Memory configuration for dual CPU T7500

I am a bit confused by the documentation for my new T7500.


From:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...em.htm#configs

====beg quote====
Dual CPU configurations (6 DIMM slots on MB plus 6 DIMM slots on Riser)

* If configuration contains DIMMs of all the same size, populate in
the following order: MB_DIMM1, Riser_DIMM1, MB_DIMM2, Riser_DIMM2,
MB_DIMM3, Riser_DIMM3, MB_DIMM4, Riser_DIMM4, MB_DIMM5,
Riser_DIMM5, MB_DIMM6, Riser_DIMM6.
* If configuration contains DIMMs of mixed sizes, populate the
larger DIMMs in the dual-processor riser.

=====end quote=======

I got my system with 2gig installed(two rdimms), presumably in:

MB_DIMM1 and Riser_DIMM1

I am adding two 4gig Crucial rdimms.

Should I put both in the riser as the 2nd point seems to indicate?
Or 4 in MB1, 1 in MB2 and 4 in R1 and 1 in R2?

Some of the wording on the documentation seems to indicate that the
MB memory is for CPU1 and Riser memory is for CPU2 (both are quad cores,
but that probably does not matter).

Thanks in advance,


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

wrote in message
...

I am a bit confused by the documentation for my new T7500.


From:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...em.htm#configs

====beg quote====
Dual CPU configurations (6 DIMM slots on MB plus 6 DIMM slots on Riser)

* If configuration contains DIMMs of all the same size, populate in
the following order: MB_DIMM1, Riser_DIMM1, MB_DIMM2, Riser_DIMM2,
MB_DIMM3, Riser_DIMM3, MB_DIMM4, Riser_DIMM4, MB_DIMM5,
Riser_DIMM5, MB_DIMM6, Riser_DIMM6.
* If configuration contains DIMMs of mixed sizes, populate the
larger DIMMs in the dual-processor riser.

=====end quote=======

I got my system with 2gig installed(two rdimms), presumably in:

MB_DIMM1 and Riser_DIMM1

I am adding two 4gig Crucial rdimms.

Should I put both in the riser as the 2nd point seems to indicate?
Or 4 in MB1, 1 in MB2 and 4 in R1 and 1 in R2?

Some of the wording on the documentation seems to indicate that the
MB memory is for CPU1 and Riser memory is for CPU2 (both are quad cores,
but that probably does not matter).

Thanks in advance,


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

Andrew,



Congrats on your new behemoth, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. Glad to see all
the caddies came too ;-))



I had a similar dilemma and came to the conclusion that if the DIMMs are of
unequal size, then the largest should go on the riser card. But I cheated
and bought 3 larger, but equal sized DIMMS and replaced them in the slots
that were already populated. I will put the smaller ones back in at some
point so I anticipate putting the smaller ones on the MB and the larger ones
on the riser card.

Mine was originally populated with Hynix memory, so I did a search on
Crucial for some of a greater capacity but same spec, i.e. same CAS, ECC,
Buffered and same speed. They work fine so far!

A word of caution if/when taking out the riser card - although it comes out
easily, be sure you reconnect everything when you replace it (on board fan
connector and MB connector I think I removed, but it's in the manual). It's
easy to forget one!



Cheers,



JR

"me" writes:


Congrats on your new behemoth, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. Glad to see all
the caddies came too ;-))



I had a similar dilemma and came to the conclusion that if the DIMMs are of
unequal size, then the largest should go on the riser card. But I cheated
and bought 3 larger, but equal sized DIMMS and replaced them in the slots
that were already populated. I will put the smaller ones back in at some
point so I anticipate putting the smaller ones on the MB and the larger ones
on the riser card.

Mine was originally populated with Hynix memory, so I did a search on
Crucial for some of a greater capacity but same spec, i.e. same CAS, ECC,
Buffered and same speed. They work fine so far!

