Confidence votes 75. A CNC lathe is a computerized Lathe, CNC is short for C omputer N umeric Control. The Lathe uses information provided by a PLC or PC, a CNC is programmed using CAD/ CAM programs like Solidworks and AutoCAD for the drawing process and MasterCAM or LazyCAM to generate tool paths and G-code. The G-Code made with the CAM software is then loaded into a Machine software Like GRBL or EMC.