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New Precision T7600 and Windows 8 compatibility - IT'S A NIGHMARE
Hi,
I wonder whether there are any users out there who - despite the alledged incompatibility - have installed Windows 8 on their new Precision workstation (T7600, T5600, T3600).
I find it ridiculous that even almost a full year after Windows 8 was RTM, Dell's top-of-the-line, highest-end, most expensive desktop workstations still do not support it. Which Dell manager in their right mind expects us to pay north of $8000 (in many cases, even more) for a box that does not even support the latest operating system? Let alone, making much of the system configuration obsolete (for example, Windows 7 limits RAM to 192 GB).
The Windows 8 successor, Blue, is almost at our doors (of course, no word from Dell whether that one will be supported, but I guess not).
On the other hand, the last-generation Precisions (T7500, T5500, T3500) all work perfectly with Windows 8 - but then, Dell does not sell those anymore!
I am writing this from a two-year old Precision T7500 with eight screens and 96 GB memory - AND WINDOWS 8 PRO x64. Works like a charm! So why can't Dell make that happen with the new T7600, too??
We need another dozen workstations right now and the first time in many years I am forced to consider workstations from Dell's competitors.
It makes very little to NO SENSE, as Windows 8 especially is MUCH, MUCH better designed under the hood then Windows 7 (let alone XP), when it comes to handling multiple graphic adapters and many monitors (which most Precision operators will have) and also when it comes to large amounts of RAM: Windows 7 only supports up to 192 GB RAM, while Dell sells the T7600 with up to 512 GB (which ONLY Windows 8 supports!!!).
Of course, most of our Vostro systems for the office types have been running Windows 8 out of the box for months, fully supported by Dell. Think about that: I can get a $400 Vostro for my secretary with Windows 8, but my new $8000 Precision, at the cost of 20 Vostros, would HAVE TO run with a four year old operating system that artificially limits my memory to more than half of what the mainboard actually supports. It blows your mind.
I have found three long, distressed reports on the internet about people struggling with Windows 8 and Precision T7600 compatibility (or T3600 in one instance), receiving absolutely no help from Dell in their struggle. One guy bought a T7600 with 256 GB RAM and was only told to "remove and plugin the power cord" when he repeatedly received blue screens in Windows 8. He eventually ordered two AMD FirePros from Amazon (Dell would not even try another graphics card then nVidia) and got W8 to work this way. It's mind-boggling.
From what I have gathered in my research, there are two problem areas with the new Precisions and Windows 8:
- Hibernation / Sleep will likely not work or lead to blue screens
- Nvidia Quadro graphic cards lead to intermittent black screens, but AMD's cards seem to work fine.
Are you aware of anything else that I would have to live with or take into account?
What do you think? If I forego the hibernation feature (useless as it probably would be anyway with 256 GB RAM) and select an AMD card (even though I really prefer nVidia), should I take the plunge?
We had probably more than three hundred Precision Workstations in operation over the last decade, beginning with the Precision 330 back in the day (must have been around 2001) - and this is the first time we are actually considering SWITCHING to HP or Lenovo. It's a real pity!
I hope to see any insights or tips from fellow Precision users. Maybe a Dell evangelist can even chime in and provide some helpful insight.
Cheers,
Mike
[Poll]
renderfarmer
19 Posts
0
May 16th, 2013 07:00
I installed Win8 just as soon as I got my T7600 about a month ago and I was getting hourly BSODs... Mine were mostly SATA related faults.I personally don't think the fault lies squarely on Dell but with Dell, MS and Intel. You mention that you have lots of other machines that run Win8 out of the box, are any of them dual LGA2011?
I've read many reports of dual socket LGA2011 systems from several manufacturers not working well with latest gen Quadros/GeForce cards, as well as having Win8 compatibility issues.
PaulT2013
20 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 05:00
Hi Mike,
I am not sure what are the exact specs of the Precision T7600 you had to deal with, but I have been using Win 8 Pro with our T7600 almost since it was release and everything is fine.
I did have my share of Blue Screen of Death initially, which I tracked down to the C-State being enabled in the BIOS. The workaround was to set the C-STATE to DISABLED. This has been resolved in subsequent bios updates.
