This morning Intel officially announced its Core 2 Duo processors , and Dell has provided Gizmodo with a blazing firm Dell Precision Workstation 390 just in time for a Day Zero hand - on recapitulation . At first glance , the political machine does n’t look much unlike from previous Dell Precision Workstations , but inside is a completely different tarradiddle .
Our trial auto ( $ 3893 ) get in fit out far beyond its introductory $ 1050 configuration , powered by the fastest Core 2 Extreme processor , a dual - core 2.93GHz “ Conroe ” splintering . Along for the drive is 2 GB of DDR2 533MHz RAM , a workstation - class NVIDIA PCIe Quadro FX 3500 computer graphic card , and an 80 GB SATAII 7200RPM scheme campaign . Then there ’s a little in high spirits - tech jewel , a Raid-0 regalia with two flyspeck one - inch 146 GB SAS hard drive spin at 15,000RPM , a brand new patch of technology which gave us singular upper test resultant role .
How tight was this devil workstation from Dell ? Find out after the jump .
Do n’t be fooled by that 2.93GHz clock hurrying , because this is the degraded processor we ’ve ever seen here at the Midwest Test Facility . That ’s because these Conroe CPU have an extra speedy front - side bus blueprint , a 4 megabit L2 cache and a 64 - bit dual core group architecture . They ’re just more effective all around , and Intel ’s blather about how they ’re quicker by 50 % or more is not really blather , it ’s all honest .
Along with that efficiency comes tranquil quietude . Dell has always been expert at hushing even its most powerful workstations , and this Precision Workstation 390 is no exception . Of the XII of workstations we ’ve tested here , this one is the hushed , and a few clock time we wonder if it was even running , only confirm such by notice its backlit power clitoris on the front . Yes , this speedster is quiet enough to be in “ church computer mouse ” territory .
Exactly how fast is it ? lease ’s start with that pair of 146 GB SAS ( Serial Attached SCSI ) hard magnetic disc drives . This is the next generation of knockout disk drives , and these 15,000RPM baby lather together in a RAID-0 array add $ 1000 to the terms of this configuration , but showed us astonishing stop number , tipping our phonograph record speed benchmarks at 160 MB per second written material and an even faster read amphetamine of 178 MB per second .
The principal event ? Since this is the workstation - category machine , we ran a suite of benchmarks centralize on Adobe After Effects makeup , and the Dell Precision Workstation 390 shove off the doors off every auto we ’ve ever test using our suite of After Effects benchmark . It lag slightly behind an HP dual effect dual Opteron auto we tested a few month back on CineBench rendering tests , which demonstrate 3 - 500 graphics functioning , but then that three-fold - core threefold Opteron automobile costs $ 1500 more than this one .
Overall , the Dell Precision Workstation 390 performs as advertised , with its Intel Core 2 Extreme 2.93GHz processor deliver speeds on some benchmarks that were nearly twice as degenerate as a dual - core dual - processor Opteron 280 automobile . If you ’re looking for power , efficiency , and quietude , look no further .
Full review[Digital Video Editing ]
Product Page[Dell ]
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