FLOW-3D supports Open GL graphics cards. Most graphics card with OpenGL 2.0 support will work well with FLOW-3D . Look for graphics cards that specifically list OpenGL support for the operating system you're intending to use. Gaming graphics cards such as ATI's Radeon X-series and Nvidia's Geforce Series 6, 7, and 8 will perform well even for very large simulations. Workstation graphic cards such as ATI's FireGL and Nividia's Quadro cards will also work but usually cost more than gaming cards.

Both AGP and PCI-Express interfaces perform well. Onboard graphics such as Intel's 945GM Express Graphics can be expected to display graphics reasonably well for simulations up to a few million cells. For larger simulations, a dedicated graphics card with 512 MB of memory is recommended.

Please contact Flow Science support at support@flow3d.com for graphics card recommendations.

FLOW-3D uses FLEX lm for license management. If you choose to employ the FLEX lm floating manager on a Windows network, your network server must be running Microsoft Windows 2000 or Windows XP and you must utilize a hardware key (dongle).

1 GB of RAM and Pentium 4-class or above processor is recommended. The actual memory required for any particular problem will depend on the size of the mesh and the physical models that are enabled.

The most important hardware factor in improving the performance of FLOW-3D is the processor since it handles both number crunching and graphics. The fastest processors available are IBM's Power 5 series which are roughly 10 to 20% faster than the fastest Intel x86-64 processors. However, on a cost/performance basis, the x86-64 processors offer the best option for FLOW-3D users. Multi-core processors are available with up to 4 cores per processor. Due to memory issues, a dual-core processor provides the best cost/performance benefit at this time. Most computers available today are 64-bit processors which can run both 32 and 64 bit operating systems.

Please contact Flow Science support at support@flow3d.com for more information.

Both Windows and Linux are available in 32 and 64 bit versions. If the available memory on your hardware is 2GB or less, there is no benefit to running a 64-bit operating system. If your hardware has 3GB of memory (or more), running a 64-bit operating system will allow large (>6 million cells) simulations to be run. On 32-bit operating systems (Linux and Windows), simulations will be limited to roughly 3 to 4 million cells regardless of how much memory is available. On 64-bit operating
systems, the size of the simulation is only limited by the available memory on the computer.

There is no noticeable difference in simulation time on Windows vs. Linux. Users should choose whichever operating system they are comfortable with. Users should keep in mind that after Version 9.2, Flow Science will no longer support Unix operating systems.

Users who wish to customize any of the routines that Flow Science distributes as part of the standard installation will need a compiler compatible with the compilers used by Flow Science to build FLOW-3D . A list is given below.