Dell T610: Workstation/Encoding rig?

trand0 · January 28, 2020

I dunno if this is the right forum to post this in, but I'm curious if I can use this for anything other than a remote server/remote storage rig.

I have a Dell T610 socket 1366 server currently running:

- Dual Xeon X5550 2.6ghz (3ghz boost) (4 cores 8 threads, 8 cores 16 threads)

- 24gb 1066mhz ECC

- Perc H700 raid setup with 1gb cache

- 1tb 2.5in 5400rpm HDD (Windows 10 Pro) (temporary as I have no HDD's for the raid setup yet)

- 860w proprietary PSU

In its current setup, it's not capable of doing much except for acting as a very limited server. I have a few things in the works, such as a couple Xeon X5672 cpu's coming in (3.2ghz, 3.6ghz boost) which should see a pretty hefty speed increase as well as a few 2tb HDD's down the road when I can get them a little cheaper through work.

In terms of additional upgrades I'm kinda stuck. The mobo only has 5 PCIe x8 Gen 2, lanes 2 of which operate at x8 while the others operate at x4. The manual suggests that the lanes only get supplied with 25w, but what I'm seeing is that that's apparently only a suggestion due to the limited space the chassis has as well as heating concerns, and that they actually get supplied with upwards of 75w. But I have no way of testing that until I get a GPU to try that with. I could upgrade the Mobo to a T710 instead, as they are rather inexpensive and it provides me with a true x16 PCIe lane, but again according to the manual "it only gets 25w". But would a GT 710/GT 730 function fine in this case for a graphics driver for higher resolutions? I'm currently only able to run a 4:3 monitor stably.

On top of that, I've also run a few recording runs using OBS trying to see what some of the results are, and I've only gotten black screens at all resolutions. Though in native 4:3 the load is much lower with no overload, but the video still comes out with a black screen.

So is there anything I can do to make this into more of a workstation? From the few posts I've come across online there is some success, though followups to said posts are pretty few and far between and I can't be certain. If I can do something along those lines I'd love to as I happen to actually have 2 of these and I definitely don't need 2 NAS servers.