Put simply, Workstations are more powerful and better equipped
PCs designed for use with demanding applications such as Audio,
Photo and Video editing and encoding, CAD/CAM applications such as
AutoCAD, 3D Modelling and much more besides. Normal, run of the
mill PCs are designed to do more mundane things like word process,
surf the Internet, write emails etc. and are perfectly capable of
such tasks. When you need more from your PC and find you're waiting
around for tasks to finish, a workstation class machine is a wise
investment as it will handle the workload much more easily.
Key features include
- Upgradable - add more than one (preferably more than 2 more
hard disks)
- Support more than one physical processor
- Support for dedicated graphics cards
- Support workstation class ECC memory
- Support for workstation/server class processors - Intel Xeon or
AMD Opteron
- Support for large amounts of RAM beyond the 4-8Gb desktop class
PCs support
- Support for RAID Storage
The main difference between a Workstation and Desktop PC is that
a professional designer/developer won't be able to get by on the
same sort of machine an office admin uses on a day to day
basis.
If you're finding your machine is having trouble with the tasks
you're throwing at it, it is time to either look at upgrading your
machine, or replacing it with something which can handle your needs
with ease.