A word of caution if/when taking out the riser card - although it comes out
easily, be sure you reconnect everything when you replace it (on board fan
connector and MB connector I think I removed, but it's in the manual). It's
easy to forget one!

So you do have to remove the riser to get to the mb dimm slots?

I have not opened it again since my first quick look. One way I
thought of cheating was to pull the 1gb from the riser, and put
both 4gb there, that way I do not need to get to the mb dimm slots
and I would have 9 rather than 10gb which will probably be enough.

I am going to do it in an hour or so.

Thanks for all your help,


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

wrote in message
...
"me" writes:


Congrats on your new behemoth, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. Glad to see all
the caddies came too ;-))



I had a similar dilemma and came to the conclusion that if the DIMMs are
of
unequal size, then the largest should go on the riser card. But I
cheated
and bought 3 larger, but equal sized DIMMS and replaced them in the slots
that were already populated. I will put the smaller ones back in at some
point so I anticipate putting the smaller ones on the MB and the larger
ones
on the riser card.

Mine was originally populated with Hynix memory, so I did a search on
Crucial for some of a greater capacity but same spec, i.e. same CAS, ECC,
Buffered and same speed. They work fine so far!

A word of caution if/when taking out the riser card - although it comes
out
easily, be sure you reconnect everything when you replace it (on board
fan
connector and MB connector I think I removed, but it's in the manual).
It's
easy to forget one!

So you do have to remove the riser to get to the mb dimm slots?

I have not opened it again since my first quick look. One way I
thought of cheating was to pull the 1gb from the riser, and put
both 4gb there, that way I do not need to get to the mb dimm slots
and I would have 9 rather than 10gb which will probably be enough.

I am going to do it in an hour or so.

Thanks for all your help,


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)


I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able to
put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot 1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously your
call.


Cheers,

JR.

I think

"me" writes:

I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able to

So the whole riser assembly, with CPU, fan and memory slots?

I could not get the shroud off the MB memory with the riser in
there. It will not lift up, so I need to pull the riser assembly
first.

This is a trickier job than I have done before.

Attn Ben Meyers: Do you ever work inside 128? I might
chicken out of this one.

put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot 1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously your
call.

Also I did not see any PCIe power cables. The cheap video card I got
for it is powered by the mother board. I will need to get some
converters to get power from the other connections. More research
to be done.


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

writes:

"me" writes:

I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able to

So the whole riser assembly, with CPU, fan and memory slots?

I could not get the shroud off the MB memory with the riser in
there. It will not lift up, so I need to pull the riser assembly
first.

This is a trickier job than I have done before.

Attn Ben Meyers: Do you ever work inside 128? I might
chicken out of this one.

I did not chicken out, and getting to both memory banks were far
easier than it looked to me at first.

But the first time I did it I got a bios message that my memory
had changed, and was in non-optimal slots. I let it go ahead to
windows, and windows saw the full 10gb.

I reread the documentation and realized that it was a bit misleading.
They label the physical riser dimm slots in order, from 1 to 6. They
are really 1-4-2-5-3-6.

So I opened the case again, and put the two 1gb rdimms in slots 1 and 2
(with an empty slot in between). I did the same with the two 4gb rdimms
on the riser. I triple checked the slot numbers on the memory slots.

No boot. The post was stuck toggling between two sets of lights, one
indicating PCI configuration was going on, and another saying that
memory was not working properly.

Opened again, reseated all four RDIMMS very carefully, checked all power
connections, reseated the video card. No help.

On the fourth try I put it back into the original configuration. With
one 1gb in mb slot 1 and 1gb in riser slot 1. Posted and the bios
reported a checkpoint at Ithr, whatever that means.

I will contact support and google. Barring an obvious error on my part,
I will try it with the 4gb rdimms in the first slots and see if I get
good boots with 8gb. But that is for tomorrow...

I wonder if one of the Slot 2s is bad somehow.

I think I will run memtest on the current 2gb.

put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot 1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously your
call.

