Tom's Hardware > All Reviews > Solutions > Desktops > Dell's XPS 710 H2C Hot and Cool

Dell's XPS 710 H2C Hot and Cool

02:09 - Wednesday 23 May 2007 by Thomas Soderstrom

1. Dell Takes On Subsidiary Alienware? Not Really!
2. Beauty That's More Than Skin Deep
3. Visual And Audible Immersion
4. All Else Considered
5. Test Setup

Dell is going to extremes to shed its reputation as a "dull" office system supplier, and wants to include gaming enthusiasts in its target market. But before you say "aren't they already doing that through their ownership of Alienware," take a glance at the strikingly different case design:

Gaming has matured, and with it so has a large chunk of the game system market. Dell realizes that gamers span several demographics, and its XPS 710 obviously is aimed at a gaming crowd with aesthetic tastes more refined than those of people who get excited by a "plastic alien face" case. The aluminium exterior with "piano black" finish looks better suited to an oak-trimmed office than a college dorm.

It's well understood that experienced gamers will not accept any system at face value, so let's see if the XPS 710 H2C Edition has guts that go beyond its glory!

Dell XPS 710 H2C Edition System Configuration
Hardware
Processor	Intel® CoreTM 2 Extreme quad-core processor QX6800 2.93 GHz at 3.73 GHz, 1066 MHz FSB, 2x 4 MB cache
Motherboard	Dell XPS710, BIOS: Phoenix A00 (05/03/07) nVidia 680i SLI chipset
Memory	4x Corsair Dominator CM2X1024-8500C5D PC2-8500 4x 1024 MB, Overclocked 1066MHz, CAS 5-5-5-15
System Hard Drives	2x WDC WD1600ADFD-75NLR1 RAID 0 160 GB, 10,000 RPM, 16 MB Cache, SATA 1.5 Gb/s
Storage Hard Drive	1x Hitachi HDS721010KLA 1 TB, 7200 RPM, 32 MB Cache, SATA 3 Gb/s
CPU Cooling System	H2C Ceramic Liquid Cooling
Floppy Drive	13-in-1 media card reader
Optical Drives	LG GSA-H31N 16x Double-Layer 16x DVD+/-RW PHILIPS BD-RE BDD1001 Blu-Ray Disk Writer
Case	10-bay Aluminium BTX tower case
Expansion Slots	2x PCIe x16, 1x PCIe x8, 3x PCI, 1x PCIe x1
Front Panel Ports	2x USB 2.0, 1x IEEE-1394 FireWire, Headphone/Mic
Rear Panel Ports	5x USB 2.0, 1x IEEE-1394 FireWire, PS/2, Network
Graphics Cards	2x nVidia GeForce 8800 Ultra 612 MHz GPU, 768 MB RAM (1080 MHz)
Physics Processor	Ageia PhysX, driver 1.0.6.0
Network	Broadcom NetXtreme 57xx Gigabit Controller
8-Channel Audio	Sound Blaster® X-FiTM XtremeMusic Sound Card
Power Supply	1000W 5-Rail Power SLI/CrossFire Compatible
Software
Operating System	Microsoft Windows XP Pro 5.1.2600 (32-bit) Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit)
DirectX Version	9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
Platform Driver	Intel 6.0.6000.16386
Graphics Driver	7.15.11.5824 - nVIDIA ForceWare 97.94