Dell XPS 710 H2C

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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Dell XPS 710 H2C - Dell has talked about competing head-to-head in the boutique gaming PC market for a while now. The company's first factory over-clocked and water-cooled gaming PC is the strongest sign yet that Dell is playing for keeps.

At around $5,500, it doesn't need to be said that this is a very expensive computer, but where does it sit with its prospective competition? We configured the same PC at several other integrators and found that Dell’s price is high compared to Velocity Micro and Overdrive PC, but much lower than what you’d pay at other boutique builders.
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With its next-generation graphics, demanding light effects, and advanced particle physics, World of Warcraft was barely playable on the XPS 710, eeking out a mere average of 143fps at a resolution of 1920x1440.

LOL
 
Torquemada XP said:
With its next-generation graphics, demanding light effects, and advanced particle physics, World of Warcraft was barely playable on the XPS 710, eeking out a mere average of 143fps at a resolution of 1920x1440.

LOL
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Yea I noticed that as well, 1 word:

OBSCENE
 
Man that's a lot of processes. I can beat that though. Our new work computers came with around 56 with only 960MB of RAM. :(

Nice review. Didn't expect four pages of tech support though.

...or did I? :p
 
that water cooling unit is a good looking piece of hardware.
 
Great review, as usual. I bet it was a little difficult to decide between recommended and recommended with reservations.
It seemed like most of the issues, besides the bentic stuff, figured themselves out over time... so maybe it should be 'recommended with patience'?

[H] has seen a lot of cooling solutions come through, so my question is, if you saw the H2C solution on a shelf somewhere, would you be interested in it? What price would be reasonable?
 
The best I can recall is that the restore partition is on the 710 (I could be wrong, one of the 7xx systems does not have it. I thought the 700) and all other recent XPS/Dimension/Inspiron systems (Post-2002 iirc). If you would like some CDs that contain a factory image of the drive you can request them from technical support. They are free of charge. I agree they should be included with the system to begin with, but it's cheaper not to.


EDIT: Just as a side note it's actually CTRL+F11 and not simply F11.

It’s actually impossible for a blank DVD to be recognized and treated as a CD.
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Strangely enough, Roxio can cause this same issue due to its DLA/PXEngine crap. It's terrible software.

It’s as if the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing.
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Precisely.



Hey, guess where I work.
 
are there 4 dvi ports? looks like just two from the back case view.

EDIT: ah nevermind, there's a plastic cover there. guess it's to reduce confusion of which port to use or something.
 
Reading that review, i was anticipating tech support ruining it. i was so terribly wrong, it made me happy :) Dell did it. they have good tech support for the XPS line. now if they can do it for ALL of their systems, then they have a winning combination.

Thank you for the review, very good :D
 
Quite a monster system.
Too bad the software FUBAR'd it.
I was expecting 2 8800 GTX to crush any games you threw at it.

Great review. Very good tech support.
 
Great review (coming from a Dell fan :p ) Did you guys test the temps before or after you pulled it apart? Do you think it would benefit from AS5, or is it not up to the task to keep temps in the 50's at a 3.2 OC?
 
Rube said:
Great review (coming from a Dell fan :p ) Did you guys test the temps before or after you pulled it apart? Do you think it would benefit from AS5, or is it not up to the task to keep temps in the 50's at a 3.2 OC?
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All of our temps are before we pulled it apart. To be honest, it was a bit difficult to put Humpty-Dumpty back together again afterwards. Taking things apart is always the easier task :).

We really don't think the quality of the thermal grease is pertinent. What we believe impacted it is the quantity of compound that was used, aside from the fact that the quad-cores run damn hot.
 
As you stated it was running a little hot under certain test I was just wondering. Since it came with too much paste on it from the get go. Did you guys clean that up and put the "correct" ammount on there. Or did you leave it the way it came with too much on there?
 
Sounds like you might have spoken with some folks I used to work with. Glad they helped you out.
 
Did the H2c system come with the latest bios update that allows use of EPP ram ?
 
Gah, I should have included the screenshot but it slipped through the cracks.

Under Shader Quality there is an option for DX10.

The Inquirer wrote a story about CoH receiving DX10 support at the end of March, but there's nothing I can find in the 1.4 patch that mentions it, but it appears to be in the game.

2000836446655656623_rs.jpg
 
Exavior said:
As you stated it was running a little hot under certain test I was just wondering. Since it came with too much paste on it from the get go. Did you guys clean that up and put the "correct" ammount on there. Or did you leave it the way it came with too much on there?
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We waited until we completed testing to disassemble the machine, so we didn't retest with a new grease application.

