Dell Optiplex 790 MT - Ebay

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Guarana [BAWLS]

[H]ard|Gawd
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Cheap boxes that can be solid moderately beefed up machines. Put in a reasonable Video Card + SSD and they'll run pretty damned well still. (As shown by the 7700k vs 2600k shootout)

I'm not linking to a specific seller because there's a lot up there right now.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...90+MT.TRS0&_nkw=Dell+Optiplex+790+MT&_sacat=0

They have
Quad-Core i5 2400's
4-8GB RAM (With 4 RAM slots on the board)
Various HDDs
Win7 Pro COA Stickers

You can find plenty of pricing for sub 150$ shipped for a solid machine.

They can run better video cards, too, as shown here:
 
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Yeah, you're going to see alot of Sandy/Ivy Era go up shortly. They're running into their 5 year lease cycle. Should be dirty cheap for family and low budget gaming boxes.
 
I literally just finished walking this path for my htpc. Optiplex 7010, half height case. Swapped out the stock i3 for a 3770 I bought here on the forum, dropped in an extra 4gb stick of ram I had laying around, migrated the os to a budget 500gb ssd, and added a half height 1050 ti. This thing is awesome and games like a monster at 1080p on my new TV. Some games even run at fine settings at native 4k. For the size of the box, it's amazing.
 
Looks like you copied much of my post from GenMay.. I just got through building mine out this week and it is a sweet rig for my daughter.
 
Makes really nice powerful ready to go PLEX server as well.
 
None of those are very hot deals though. I got my kids an HP 8200 CMT i5-2400 for $125 about a year ago. eBay 4runnerrecycling
 
LightningCrash said:
None of those are very hot deals though. I got my kids an HP 8200 CMT i5-2400 for $125 about a year ago. eBay 4runnerrecycling
Click to expand...

I got my Optiplex 790 with 8gb (2x4), i5 2400, DVD, Win 7 COA, NO HDD (already have several extras and an SSD) all in very good condition for $105 shipped after $15 off of $75 coupon.. It was packaged very well. Sometimes you have to look / wait for the deals on Ebay..

Here is the listing I bought from. Notice they had the processor listed wrong, so maybe some people thought it was an i3, so thus I got a good deal.. Good Seller by the way:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/132054554423?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT
 
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Thanks for confirming. Funny how Dell went back to proprietary when Michael Dell came back. Actually, not funny. Annoying.
 
I scored one of those from work a while back. Upgraded my parents old C2D machine with it. Dropped in a 120GB SSD and a 500GB WD drive for picture storage.
 
I picked up an Optiplex 9020 for my brother in law which had a 4770, 16gb, 120GB SSD, 500GB HDD, and dual AMD cards made for crossfire + 2x 21" Dell Ultrasharps with a soundbar for around $300. It was the SFF model. I'll say this, it was actually VERY quick and quiet. Made me want one to use as a 2nd machine instead of my 10 core Xeon, 16GB, GTX 960 4GB, system.

These dells were actually pretty nice.
 
Since you can't OC them, no point in getting any of the 'K' chips for ANY of these pre-built systems.

What I'm looking at is something like the Dell T3600 or HP Z420 because you can get the E5 1620 Xeon (which fits between a 2600 and 2700 at stock clocks) and you don't need to upgrade the PSU. Both of these models have optional 620-640W PSU's. And you get virtualization tech, in case you want to run some VM's on them. Many of them also come with 16GB of RAM so no need to add more (which is nice since they want ECC).

But you also end up paying a little more for this than just the regular desktops - in the ~$300 range for Buy-It-Now.
 
CombatChrisNC said:
Since you can't OC them, no point in getting any of the 'K' chips for ANY of these pre-built systems.

What I'm looking at is something like the Dell T3600 or HP Z420 because you can get the E5 1620 Xeon (which fits between a 2600 and 2700 at stock clocks) and you don't need to upgrade the PSU. Both of these models have optional 620-640W PSU's. And you get virtualization tech, in case you want to run some VM's on them. Many of them also come with 16GB of RAM so no need to add more (which is nice since they want ECC).

But you also end up paying a little more for this than just the regular desktops - in the ~$300 range for Buy-It-Now.
Click to expand...

