Dual Xeon build?

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LawBeefaroni
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Dual Xeon build?

Post by LawBeefaroni »

I've been without a desktop PC for a while. Mostly due to lack of space. My last upgrade was to a laptop and it didn't make sense to keep a a backup desktop.

A friend recently offered me a PC from his company. They're closing the Chicago office and have a ton of these that have been going to recycling.

It's a Dell 7000 series (I think 78xx) dual Xeon with 32gb RAM. I have SATA and SSD hard drives to stick in. Will be running Windows 10. 900W PSU.

Two questions:

1. This will be primarily for the kiddo to do her video and audio editing. However, is it viable for gaming?

2. If the answer to the above is "yes", what kind of card would be appropriate? The mobo has dual pcie slots but the PSU may be underpowered. I'm not looking for a full on gaming machine, just something capable that I wont have to upgrade for a while.


I've been out of the desktop game for a while and know nothing about this kind of set up.
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TheMix
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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by TheMix »

Probably need to check the motherboard, but I'd think that any of the current crop of video cards would work. As for power, I'd expect 900w to be plenty. These days the push is to reduce the power requirements on most things. Especially video cards. I think my pcs are usually in the 700w range.

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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by Smoove_B »

The only advice I can give is to research online first what video cards absolutely work inside the case. On paper any number of cards might work (based on the hardware), but it might not actually fit inside the Dell proprietary case. I've opened them up to see all kinds of weird cage and plastic duct design (for ventilation), making the addition of any type of video card difficult if not impossible.
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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by hitbyambulance »

LawBeefaroni wrote: Tue Jul 30, 2019 11:54 am
A friend recently offered me a PC from his company. They're closing the Chicago office and have a ton of these that have been going to recycling.
this thread is informative. https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads ... c.3165054/
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gameoverman
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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by gameoverman »

The dual Xeons will be great for video editing.

For gaming, the performance would depend on which specific Xeons it has and their base frequencies. For casual gaming, which even slow Xeons should manage, I'd go with a 4gb vram entry level card at this point. Some games really need the vram. Right now that means an RX 570 or GTX 1650. I'd skip the GTX 1050 Ti unless you're getting a great deal on one. The 570 is the better choice but it requires a pci-ex connector and the 1650 does not. I'm pretty sure a 900W PSU would have the connector but I haven't seen the computer so I could be wrong.

If those are fast Xeons, then a faster card like a GTX 1660 Ti could be useful. A lot of this depends on the games too. For Fortnite and Minecraft and other esports type games, you won't need that much videocard power. For AAA games you'll need all you can get.
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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by LawBeefaroni »

Ordered a Radeon RX 570 8GB. Specs and reviews indicate that it should fit but I'm not 100%. If not, I may have a like-new card to sell...
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LawBeefaroni
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Re: Dual Xeon build?

Post by LawBeefaroni »

Radeon fits and is working great. Whole rig is much quieter than I expected. Runs ARK great and has been chewing through 4K video editing at an acceptable pace.

So confirmed to work together:

Dell Precision 7810

XFX Radeon RX 570 RS XXX Edition 1286MHz, 8gb GDDR5


Had to use the included power y-dongle but otherwise non-issues. Probably not room for dual PCIE cards though.
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"No scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer." -Stigler's Law of Eponymy, discovered by Robert K. Merton

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