Make sure your BIOS is on version 07 and you should be able to turn your C-State back on without having a BSOD. Same with regards to the drivers. Make sure you have the latest driver and system updates applied.
One thing I always clean install big OS updates Win7 -> Win8, that way things tend to go much smoother.
Here are my basic specs:
Precision T7600
1 x Intel Xeon Processor E5-2680 (Eight Core, 2.70GHz Turbo, 20MB, 8.0 GT/s)
32GB (4x8GB) DDR3 RDIMM Memory, 1600MHz, ECC
PERC H310 RAID Controller, T7600
2.5" SATA/SSD BOOT, plus 1- 3 x 2.5" or 3.5" additional SATA HDD
256GB 2.5'' SATA3 Solid State Drive
2nd 2TB 7200RPM 3.5'' 512e/4K Hard Drive
Raid Type : Non RAID
Graphics : 2GB nVIDIA Quadro 4000 Dual Monitor 2DP and 1DVI Dell(TM) Precision TX600
1300W Power Supply
I run the all of the Adobe application Audio, Video, Design, Web development, 3D Lightwave, Office 2013/Office 365, Virtual Machines....etc. I don't have any issues so far with anything. Let me know if there is a particular software that is not playing ball for you.
I forgot one thing that is bothering me, is the PERC H310 RAID Controller. It is messing with the speed of the SSD as it doesn't have a proper pass-through option. Allegedly it also stops the TRIM function on SSDs. The SAS0 and SAS1 connectors on the motherboard are disabled ????? And it look like that both the SATA0 and SATA1 on the motherboard only go up to 3GB/s????? I was going to connect the SSD to the SATA0 connectors directly on the motherboard but at 3GB/s that would not make any sense.
Personally Dell should have made the PERC H710P part of the standard configuration, as that is a "proper" RAID cad that also supports/takes advantage of the speed that SSDs provide.
Other than the RAID controller/SATA speed design blip I had so far a very smooth ride.
I hope the information above was useful.
Kind regards,
Paul
renderfarmer
19 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 06:00
As for the H310; Dell needed a means of connecting up to 8 SATA drives @6gbps in the T7600 and the C600 platform only has 2 native ports - I don't know why they chose to disable them but it may have been to free up PCIe lanes for other uses. The H710P is definitely more capable but it wouldn't add TRIM support, and it would add to the base price of the system.
It's a mixed bag for sure.
renderfarmer
19 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 06:00
Thanks Paul, that was very helpful. Did you leave the default Win8 drivers on or did you update the chipset and sata drivers from the intel website?
PaulT2013
20 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 08:00
When we buy a premium product we expects the best in class especially at these prices.
I agree with you the H310 is a bare essentials RAID controller with 8 x 6GB/s connectors to compensate for the disabled/slow speed ports on the main board.
Even if there was an option to at least connect the OS SSD to SATA0 to get the full speed and TRIM. Unfortunately the 3GB/s SATA port speed flushes that one down the drain.
Check out this video showing the benchmark difference on a T3600, internal SATA vs PERC H310.
I am guessing as you said that on the T7600 Dell disabled slowed down the motherboard connections for PCIe lane or something similar.
PaulT2013
20 Posts
1
May 26th, 2013 08:00
Hi RenderFarmer,
In general I try and keep to the Dell drivers if they are up to date, just in case they were customised by Dell in some way. The Intel drivers don't tend to change so much, but with nVIDIA Quadro drivers I tend to install the latest version from the nVIDIA site until Dell updates their version.
I sometimes install drivers other than Dell's own if there is a conflict/issue/BSOD and there are never version from the original vendors.
The only thing I can't really comment is issues with dual CPU system and Windows 8 as mine has only one.
Again as I mentioned before, I would reset everything to default like BIOS..etc. and do a clean install from scratch.
PaulT2013
20 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 09:00
I have actually updated the PERC H310 to the latest Dell firmware. That was fun as the 64bit updater doesn't run on a 64bit system???? So I had to install the management application which is a kind of webby interface for the RAID card. This allows you to upload the new firmware. It didn't make any difference in my case.
renderfarmer
19 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 09:00
I wasn't aware that there are official Dell Win8 drivers available. That's why I asked. In Win7 I stick to Dell's stuff except for Nvidia.
