When I was researching this purchase, I found the amount of information on the Internet very lacking (i.e. only coming from Dell). I had a bit of a scare with some of the hardware I bought for the system, but in the end it all turned out well. Here are some things you may not gather very easily on your own.
- While the manual and purchase page say you can only use two HDDs with the onboard SATA controller (despite picturing 4 SATA plugs), you can actually use four. I am currently running the stock 80GB SATA drive as my root/boot partition, and have my important data (databases/website/etc) split across a 250GB RAID1 array.
- This system is bloody loud when it’s powered on. It POSTs with its fans sounding like a jet engine, and quiets down to a freight train during normal operation. I measured it at 60dB SPL from about 2′ away. Don’t sit near this thing for too long, and definitely don’t try to entertain any fantasies of it sitting near your desk. I have it tucked away in the basement (and can still hear it through the heating ducts if the house is sufficiently quiet).
- The case is gigantic. I am just shocked at how deep this case is — 26.55″. You can measure it out and try to get a feel for it, but you just won’t appreciate this fact until you see it in person. This brings me to my next point…
- This server is very heavy. I was totally unaware of what I was getting myself into. My wife said the box was delivered by a very large guy who used a dolly and had to use a special pneumatic lift to get the server off his truck. The shipping weight is 125 lbs, and the tower itself is around 110 lbs. My back wasn’t very happy with me after I lugged this thing across my house and down to the basement all by myself.
- Buy whatever 667MHz FB-DIMMs you can get your hands on, and don’t worry about PC5300 vs PC5400. Everything I’ve read says that there’s really no difference other than testing (PC5400 is tested at a higher clock rate), and despite my ordering PC5400 Crucial RAM, it showed up with PC5300 markings on it in the end. I saved at least $100 by not relying purely on configuration tools that ask you what kind of hardware you’re buying for — clearly there are different price tags to be expected when you’re dealing with actual server hardware. The Mac fanatics should be used to this by now.
- The POST stage takes a very long time. I’m not used to waiting so long to get to the actual boot process. It definitely makes testing my boot scripts a real pain in the butt.
- It’s a lot of hardware for the money. Considering what I got for what I spent, I’m very happy with the purchase. There’s certainly room for upgrades in the future if I require it, and the case/PSU/fans are all top-notch — definitely beyond what I’d be capable of tracking down if I tried to build this myself.
If you are in the market for one of these bad-boys, and have some questions about it, definitely feel free to leave comments here or fire me an email.
March 23rd, 2007 at 9:02 pm
Great info, thank you. Can you make any comments regarding the front LCD and its vaguely eluded to ” user programmability” ?
March 24th, 2007 at 8:49 am
You can set the LCD text in the firmware settings on boot to static text, and also using the OMSA tools found here: http://linux.dell.com/monitoring.shtml
Of course, if you’re planning to use Windows or one of the Dell-supported linux distros, I think the tools are all included.
It’s not a big deal for me, so I just set the static text to the hostname of the machine.
July 12th, 2007 at 2:21 pm
The fans are unbearably loud. I own a PE 1800 and just ordered a PE 1900 for a friend. I was amazed at the difference. My 1800 is loud only for a few seconds when I boot, but it immediately quiets down. The 1900 stays loud forever. I even took out three of the six fans (since the 1900 I ordered only has one cpu and four sticks of ram), but the noise was still unbearable.
To solve the problem, we bought some generic 92 mm fans that connect to the cd-rom (4 pin) power supply (you can use splitters to get as many connectors as you need). I will have to do something to secure the fans since they are much thinner than the fans that came with the 1900. I bought variable speed fans with an internal thermostat so that the computer will cool properly.
Here is a link to the fans we bought, but others should work fine. I am sure there are better fans out there.
Vantec ThermoFlow 92mm Case Fan
http://shop2.outpost.com/product/4728649;jsessionid=rzxC7KV1T5lunwhntJC5mA**.node2?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG
I was concerned that removing all of the fans from the motherboard would cause some problems on booting, but the computer booted fine and did not complain. There is an orange light blinking on the back of the computer, but that is the only thing I noticed. I was concerned that some error message would require user input before booting, which would cause problems if you use a ups and want your computer to automatically reboot after power outages.
October 12th, 2007 at 1:31 pm
I want to say thanks to Richard who posted the last comment here. I used the same solution as him for the server in our office (very low demand on the server) I am using the thermoflow fans from Vantect, however I found them at NewEgg.com for $7.49 a piece.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811999617&Tpk=TF9225
It has greatly reduced the noise coming from the server. I’ve been monitoring the case temperature and it has stayed at 24ยบ C. The fans also have not sped up.
He had mentioned that he had to find a way to secure the fans, when I did was remove the orange brackets from the original fans and snapped in the newer fans. Of course, the new fans are considerably thinner, but they secure properly when snapped into the orange brackets.
May 9th, 2008 at 9:09 am
Did you have linux on it? And have you got the temperature reading?
May 9th, 2008 at 9:09 am
I do have linux on it. But I do not use any of the temperature readings. With fans that loud – I’m pretty confident it’s cool in there… :P
May 12th, 2008 at 9:01 pm
Can someone tell me how many fans I need to buy to replace the loud ones on the PE 1900? My client has been complaining and I want to buy th fans ahead of time and swap out the loud fans all on the same visit.
Thank you.
July 27th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Hi, I’ve purchased a Poweredge 1900 as well because of the features vs. price.
I noticed the same things: huge box and case, huge weight and UNBEARABLE NOISE.
I’m anxious to know if anyone of you running Linux on PE1900 have managed to detect the fan speeds and force them to stay down at as slow speed possible for proper cooling?
I’m actually also propably going to switch all the fans simply because there is no place in this home office where anyone could stand that noise.
To Jen: as you ordered fans from newegg – did you connect the 3pin connector with speed control to the 4pin hotplug connector or just plug it to the back of the dvd drive without speed control?
I hope someone is still reading this thread :-)
August 10th, 2008 at 10:15 am
To anonymous: check out the thread I started in Dell Community forums:
http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board/message?board.id=pes_other&thread.id=21766