Budget 3D Cad recommendation

[fpnut]

Hi Everyone, I'm looking for a budget 3d CAD that is simple enough to learn but can do assemblies and BOM generation. I mainly design piping systems, some mechanical parts and assemblies, and also some structural stuff.

As a background: I don't have any experience in 3d CAD, since I never found the need to go 3d. Right now though, I'm looking to learn the basics as I hope it can help me in the future.

So, any recommendations? Currently I'm looking at either VariCad or BricsCad, but I'd like to know opinions before I sink some time to learning it, since from what I gather from people's comments that they both are very much different from each other and quite different from the industry standard practices? Well my budget is $1000 max, though maybe I can stretch it a bit.

Thanks in advance.

 

[IRstuff]

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Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!

 

[PatCouture]

For Learning purpose I would say any decent laptop should be able to run those softwares. Looking at your budget you don't have enough money for a professionnal graphic cards but I would say the new integrated graphics from intel are surprising (HD graphics 4400 and higher). I also know about some people using gaming cards with success but it's more of a gamble if it will work well or not.

Patrick