still have all that in less cost than the equivalent laptop system.

The downside is, of course, mobility. A desktop is meant to stay where it is set up ? which requires quite some work as well.

While there are some good pre-built desktop PCs available out there, we would recommend you buy the PC components piece-by-piece and then assemble them yourself. It's not too hard and with a little technical know-how and elbow grease anybody can set-up a multimonitor desktop.

Best processor to Run Revit

Revit is generally speaking a single-thread software, so you need to concentrate more on overall processor speed rather than the number of cores or threads the processor supports. While there are some multi-threaded functionalities within Revit, they are capped to 16 threads and you won't have any improvements using a processor better than that.

If you're using a corporate workstation, they might provide you an Intel Xeon for your machine. If you're buying the processor separately yourself, we would recommend getting an Intel i5 or i7 with high GHz rating (nothing below 3.6 GHz normal working frequency). If cost is an issue for you, try using Ryzen 5 or 7 ? though they are intended for gaming, but they should run Revit fantastically as well since games are 3D applications as well. They're generally better cooled as well, these days.

Best graphics card for Revit

Graphic card is that component of a PC that is responsible for creating what you actually "see" on screen. It renders the 3D scenes in real-time while the processor takes care of the background calculations. Therefore, a good graphics card is vitally important for you to run Revit.

A graphics card is small computer by itself, having its own RAM and processor. Technically you can run Revit on just 1 GB graphics card RAM ? but that's the bare minimum. If you want to work any models of respectable sizes, we suggest a 4 GB graphics card. And the better processing power you have in the card, the better. Here, check the cooling capabilities of the card as well ? they heat up enough to boil water.

Nvidia's Quadro series are cards dedicated for 3D modeling, and your company may provide you one in your system. However, they aren't cheap at all. So, for yourself you may buy Nvidia's GTX or RTX series ? the later the better ? with 4 GB video RAM at least.

AMD also sells great video cards, but all of them are highly optimized for gaming and aren't necessarily good for 3D modeling. However, they do come at a less price.

How much RAM is needed to run Revit

RAM isn't very expensive, so you should get it as much as you can. While running, the whole software is loaded onto the RAM to run ? including the model. So, the bigger models you are working upon, the more RAM you will need. We recommend 16 GB at least for beginners, and 64 GB for heavy professionals.

The speed of RAM also decides how well Revit will run without lags or jerks. 2666 MHz is the minimum required speed for the RAM if you want to run Revit. We say be safe and buy 3200 MHz. Also, it matters how many RAM sticks you are using. It is better to use two 16 GB RAM sticks in dual-channel configuration instead of one 32 GB RAM stick.

Hard drive type and space

For fast loading of the software, you should consider an SSD (Solid State Drive). The fastest would be NVMe storage drives, but those are quite costly. A step down is the M.2 sticks ? again not much cheaper. The cheapest are the SATA SSDs which are slower as well ? but they can get the job done if you're not much worried about software or model loading times.

You need at least a 512 GB hard drive (of any kind) to run Revit. The software itself isn't that big, but we have to consider the operating system as well. Of course, if you already have a capable PC and just upgrading it for Revit ? then a 240 GB storage should do fine.

Best PC Config for Revit - the Best System for Revit