Need help configuring a workstation

[qqq]

Scat, everything you said about buying base unit from Dell & then upgrading by buying components elsewhere makes sense from economical point of view.

But, Dell is smarter than all of us.

If you buy additional components somewhere else, you are not covered if something goes wrong & they have a reason to blame on non-dell components.

I really don’t need their 1TG & 2TB SATA HDD but if I don’t order them, I don’t know if I will get the housing adapters for my own HDD or not.

I did research on W-2235 & didn’t find passmark for it, so I took the average of w-2225 & 2245.

But according to your expertise it seems that if the passmatk is not available, something is wrong with that processor? If so I will take w-2245 according to your advice for an extra $ 111.00.

But not being a hardware expert, I rather spend extra $ on Dell parts & have a peace of mind.

I have been dealing with Dell for over 15 years & one thing that lets me sleep better is that I don’t have to worry about my rig. If anything goes wrong. a phone call takes care of it within a day or two & they come with new parts & no monkeying around. I don’t know if any other company like HP or someone else does that. This no way that I am promoting Dell or in any way associated with them but just my own experience. I don’t know how it will workout during the Covid period.

 

[Rheanna Almond]

Hi,

First I am very grateful to all of you who have helped me in past with my Dell T-7500 workstation.

I have been using Dell T-7500 Workstation with following Config for almost 8 years & I was considering buying newer Dell 5820 about 2 years ago but many of you suggested that I really didn’t need it & you were right.

But now I am trying out new charting app & use only tick charts. I frequently require to build a new tick chart of random high tick time frames from a pool of tick data stored in the app & it takes a long time to build a new tick chart & while the app is building a new chart, all activities on all screens stops until the chart is built. The CPU usage shows 50% & RAM 45%.

Here is current rig :

Win-7, Xeon E5645 @2.4 GHz, 12 GB RAM, 3 AMD, FirePro 2460 Graphics Cards supporting 12 Monitors.

I want to now get Dell T-5820 workstation & need help with configuration.

I don’t play any games at all. Mainly charts & streaming videos & regular stuff.

CPU :

I am considering Xeon W-2235 ( 6C, 3.8- 4.6 GHz Turbo, DDR4 2933 )

RAM :

Would 16 GB ECC DDR4 2933 be enough ?

Grahics Cards :

AMD Radeon WX 3200, 4 GB ( 3 of them for 12 Monitors )

Boot Hard Drive :

M.2 256 GB PCIe NVMe Class 40 Solid State Drive

Extra Hard Drives :

2 x 1TB + 3 x 2 TB ( Total 5. All 3.5 inch Sata 7200 RPM )

Question : Would I be able insert & use one of my 3 TB, 3.5 inch HDD in one of the 2 TB bay ?

Does anyone have one of this workstation?

Thank You

At the first question the answer is Yes. I don't have any of this but your workstation would be more future proof with double of RAM memory.

 

[Scataphagos]

If you buy additional components somewhere else, you are not covered if something goes wrong & they have a reason to blame on non-dell components.

That's why you'd "remove components you didn't buy from Dell" before troubleshooting with Dell Technical Support.

I really don’t need their 1TG & 2TB SATA HDD but if I don’t order them, I don’t know if I will get the housing adapters for my own HDD or not.

What do you mean, "housing adapters for your own HDD"?? The rack drive bays can accept either 2.5" or 3.5" drives. No housing adapters(?) needed.

"...But according to your expertise it seems that if the passmatk is not available, something is wrong with that processor? If so I will take w-2245 according to your advice for an extra $ 111.00..."

I doubt there is anything wrong with W-2235. Looks like Intel came out with the W-2225, a 4-core... and the W-2245, and 8-core... then later the W-2235, a 6-core... to "fill in the line up". Seems the upgrade price from a 6C to 8C for only $111 is a good deal. As you know... when you start dialing up performance, the price escalates quickly

 

[Scataphagos]

But according to your expertise it seems that if the passmatk is not available, something is wrong with that processor? If so I will take w-2245 according to your advice for an extra $ 111.00.

Even the 10C, W-2255 seems reasonable @ $105 more than the W-2245. Bumps the Passmark up to 23,000... the "single core" spec is a little higher, too.

A good thing with Dell... you can return your unit within 21 days for a full refund. Should your performance be disappointing, you're covered and can go for an upgraded CPU.

 

[931]

Even the 10C, W-2255 seems reasonable @ $105 more than the W-2245. Bumps the Passmark up to 23,000... the "single core" spec is a little higher, too.

A good thing with Dell... you can return your unit within 21 days for a full refund. Should your performance be disappointing, you're covered and can go for an upgraded CPU.

Only for upgrades or just money back also?

 

[Scataphagos]

Only for upgrades or just money back also?

I know they'll refund the return of a computer within the 21 days. Don't know about separately purchased upgrades... Seems they would, however, consistent with their customer satisfaction policy. I've purchased more than a dozen Dell computers over the years but have never purchased upgrades from them... too expensive. I've returned only one unit within the 21 days.... to buy an upgraded machine.

 

[qqq]

Thank you Scat.
That clears up everything.
Really appreciate it.

 

[Scataphagos]

Thank you Scat.
That clears up everything.
Really appreciate it.

Perhaps the board would like to hear from you when you get your new rig running... to let us know how it performs in your "high demand" task.

 

[931]

to let us know how it performs in your "high demand" task.

Id guess software that you use is brute forcing the tick data to screen.
Otherwise it makes no sense why so powerful machine is needed.


Tick data could be visualized on random old laptop using openGL also. But graphing has no level values atm, because i only care about ratios.

https://www.elitetrader.com/et/threads/iqfeed-vs-polygon-io.320799/page-9

This runs on gtx 550, around decade old entry level GPU.
And the rendering code is not even fully optimized.
It could be at least 50%+ faster.

Time conversions could be done by GPU utilizing 1000+ cores.
GPU memory could be utilized more, com overheads lowered etc.

 

[Scataphagos]

Id guess software that you use is brute forcing the tick data to screen.
Otherwise it makes no sense why so powerful machine is needed.

Correct.

In general, market charting/trading requires low power and minimal graphics.

But when you graph and archive tic data, especially on several/many issues, that's different. The CPU, GPU, RAM, and storage will be humping every second of the day. Not sure how much horsepower it would take to wrangle all of that without backlog delay... probably more than one would think.