You can overclock the 1366 e5 16xx CPU like a boss though. I recently picked up a 1650 for $89 to upgrade my wife's computer to an x79 setup. I already had a spare MB, so all I had to get was the CPU and RAM. Did a quick OC to 4Ghz and will OC more if/when it needs it.
 
I'm still rocking an i5-2400 and a 970 in my HTPC. Solid little chip. Handles 1080p 60hz gaming just fine. It's about to get the boot in a month or so but that era is still going strong.
 
CombatChrisNC said:
Since you can't OC them, no point in getting any of the 'K' chips for ANY of these pre-built systems.

What I'm looking at is something like the Dell T3600 or HP Z420 because you can get the E5 1620 Xeon (which fits between a 2600 and 2700 at stock clocks) and you don't need to upgrade the PSU. Both of these models have optional 620-640W PSU's. And you get virtualization tech, in case you want to run some VM's on them. Many of them also come with 16GB of RAM so no need to add more (which is nice since they want ECC).

But you also end up paying a little more for this than just the regular desktops - in the ~$300 range for Buy-It-Now.
Click to expand...

I much prefer the non-k chips as back then the k chips had less features. Which virtualization feature do you mean? I think pretty much all of those had "vt-x". non- also had (IIRC) "vt-d" and the E5's have SR-IOV.

ecc reg ram for the e5's is SUPER cheap. I think a few months ago I picked up 32GB for $40 shipped...
 
Does modifying the Optiplex (adding more RAM, for example) void the 3-year warranty? That is the most attractive part of these units, for me.
 
cyclone3d said:
You can overclock the 1366 e5 16xx CPU like a boss though. I recently picked up a 1650 for $89 to upgrade my wife's computer to an x79 setup. I already had a spare MB, so all I had to get was the CPU and RAM. Did a quick OC to 4Ghz and will OC more if/when it needs it.
Click to expand...


We're talking about Dell Optiplex systems here, there are no overclocking options without replacing the motherboard.
 
Dew said:
We're talking about Dell Optiplex systems here, there are no overclocking options without replacing the motherboard.
Click to expand...

Not to mention he's got the socket wrong too. LGA-2011-1 E5-16X0 does have multiplier overclocking, so it could be done with software even on a mobo that doesn't support overclocking normally. Just adjust Turbo bins.

All irrelevant though. This is a LGA 1155 board, it'll take E3 Xeons, not E5's. No E3's have unlocked multipliers to my knowledge, maybe a handful of ES chips, but that's about it.

Like I said originally, good for family machines and can be made into pretty decent gaming machines with a power supply and a video card.
 
Thanks op. I ordered one with the i7 2600 and 8 gig of ram for 169.00. Shipping was a bit high but still came up to less than 200.00. I have a ssd that I will put in and give it to a family member that desperately needs a computer. We have these at work and there decent little computers. Nothing fancy but they get the job done.
 
So I've been digging around on eBay, and don't just look for 790s! The 990s are just as good, and they have an extra 6gb/sec SATA port over the 790s

Been searching on this:
Code: 
optiplex (790,990) (i5,i7) -(sff,usff)

You can't exclude "desktop" because a lot of people seem to refer to the MT as desktop :/
 
If you like the BTX setup, then the Optiplex 780 is the last of the breed, with pretty much the same specs as the 790/990 except they can only take a single slot video card, or a dual slot card that only uses 1 case slot, like a single slot 750 TI or Zotac 1050/TI Mini
 
matt167 said:
If you like the BTX setup, then the Optiplex 780 is the last of the breed, with pretty much the same specs as the 790/990 except they can only take a single slot video card, or a dual slot card that only uses 1 case slot, like a single slot 750 TI or Zotac 1050/TI Mini
Click to expand...

The Optiplex 780 is a 775 platform, best you can put in is a Q9650 (don't know if you could pin mod a 771 chip for these)
 
CombatChrisNC said:
Since you can't OC them, no point in getting any of the 'K' chips for ANY of these pre-built systems.

What I'm looking at is something like the Dell T3600 or HP Z420 because you can get the E5 1620 Xeon (which fits between a 2600 and 2700 at stock clocks) and you don't need to upgrade the PSU. Both of these models have optional 620-640W PSU's. And you get virtualization tech, in case you want to run some VM's on them. Many of them also come with 16GB of RAM so no need to add more (which is nice since they want ECC).