We didn't experience any instability from temperature, so they weren't penalized for that, just for the sloppy application.
 
Even if you were running it on Vista you wouldn't be able to enable the DX10 function until a patch was released for CoH. As for the application of thermal paste, Dell does that as a rule, rather then exception. Its even in their service manual iirc.
 
Since the [H] readers are the wind beneath our wings, we cleaned up the thermal paste and re-applied some Arctic Ceramique. We considered AS5, but since AS5 requires 200 hours to reach optimal temperature, and we have to ship the system back to Dell pretty soon, we went with the white stuff.

2005152015519679953_rs.jpg


We then fired up five instances of Prime95 and CoreTemp.

It's still running, but when we left the office a little while ago it was at 78C. In other words, seemingly no difference. We'll check in on it again tomorrow as well.
 
I figured I would mention that I had the same wait time/chat problem with Dell. I have an XPS m140 laptop (just about to turn 1 year old). I have 3 year on site with CompleteCare. Even though I used the Dell XPS 'super' support, I was on hold for 15 minutes and gave up because I was at work. They said to go to the www.dell.com/xpschat, but like in your review was closed. Since I was not going to call and wait again, I had tried the xps chat about 5 times over 2 weeks and on the 5th time, it was finally open. They were very courteous.

All I needed was my hinges tightened (it's my main general use PC, it goes with me everywhere). They also asked me "are you having any problems with your touchpad?" then I asked "am I supposed to be having problems with my touchpad?" - my humor went in one ear and out the other and I said "No, it's fine". They also asked whether I had any missing rubber pieces (screen spacers, rubber feet) which are all still intact on my PC. I was contacted the next morning by a tech and he came the same evening at 6pm. Just over 24 hours and I had it fixed properly.

Moral of the story? Great support if you can get in contact with them.
 
Josh_Norem said:
Since the [H] readers are the wind beneath our wings, we cleaned up the thermal paste and re-applied some Arctic Ceramique. We considered AS5, but since AS5 requires 200 hours to reach optimal temperature, and we have to ship the system back to Dell pretty soon, we went with the white stuff.



We then fired up five instances of Prime95 and CoreTemp.

It's still running, but when we left the office a little while ago it was at 78C. In other words, seemingly no difference. We'll check in on it again tomorrow as well.
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Now THAT's customer service!
 
It's a cliche, but we really do everything for the readers. And if the readers have a request, we do what we can to please them/you
 
Josh_Norem said:
It's a cliche, but we really do everything for the readers. And if the readers have a request, we do what we can to please them/you
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I just PMed my address to you for the machine. I would like you to overnight it also. I don't like waiting so don't keep this reader waiting.

jk.:p


Btw, if Dell was serious about competing with hardcore system builders, they could have at least used better ram than some 667mhz Samsung ram in a 6k system....
 
Thought I should let you know about this...

There is a serious issue going on between Dell, nVidia and Creative. The X-Fi soundcard has the 'pops and crackles' issue that Creative admits exists but blames on nVidia - This reuslts in your game sound crashing out to a high pitched whine or random static.

Dell are aware that it's an issue, they have issued new BIOS patches that have made things worse for most.

This link :

http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=xps_desk_audio&thread.id=572&view=by_date_ascending&page=1

Is a sticky forum thread at the top of the Dell Tech Support Audio forum and goes on for 19 pages of peoples issues.

BUT - They are still selling the same setup.

Like I said, thought you should know. I have one of these machines and I have the issue and on a $5k+ machine it's unacceptable that Dell blames Creative, Creative blames nVidia and nobody is fixing it.

S.
 
silkp said:
Like I said, thought you should know. I have one of these machines and I have the issue and on a $5k+ machine it's unacceptable that Dell blames Creative, Creative blames nVidia and nobody is fixing it.
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I personally blame Creative. I got a standard XtremeGamer card and installed the 'new' drivers that fix the BF2 voip issues, but it will break again every couple weeks, making me uninstall and reinstall the drivers over and over. Of course I have an nForce4 board, so it probably isn't as relevant...
 
I know this was about the first reply, and I know I'm late but:

With its next-generation graphics, demanding light effects, and advanced particle physics, World of Warcraft was barely playable on the XPS 710, eeking out a mere average of 143fps at a resolution of 1920x1440.
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LOL that was funny
 
Josh_Norem said:
It's a cliche, but we really do everything for the readers. And if the readers have a request, we do what we can to please them/you
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All I ever see are creative cards. Is there anything els out there you guys could order with your next evaluation? Sound seems to have been dropping off the radar in the reviews. It is only mentioned if there is an "issue".

