How to configure your workstation for SketchUp Pro

The 2D and 3D modeling program SketchUp Pro is a powerful and inexpensive CAD tool for three-dimensional solutions in architecture, product design, advertising and graphic design. SketchUp focuses on precision rather than speed, and impresses with its impresses with its simple, intuitive usability. You want to work on larger and very complex projects with appealing geometry more easily and quickly? We configure the optimal business workstation for your individual SketchUp Pro applications and offer you the possibility to  to evaluate the system with a test license for SketchUp Pro via remote access. Contact us to arrange a free remote test. Below is our expertise for SketchUp Pro 2022:

The right CPU for Sketch Up 2022

SketchUp Pro uses a single processor core for 2D and 3D designs. The higher the clock frequency of this processor, the better the performance in SketchUp. For 3D modeling, we recommend an Intel Xeon 4- or 6-core with a high MHz frequency starting at 3.00 GHz. A good alternative is an Intel i7 or i9 with a turbo boost from 4.00 GHz. If you use your workstation for photo-realistic renderings and simulations at the same time, you will benefit from every single processor core. Business workstation with Intel i7 9700 with 8 cores and 4.70 Ghz or Intel i9 10900X with 10 cores and 4.50 GHz offer a balance of CPU cores and threads. Intel Xeon processors are suitable for continuous operation, very robust and durable. We recommend an Intel Xeon W-2155 with 10 cores, 20 threads and up to 4.50GHz in Turbo Boost. The Intel Turbo Boost technology automatically increases the CPU speed up to the maximum Turbo frequency when required with stable temperature and power consumption values. The performance increases by up to 15% in both single-thread and multi-thread applications. These all-around processors ensure that you have strong SketchUp 3D modeling performance while also having large core counts to speed up your renderings.  

The optimal RAM configuration for Sketchup Pro 2022

Per CPU core, it is recommended to use up to 6 GB of RAM per existing processor core for computationally intensive CAD programs. If you choose a server CPU, an Intel Xeon 6 core, we recommend using 32 GB of memory with automatic error correction (ECC) for SketchUp Pro. By using ECC memory, single-bit errors are automatically detected and corrected. The more memory used, the higher the risk. An absolute must-have for all professional servers and workstations focusing on design, development, modeling, simulation and analysis. For more demanding tasks, such as rendering, we recommend 64 GB RAM in identical memory channels in quad-channel mode. If their CPU supports the use of quad-channel occupancy of RAM, 4x8 banks are more optimal than 2x16GB modules and 4x16GB is faster than 2x32GB DDR4 modules. The higher data transfer rate can result in a performance increase of up to 10%.

The perfect graphics card choice for Sketchup Pro 2022

Like most graphics applications, SketchUp's GPU requirements have increased over the last few years. SketchUp was not specifically designed for real-time rendering, but GPU performance is still important in certain situations. There are no major advantages in 3D modeling achieved by using high-end graphics cards. We recommend using dedicated graphics cards from NVIDIA of the Quadro RTX or Geforce RTX series. PassMark's benchmark test has proven to be a good performance index. SketchUp recommends graphics cards from 2,000 Passmark points. If you use other CAD applications, make sure to choose a graphics card that is also suitable for these programs. We recommend an NVIDIA Quadro RTX A2000 with 6GB GDDR6 VRAM for 3D modeling in Sketchup. If you plan to do GPU rendering, consider selecting a higher-end NVIDIA GeForce graphics card to accelerate the performance of your renders. An NVIDIA Geforce RTX3060 with 12GB, Geforce RTX3070 or Geforce RTX3080 are our recommendations. With new NVIDIA Quadro RTX graphics cards of the A-series you will achieve very good results in SketchUp. We would be happy to provide you with a quote for a business workstation with NVIDIA Quadro RTX A2000, either with 6GB or 12GB GDDR6 VRAM or an NVIDIA Quadro RTX A4000 with 16GB GDDR6 graphics card memory. AMD offers two interesting alternatives with the Radeon Pro W6600 and W6800. Since the performance of your graphics card in SketchUp is very strongly coupled to the graphics card driver, we recommend updating the graphics card driver at regular intervals.

Optimized hard disk speed-up for SketchUp 2022

Due to our very positive experiences with solid state hard disks we can recommend SSD hard disks without restrictions.  Our tip: Install the operating system and the CAD programs on an M.2 SSD and use a second SSD for fast access to your project data. If you need additional larger storage space, 2TB, 4TB, or 8TB S-ATA hard disks are suitable as a cost-effective alternative.