PCIe Bifurcation Frustration with Icy Dock ToughArmor NVMe and 3 PCs

By Scott • 2024-07-28 Computers, Reviews, Videos

Icy Dock ToughArmor Review and PCIe Bifurcation Thumbnail Image

In this video I try to test out the Icy Dock ToughArmor M.2 NVMe Mobile Rack for PCIe slots. It supports 2 removable NVMe drives placed in the included sleds, and (almost) fits an x8 or x16 lane PCIe slot that supports bifurcation to get 4 juicy lanes to each of the SSDs. I test it out with Samsung 990 Pro and Western Digital SN850X 4TB drives. That being said, it turns out that not all bifurcation implementations are created equal, nor are all PCIe slots. Hence the frustrating aspect. Buy it with a generous return policy in place, if you buy it at all. Just to be 100% clear: This is not sponsored in any way. If you couldn’t … Continue reading

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New Home Backup Server (Dell T640 with 18 20TB Disks)

By Scott • 2024-06-13 Computers

HM-BACKUP05 - Cover 01 - 360TB Raw Storage

In this video I create a new backup server from a Dell EMC PowerEdge T640 with 18x 20TB Seagate Exos refurbished drives. Also there’s some more ranting about backups in general. But idk, there are chapters so you can skip to whatever. And it’s not technically a server, in that it doesn’t serve files. It’s really more of a client that takes files from other servers and holds onto them. But I call it a backup server because hardware-wise it’s a server. Anywho, that’s the description. It’s probably not optimal for the YouTube algorithm, but hey, I’m not an influencer even though I have a TikTok account that I don’t use. For posterity, here’s a transcript of the video in … Continue reading

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Can You Put an RTX 4080 in a Dell Workstation? (Precision T7865)

By Scott • 2024-01-05 Computers

Dell Precision 7865 Upgrades - ScottDotDot Cover Image

I just got my most expensive single computer ever. It’s an already-outdated Precision 7865 with an AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 64-core CPU, direct from Dell. RAM upgrades from the manufacturer are always a bit of a rip, so in this video I upgrade it to 512GB. Also, I find out for the first time whether a consumer graphics card (PNY / NVIDIA RTX 4080 16GB) will actually fit inside the moderately-sized chassis. Oh, and fit two Western Digital Black SN850X 4TB SSDs to replace the woeful 256GB el cheapo card that came with the system from Dell. Absolutely nothing in this is a paid ad. It was paid for by my wallet. Buy Dell, HP, Asus, even Razer for all … Continue reading

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Reducing Fan Noise from a Dell PowerEdge R905

By Scott • 2013-06-08 Basement, Computers

If you’ve read my blog, you know that I have a quite a few servers in my basement that I use as a home lab environment. For home or low-demand virtualization, you can’t beat the Dell R905 for price. Consider that, as of the time I’m writing this post, you can get an R905 like I did with 128 GB of RAM for about $960. That’s only a little more than the cost of the RAM! That machine has 4x AMD Opteron 8356 quad-core CPUs @ 2.3Ghz and two built-in 10gbps ethernet ports (plus 2 gigabit ports), a PERC6i controller, dual PSUs, and a full enterprise DRAC. It’s a little old, but you can’t get those specs in any other … Continue reading

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Quieting Dell PowerEdge 1855/1955 Blade System Chassis Fan Noise: Undocumented DRAC/MC Commands

By Scott • 2012-01-06 Basement, Computers

TL;DR: Skip right to the undocumented commands Background I recently purchased a Dell BMX blade chassis on eBay that came loaded with ten 2x dual-core, 24GB PE1955 blades. For a system with 40 cores, 240 GB of RAM and two 16-port gigabit switches in a 7U frame, $2500 was too good to pass up. Especially since shipping cost me a mere 2 hour round-trip to Brooklyn. I didn’t really need ten more servers, so I figured I’d sell off 5 or 6 of them (hopefully breaking even on the entire system — the 4GB FB-DIMMs in 6 of the servers is worth $1450 – $1900 alone). The remaining servers would be all mine! But I forgot to research the noise! … Continue reading

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