Can an E6410 w/ NVS 3100M run Solidworks well?

Hi y'all. So I'm going to be a mechanical engineering student next year and I will need a machine for SolidWorks. Right now I have a Latitude E6410 that needs a new motherboard, and I'm debating fixing it or buying used Thinkpad W510.

This is my Latitude:

Core i5-520M
8GB RAM
Intel HD graphics (will upgrade it to Nvidia NVS 3100M)
1280x800 screen
6-cell battery

It needs a new motherboard though. I can buy an Nvidia 3100M-equipped motherboard on Ebay for $60 and a heatsink for said motherboard for another $10, so I can fix it for about $70. However, can that setup run SolidWorks reliably for the next 4 years? The NVS 3100M is still a pretty weaksauce card, and it's not certified for Solidworks, but has anyone tried?


Alternatively, Thinkpad W510's float for around $500 on Ebay, and I'm considering buying one of those instead of fixing my Latitude. Their Quadro FX 880M are certified for Solidworks, and they generally come with 900p or 1080p screens and quad-core i7s, which are much nicer than what I have. I also prefer the Thinkpad keyboards. They are much heavier than my Latitude E6410 though, which is a concern, and it's a lot cheaper to fix my Latitude.

I'd much rather fix my Latitude, but if it can't run Solidworks, I don't really want to bother and I'd rather put that $70 towards a W510. So should I fix my Latitude, or go out buy a Thinkpad W510?

I'm also open to other options. I'm not willing to spend much more than $600 on a laptop, and if I buy a different one, it must have a 900p or better screen, a 3-button Trackpoint or similar device, and a centered screen (I'm looking at you, Thinkpad W500).

 

Afaik, the certification just means that they've specifically tested SW on a particular GPU, but it doesn't mean that SW won't run on other hardware. Basically it should at least just work, but rendering in some super corner cases might be funny, etc.

FWIW, I ran SW on an X4500 for a year in college, and it was fine. Not blazing fast, but fine.

 

What Commander Wolf said, on lower grade GPUs, performance won't be pretty, but it will run. Nothing runs SW like a non NVS quadro, but your NVS3100M would at least allow you to do some quick touch ups and light stuff. You will have to use the university's workstations for more complicated projects tough.

 

I've supported one E6410 with an i7-640M and the NVS 3100M, but I've never heard any complaints from him about the usability of SolidWorks 2011. I don't know how complex the drawings were, or whether or not SolidWorks is CPU-intensive, but his CPU is faster than your i5-520M.