Granted, I know that for most people they will not give a flip what it comes with, but if there are quality differences in onboard/ versus creative xfi / versus brand X we would like to know.
 
JOESKURTU said:
All I ever see are creative cards. Is there anything els out there you guys could order with your next evaluation? Sound seems to have been dropping off the radar in the reviews. It is only mentioned if there is an "issue".

Granted, I know that for most people they will not give a flip what it comes with, but if there are quality differences in onboard/ versus creative xfi / versus brand X we would like to know.
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Who else is there? Seriously, for most people creative and store brand is really the only option. Though I must say a buddy of mine got a Dynex (Best Bizzle brand) 7.1 card and loves it. Lets see how it takes vista though...
 
JOESKURTU said:
All I ever see are creative cards. Is there anything els out there you guys could order with your next evaluation? Sound seems to have been dropping off the radar in the reviews. It is only mentioned if there is an "issue".

Granted, I know that for most people they will not give a flip what it comes with, but if there are quality differences in onboard/ versus creative xfi / versus brand X we would like to know.
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We've had Auzentech cards in our machines before, but classically, integrators don't offer a lot of choice. We're limited to what we can look at by the options the builders give us. Take a look for yourself. You get onboard or Creative. Occasionally, at a higher-end builder, you get Auzentech, but the only cards we've seen from them are upwards of $200. They've very, very good, though.
 
silkp said:
Thought I should let you know about this...

There is a serious issue going on between Dell, nVidia and Creative. The X-Fi soundcard has the 'pops and crackles' issue that Creative admits exists but blames on nVidia - This reuslts in your game sound crashing out to a high pitched whine or random static.

Dell are aware that it's an issue, they have issued new BIOS patches that have made things worse for most.

This link :

http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=xps_desk_audio&thread.id=572&view=by_date_ascending&page=1

Is a sticky forum thread at the top of the Dell Tech Support Audio forum and goes on for 19 pages of peoples issues.

BUT - They are still selling the same setup.

Like I said, thought you should know. I have one of these machines and I have the issue and on a $5k+ machine it's unacceptable that Dell blames Creative, Creative blames nVidia and nobody is fixing it.

S.
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We had an experience similar to what you mention during our evaluation of the AVADirect Custom SLI system. IIRC, that was the first time we saw it, but swapping the Creative soundcard with one from Auzentech fixed the issue.
 
A lot of extra money for a very complex cooling system which I bet would be out done by a really good fan/heatpipe setup. Honestly.... peltier and water to achieve borderline meltdown temperatures?
 
Jakalwarrior said:
A lot of extra money for a very complex cooling system which I bet would be out done by a really good fan/heatpipe setup. Honestly.... peltier and water to achieve borderline meltdown temperatures?
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I don't think a good HSF would be able to maintain decent temps on an overclocked QX6700.

We've seen dual-core CPUs overclock okay on air-cooling, but still run rather hot. But the quad-core CPU is a different animal entirely, and gets much hotter when overclocked. I can't recall the exact TDPs for the CPUs but I believe the Core 2 Duo is under 80w and the quad-core is around 125w. That's a significant difference.
 
It's been running for over two days now. Five instances of Prime95. No crashes or any trouble. Here are the final temps.

2001781621432653165_rs.jpg
 
I'm curious why they didn't compare build price with AVADirect, [H] Silver Award winner. Also, I was surprised at the mobo chipset and RAM speed...
 
SentToSchool said:
I just PMed my address to you for the machine. I would like you to overnight it also. I don't like waiting so don't keep this reader waiting.

jk.:p


Btw, if Dell was serious about competing with hardcore system builders, they could have at least used better ram than some 667mhz Samsung ram in a 6k system....
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I concur. Also, why an older chipset? Isn't the 570 a bit lacking compared to the 590? And moreso still, isn't it lacking compared to the current 680i? My understanding is that the 590 supports x16 on both PCI-E slots for the video cards, which would mean it wouldn't be a bottleneck (or at least, not as much of one) for a high end card like the 8800GTX. It almost seems like Dell took advantage of their name and the ignorance of PC gamers that don't know their hardware from their hotkeys (and in my opinion, they do not deserve to be called a gamer for that) and just threw out a big shiny figure that'd get them some good margin, based on that ignorance. This isn't to indirectly say "I could build the same deal for cheaper", but it is to say, I don't think the hardware justifies the cost. I may be a bit biased since I build my own computers, but I honestly do feel that Dell could have offered more than this.
 
I've had the sound issue on Vista, but never XP. As far as I knew it was limited to Vista, is that not the case?
 
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