Ah, yeah, the dual CPU factor may be the clincher... I updated to A07 but I think I'll wait for official support from Dell before I make the switch on my Dual Proc T7600.
I agree. It's disappointing but we don't know what we're gaining from the trade-off. I wish Dell released an updated firmware for the H310 to see if that improves thing. Maybe worth looking into cross flashing it with the correct LSI firmware. I know some OEM LSI cards can do that.
PaulT2013
20 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 09:00
You are correct there are no Dell Win 8 drivers. I am using Win 7 64bit drivers.
You can try what I have done and that is Windows 7 allows you to boot from a VHD, effectively you would create a dual boot system running Windows 7 standard and Windows 8 from the VHD.
That way you can test the waters before hand. I was running for the first few months like that. Once everything was sorted out I clean installed Windows 8 Pro directly on the drive itself.
Using VHD Boot you can play with Win 8 and if it gives you any trouble, simply detach the VHD in Disk Management and delete the VHD, end of story.
I found a nice and simple step by step instruction see below:
How to Create Windows 8 VHD for Boot to VHD using simple, easy to follow steps.
blogs.technet.com/.../how-to-create-windows-8-vhd-for-boot-to-vhd-using-simple-easy-to-follow-steps.aspx
In fact VHDs are great for testing things out without messing up your current setup.
I do hope that now that Windows 8.1 is nearly out that we will get the official Windows 8 Dell drivers. One can only hope.
:)
PaulT2013
20 Posts
0
May 26th, 2013 09:00
Here is the info on How to remove the Windows 8 VHD from the Dual Boot menu.
www.techrepublic.com/.../6571
skinnafrog
1 Message
0
June 14th, 2013 17:00
We have a Precision T7600 at work that's been running just fine with Windows 8 Pro x64 for about 6 months. No issues at all. It does only have one (6-core Xeon) CPU installed, though, so it may be the dual-CPU that's tripping you. I've just ordered a T7600 for myself today and intend to install Win8 x64 on this also, so hopefully that runs just as smoothly.
Yob
16 Posts
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July 18th, 2013 12:00
Dear PaulT2013,
Could you pease provide us more information ...
Yob
16 Posts
0
July 18th, 2013 12:00
Hello everybody,
I just paid last week and I should recieve my dell workstaion in two weeks. I really got scared and angry when I heard that we cannot install Windows 8 on this machine but after I read your comments and got even more confused. So can we install Windows 8 or we cannot ? In addition, if I want to istall Windows server 2012, is that possible ?
Best regards
renderfarmer
19 Posts
0
July 18th, 2013 13:00
It appears that those machines that have only 1 CPU installed have no problems with Windows 8. But those that have both CPUs installed can't run Windows 8 for more than a few hours before Blue screen crashes happen.
Yob
16 Posts
0
July 18th, 2013 14:00
I am going to recieve Dell t7600 with the following configurtion:
Two Intel Xeon Processor E5-2620 (Six Core, 2.00GHz Turbo, 15MB, 7.2 GT/s)
1 Memory : 32GB (4x8GB) 1600MHz DDR3 ECC RDIMM
1 Hard Drive : 256GB 2.5inch Serial ATA Solid State Drive
1 Additional Hard Drive : 500GB 2.5inch Serial ATA (7.200 Rpm) Hard Drive
1 Contrôleur de disque dur : Requis pour la configuration du contrôleur PERC
1 HDD Controller : PERC H310 SATA/SAS Controller for Dell Precision
1 C6 2.5inch SATA / SSD BOOT, plus 1 additional SATA HDD
1 Lecteur optique : 8X Slimline DVD+/-RW Lecteur
1 3Go NVIDIA Quadro K4000 (2DP et 1DVI-I) (adaptateur 2DP-DVI et 1DVI-VGA)
I would like to create Windows 2012 VHD for Boot to VHD . Is this possible ?
I cannot understand why there is an issue of installing Windows 8?