Dell Precision 7920 Tower (2020): A Dual-CPU Monster

The Dell Precision 7920 Tower is one of the world’s most powerful desktop workstations. Dell sent it to us in a supercomputer-like configuration with not one but two Intel Xeon Platinum 8260 processors (24 cores and 48 threads each), 96GB of memory, five storage drives, and a 48GB Nvidia Quadro RTX 8000 graphics card.

- CHARLES JEFFRIES

“Specialized” is the word to describe this monster, as its hardware is only as good as the software that can leverage it. Case in point—the Precision 7920 didn’t always excel in our benchmark tests, since most of them don’t scale to use all its hardware. Its heavy lifting potential is best used in data-science and machine learning scenarios where maximum performance and long-term reliability are key, for which the 7920 gets our highest recommendation. In scenarios where only a single CPU is needed, the Dell Precision 5820 is more economical and nearly as expandable, and the HP Z2 Tower G4 can provide a lot of pep in a smaller and even more affordable form factor. But when push comes to shove, the Precision 7920 stands tall as one of the fastest workstations that money— and a lot of it—can buy.

SCALABLE TO THE NINES

The components in our Precision 7920 review unit that contribute the most to its $20,000-plus price are dual 2.4GHz Xeon Platinum 8260 CPUs (a $6,529 uptick over the single base 1.9GHz Xeon Bronze 3204) and the 48GB Quadro RTX 8000 GPU ($4,203 over the base 2GB AMD Radeon Pro WX 2100). Behind those, 96GB of DDR4-2933 error-correcting code (ECC) memory rings up at $1,300, and its storage drives—a single 512GB solid-state drive for Windows 10 Pro for Workstations and four 4TB, 3.5-inch SATA hard drives for data—add about the same. The hard drives are configured in a RAID 10 array via a MegaRAID SAS 9460-16i storage controller, which adds another $411. A three-year warranty with onsite service is standard fare, though I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the available five-year warranty for a machine this expensive.