Precision Fixed Workstations

[HDKaj]

Have a used T7600 I've been using for a bit over a year.  Lovely machine!  Dual Xeon E5-2620, 64GB RAM.  It's my primary G/P machine.  I use it occasionally to rip our videos (DVD / Bluray) using DVDFab.  I added a nVidia GeForce GT710 because I wanted a video card that did NOT use a fan, 'cause I'm not a fan of video card fan failures.  The GT710 helps speed up DVD ripping with its GPU.  I may look at a newer video card later, with higher CUDA rating.

I'm tossing around the idea of upgrading my Xeon processors to get a bit more performance for ripping.  A document from tomshardware.com says that basically ANY of the E5-2600 series Xeons could be used in this machine, all the way up to E5-2687W.  I'm leaning towards the E5-2643 'cause they can be purchased relatively inexpensively, over 50% increase in clock, but I'd be losing 2 cores/processor & increasing CPU power consumption from 95W to 130W.  The E5-2667 looks pretty good, with almost a 50% increase in clock, same # of cores & only 20 more watts of power consumption.

I haven't looked at how they are installed but am hoping that the heat sinks are transferable from chip to chip?  Just fresh heat sink compound required?

[hammarlund]

A heat sink designed for 95W may or may not be capable of more wattage.  For example, my new workstation came with a heat sink that is at its absolute maximum: not only is it barely sized for the TDP I have, with no headroom, but even moving up 15 W would require a new heatsink... which, not incidentally, Dell refuses to sell.

Dell really doesn't support upgrades well.  Given Dell's cost-cutting on my own machine it's hard to imagine they would have shipped a 130-W-caoable setup with a 95W heatsink, though you may be lucky.  otherwise you'll have to hope for a heatsink on ebay unless you have room for aftermarket.

[HDKaj]

Thx for the reply.  Yeah, I am well aware of thing that DELL will & will not sell to its customers.  Sales people would promise the world, to make a sale, but reality was less afterwards.  Aftermarket has lots of great products, but it's always fun seeing what you can fit in a DELL chassis.

I'm not in a big rush to upgrade processor, as what I have suffices, for now.  I figure a GPU upgrade would provide me with a bigger payback for DVD / Bluray ripping, as more CUDA cores would improve throughput.  But I can live with performance I have now, for now.

[U2CAMEB4ME]

Welcome to the Dell Community  @HDKaj 

The T7600 shipped with all 4 wattage CPU's.

But I can not find any reference to different model fan/heatsink???

Hardware Specifications for the Precision T7600 Desktop Workstation:

https://www.dell.com/support/article/en-us/sln290764/hardware-specifications-for-the-precision-t7600...

Intel® Xeon®E5-E5-2687W Processor(Eight Core HT, 3.1GHz Turbo, 20 MB Intel Smart Cache, 130 watt)

http://www.cpu-upgrade.com/CPUs/Intel/Xeon/E5-2620.html

Best regards,

U2

[bmcowboy]

Hi @hammarlund ,

Wonder if you already completed with your T7600 upgrade project. If not, here's my experience to share with you.

- Performance

For CPU performance, here's my CINEBench results (dual 2687W) for your reference. You may find this free benchmark tools from Microsoft Store and run it on your existing system as comparison and see if worth for the investment.

- Tempurature

While E5 2687W v1 with the highest TDP (150W) among all E5 2600 v1 family members, 2 units of them together with stock heatsink (DP/N 01TD00) often lead to CPU temperature at 6X°C under low loading / 7X°C under general loading / up to 89°C under CPU stress test. All fans run in their highest speed as if it's gonna blow! I then investigate if there's any possible way to implement liquid-cooling system without modding (yup, I don't have a clue on any modding works). And finally got the followings:

Dell T7910 Liquid-Colling unit 

DP/N: 0TMJK2

Easy installation without difficulties. Just fit for T7600 even though it's designed for T7910. No BIOS alert received. Maximum CPU temperature under stress test drops significantly from 89°C to 73°C, and keep at 4X°C on generally usage.

However, as these liquid-cooling units changed the direction of how wind blows, you may not close the original side panel or have to add extra fan at the back panel like those in this video.

See if information above helps.

[Raven1505]

Hi @bmcowboy 

Do you know where I can buy the heatsink that he mentions? The ebay link you put has a different model or at least different from the one you have in your photos and video, do you know what version of the E5 2687W allows? I was thinking of putting version 4 but I don't know if I can handle it

a greeting

[bmcowboy]

Hi @Raven1505 ,

Not sure why those eBay links changed sometimes somehow. You may check out this:

DELL PRECISION T7910 LIQUID COOLANT HIGH PERFORMANCE HEATSINK - TMJK2 

Or simply google "Dell TMJK2" will find what you need.

For Xeon CPU version, T7600 base on Intel C600 chipset and support E5-2600 v1 family only. Further reference, T7610 on Intel C602 chipset support both E5-2600 v1 and v2 family.

[Raven1505]

Thank you very much for the answer, do you happen to know if you can put a tesla k80 on this equipment? I have tried to make it work but I can not achieve it, they say that you have to enable "above 4g decoding" so that it can run more than 2 gpu, but I do not see this in the bios options.

I currently have an rx 580 4 gb and I want to add the nvida tesla k80

[bmcowboy]

Hi @Raven1505 ,

Does your workstation POST with dual GPUs installed? As per a Dell's KB here, update BIOS version to the latest one and change PCI MMIO Space Size from default small to large may do the trick.

[JamesJAB1]

I do not own a T7600, but I do have a T7500 and an T7610.  I have had no issues with multi GPU setups in either machine.
T7500 = GTX 1080 ti and GTX 1060
T7610 = RTX 2070 Super, GTX 1080 ti, and Quadro P4000

Although if you can, try to stay away from "open air" style GPUs because they vent out the side of the card.  The T7600, T7610, and T7910 work best with Blower style cards.  If you want to use the top PCIe port you also need to find a card with the power plugs on the back of the card, not the side (The side panel latch mechanism is in the way.)
My current T7610 setup is two blower cards.  GTX 1080 and GTX 1080 ti.