if youre contemplating CAD... (Score 1)

... look into a program called RHINO made by ROBERT MCNEEL & ASSOCIATES. i use it on my prototyping and fabrication projects as it is relatively tiny compared to AutoCAD and has less clutter. it is efficient enough to work on my old dell latitude, while still putting out high-quality renders. the product is cheaper than AutoCAD and offers plug-ins which put it on par with cinematic rendering software like MAYA and 3DSMAX. Just starting out, Id say RHINO beats AutoCAD all on its own in terms of price, efficiency and computer performance.