But you also end up paying a little more for this than just the regular desktops - in the ~$300 range for Buy-It-Now.
Click to expand...
I agree with this. I've seen a number of relatively cheap T3600s pop up over the past year, though they're generally going to cost a little more than the Optiplexes, though if you're upgrading it to be a basic gaming rig, the 635W 80+ Gold rated power supplies should be sufficient, and narrow the price gap. One slight downside is that they're fairly big compared to the Optiplexes. Every once in awhile, you get miss out on deals like this. I (accidentally) bought a T3600 last year for about $225 that I haven't decided what route I'm going to go with it, whether it's E5-1650 or E5-2670.

Ever since people started to make those videos on how to make budget gaming rigs with these old Optiplexes, their prices have been going up in general. I feel like they were cheaper for the same configurations than they are now. If memory serves me correctly, I think I used to see Optiplexes with Ivy Bridge i5's (usually the i5-3470 or i5-3570) and 8GB of RAM in the $120-150 range for buy it nows earlier last year. Those prices then crept up to more like $175-200 mid year. Dellrefurbished prices are typically higher, even with coupon, than many eBay prices, and if I was able to pick up an Optiplex 7010 with an i7-3770S, 8GB of RAM, and a 128GB SSD for about $200 or a Precision T1650 with an E3-1280 V2, 16GB or RAM, and 1TB HDD for like $250 last year from dellrefurbished, I feel like Sandy Bridge i5 systems on eBay should be much cheaper than they are.
 
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Jorona said:
Not to mention he's got the socket wrong too. LGA-2011-1 E5-16X0 does have multiplier overclocking, so it could be done with software even on a mobo that doesn't support overclocking normally. Just adjust Turbo bins.

All irrelevant though. This is a LGA 1155 board, it'll take E3 Xeons, not E5's. No E3's have unlocked multipliers to my knowledge, maybe a handful of ES chips, but that's about it.

Like I said originally, good for family machines and can be made into pretty decent gaming machines with a power supply and a video card.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I meant LGA 2011, which is what the T3600 has and what I was replying to.
 
I know I just realized I put 780 in there. Meant 980, which has an 1155 board in a btx format.

Fwiw, the 775 optiplex can use 775 x3 xeons. X5 771 will not work even with adapter
 
What form factor is the optiplex 990 MT? I'm wondering if parts can be swapped into a modern mATX case, also wondering if the board has standard socket mounting in case you want to put
a better HSF in there
 
I see a BIN auction for a "Dell Optiplex 790 Desktop PC Core i5-2500 3.30GHz 4GB RAM No Hard Drive" for $106.19/shipped. Says it comes with HD caddy as well, just toss in HD + OS. That a good price for a i5?
 
You likely can swap the board to a standard case, however the IO Plates are usually not swappable, so you won't have one in a new case.

Most of them have standard mounting brackets, yes.

ir0nw0lf - yes
 
ir0nw0lf said:
I see a BIN auction for a "Dell Optiplex 790 Desktop PC Core i5-2500 3.30GHz 4GB RAM No Hard Drive" for $106.19/shipped. Says it comes with HD caddy as well, just toss in HD + OS. That a good price for a i5?
Click to expand...

Desktop likely means low profile graphics only. It ALSO means that you can only do ~35W through the PCIe slot - check Dell's specs on that. Only the MT (Mid Tower) will allow a full 75W through the slot.
 
CombatChrisNC said:
Desktop likely means low profile graphics only. It ALSO means that you can only do ~35W through the PCIe slot - check Dell's specs on that. Only the MT (Mid Tower) will allow a full 75W through the slot.
Click to expand...

I have an Optiplex 7010 desktop (only allows half height cards) but it's powering a 1050ti (75w I believe) with no problems.
 
[L]imey said:
I have an Optiplex 7010 desktop (only allows half height cards) but it's powering a 1050ti (75w I believe) with no problems.
Click to expand...

Well that's great. Good to know. I was worried because I had read it somewhere.

http://clascsg.uconn.edu/download/specs/O790.pdf

Page 19, but I'm wrong because it's got limited power for both DT and MT. I haven't looked at the 7010's though, but if yours is working, it's working.
 
I heard the same, but it was supposedly only about the SFF and USFF because they use ITX boards and the Desktop and Mid Tower use MATX. But I forget where I read it. (that was specifically for the 7010 though, so YMMV on the 790's from ebay)
 
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