So... I've always been curious to try one of them off-lease government/research center workstations - particularly the Dell Precision ones, like T3400, T3500, and etc.
Early last week, I found a good eBay deal on a Dell Precision T7500 workstation and asked seller if I can do local pickup, since it wasn't that far away from where I live (otherwise, the shipping would have been a killer, costing more than the station itself, lol.)
So, for about $40, including the price of gas,
I got this:
Dell Precision T7500
CPU: dual Xeon E5605 (socket 1366, onboard + riser card)
RAM: 8 GB PC3L-10600R dual-channel (triple channel possible)
GPU: Dell Radeon HD8490 1GD3 (meh... but good enough for a test card)
PSU: stock 1100 Watt Delta 80+ Silver
Optical: standard SATA DVD-R/RW
No HDD or anything else was included. But for that price, I really can't complain. Many T7500 stations on eBay don't even include a CPU riser card / 2nd CPU... and the ones that do typically easily start at 2-3x the price. So that was the catch for me with this one when I saw it - the second CPU/riser card, which was shown in the pictures but not specifically mentioned in the auction.
I drove out last Friday (a little less than 1 hour away) and brought it home. I did look up videos and info on the T7500 before that, and some did mention it is a bit on the "larger" side. Still, I figured it should fit under my desk nevertheless. It doesn't:
(As a comparison, that is a Dell XPS 8700 m-ATX case "mini-tower" on the right.)
So I'll have to make some room for it elsewhere, eventually... which is okay for now, because I'm still only playing with its stock config right now. However, I do plan on getting 2x hex core CPUs for it and more RAM. Then a better GPU (have two workmates who say they have some old cards they want to sell, so we will see - one is offering a GTX 980 Ti, the other a GTX 1050 Ti.) Another project for another day, though.
I did a quick CPU stress test, and even with the two 80W TDP E5605 CPUs, it's quite power-hungry, drawing around 200W from the wall. With a higher-end video card, I think this one might be more suited towards winter-time use when I need heat in the house.
I also got a few more good scores on the following day after picking up the station from CLs, but I'll put that in the next post and when I have more time to go through that stuff.