Dell Precision T3600 Review: Dell's New Enterprise
by Dustin Sklavos on April 23, 2012 7:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
- Dell
- Precision
- Workstation
- Maximus
Heat, Noise, and Power Consumption
Since we already addressed build quality previously when discussing the entire new Precision line-up, now we can see if the claims of both silence and improved thermal performance really hold up with Dell's Precision T3600.
As far as noise goes, the T3600 remains whisper quiet at idle and only really kicks up under extreme load. Even then, the fan noise is a very low rush that still remains below 40dB. Dell's guests spoke about how quiet the top of the line T7600 workstation was, but the T3600 is pretty stellar on its own.
Thermally, though, there's a minor cost. It's clear Dell tuned the T3600 for silence rather than thermals, and while the heat isn't terrible (and is in fact well within spec), it's not perfect either. With that said, Dell's cooling system also seems to have a decent amount of headroom to it given how quietly it runs at these temperatures, so having a series of workstations rack-mounted probably won't be an issue so long as their exhausts aren't blocked.
Finally, as the most powerful desktop workstation we've tested and the first one running enterprise-class Sandy Bridge-E hardware, the T3600 winds up pulling the most power from the wall. In perspective, however, the 97 watts of idle draw and 262 watts of full load power are still nowhere near what an enthusiast-class gaming system can pull. Despite the combined rated TDP of 272 watts (130W on the CPU and 142W on the GPU), the T3600 draws just 10 watts shy of that under stress.
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ggathagan - Tuesday, April 24, 2012 - link
Dustin,I realize this is a preview, but was RMT demonstrated to you, or did Dell simply describe its operation to you?
If you are able to do a full review in the future, that would be one of the 1st things I would want to see tested.
Doberman777 - Friday, April 27, 2012 - link
Hmm, I'm reading that the new Mercury Playback Engine in Adobe CS6 apps dumps the use of CUDA in favor of OpenGL/OpenCL, whereas the NVIDIA website is claiming that their Quadro cards with CUDA further enhance performance. Which is correct, and in view of this, I'm really confused about choosing a new graphics adapter for CS6 apps.Hansz - Friday, July 6, 2012 - link
Our t3600 appears to have only 2 working SATA ports onboard (SATA0+SATA1). There are 4 more Sata ports which are labeled HDD0 - HDD3 but they dont appear to work. Those HHD ports cannot be seen or activated in BIOS. Some PCI-E controller has been added by Dell which allows more than 2 drives. However it would be nice to be able to use more than 2 onboard SATA ports.So what's up, did Dell decide to disable the additional ports because of some problems?
Also the BIOS info about 3x HDD Fans is a bit confusing as there do not seem to be any HDD fans.. there are 3x system fans..
Mafeer - Thursday, February 7, 2013 - link
Hai,how is this system for working auto desk 2013 products like auto cad, 3ds max and maya rendering. our main purpose is rendering 3ds max and maya.
below the specs which i received from one of my vendor, could any evaluate this,
Model – Del™ Precision™ T3600
Base – Standard 635W Base
Processor – Intel® Xeon® Processor E5-1620 (Quad Core, 3.60GHz Turbo, 10MB)
Memory – 16 GB
HDD – 1 TB
Graphics – 2 GB NVIDIA Quadro 4000 (2DP & 1DVI-I) (1DP-DVI & 1DVI-VGA adapter)
Operating system – Windows 7 Professional (64Bit) English
Thanks
Caryn - Thursday, May 30, 2013 - link
Curious if this would be a good computer for me to do my Photoshop (PSE9) and my husband to do his gaming (WOW, etc) ?? I have an older Dell and its been a great computer but having a hard time handling what we are making it do these days. Looking for a new yet not so expensive system and trying to compare. Advice appreciated :) Thanks!!Chris Rodinis - Thursday, June 27, 2013 - link
Here is an overview of the T3600: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99VvEY58m9g