Also I did not see any PCIe power cables. The cheap video card I got
for it is powered by the mother board. I will need to get some
converters to get power from the other connections. More research
to be done.

I will have to delay thinking about this until I fix the rest...


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

wrote in message
...
"me" writes:

I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able to

So the whole riser assembly, with CPU, fan and memory slots?

Yes, the whole riser does come out quite easily. Once you have done it you
can appreciate the design and engineering applied to it ;-))


I could not get the shroud off the MB memory with the riser in
there. It will not lift up, so I need to pull the riser assembly
first.

This is a trickier job than I have done before.

Sorry I should have mentioned there is a shroud over the MB CPU and DIMM
area that does need to be removed first. This seems to channel the flow of
air from the front fan. On mine, it just pulls off with careful pressure
(some at the front fan end to release it there). It does feel reluctant,
but I've taken mine off several times now without incident. I do think you
need to remove thiis before removing the riser card as there is a connector
on the side of the riser that this covers whilst in situ.

The riser assembly then comes out real easy, once you open the handle and
pull. It is a "quick release" type of mechanism that actually pushes the
riser away from the MB, This also protects the two multiway connectors that
attach to the MB when you re-insert as it doesn't need much force to
replace. I had my case on its side and gravity does the trick.


Attn Ben Meyers: Do you ever work inside 128? I might
chicken out of this one.

Hey, please don't chicken! Seriously though, it is your call and I respect
that, but I'm happy to try and help as necessary. I felt nervous the first
time it did this but it is designed to come apart as per the manual.
In fact the first time I took the side panel off, I noticed that the light
on the network adapter was still flashing. and I realised the PSU has a
hefty storage capacity, so when you want to work inside the case either wait
a few minutes after switch off, or pull out the mains from the rear of the
case and then do a switch on to discharge it. Better safe than sorry!
These comments are not aimed to worry you - just re-assure you and pass on
safety awareness. I'm assuming you have worked on other computers and added
extra bits. This is no different, just bigger and better!


put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot
1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously your
call.

Also I did not see any PCIe power cables. The cheap video card I got
for it is powered by the mother board. I will need to get some
converters to get power from the other connections. More research
to be done.


I haven't looked for extra cables to supply power to video cards as the PCIe
bus seems able to power two separate PCIe x16 video cards, along with the
other slots. Anyway, there should be power to spare as it is an 1100 watt
psu!. I guess you could use an adapter on one of the spare power leads from
any unused front 5.5 inch bays.


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

I'm off to bed now, but happy to chat further over the weekend if you wish.
Take care and see you further down the group.

JR.

"me" writes:

wrote in message
...
"me" writes:

I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able to

So the whole riser assembly, with CPU, fan and memory slots?

Yes, the whole riser does come out quite easily. Once you have done it you
can appreciate the design and engineering applied to it ;-))


Yes, it was impressive. It looked really daunting at first, but was
a snap.


I could not get the shroud off the MB memory with the riser in
there. It will not lift up, so I need to pull the riser assembly
first.

This is a trickier job than I have done before.

Sorry I should have mentioned there is a shroud over the MB CPU and DIMM
area that does need to be removed first. This seems to channel the flow of
air from the front fan. On mine, it just pulls off with careful pressure
(some at the front fan end to release it there). It does feel reluctant,
but I've taken mine off several times now without incident. I do think you
need to remove thiis before removing the riser card as there is a connector
on the side of the riser that this covers whilst in situ.


I thought I needed to get the whole riser out first.
Anyway as I need to take out the riser anyway, I do that
first.

The riser assembly then comes out real easy, once you open the handle and
pull. It is a "quick release" type of mechanism that actually pushes the
riser away from the MB, This also protects the two multiway connectors that
attach to the MB when you re-insert as it doesn't need much force to
replace. I had my case on its side and gravity does the trick.


It is a really slick design.

Attn Ben Meyers: Do you ever work inside 128? I might
chicken out of this one.

Hey, please don't chicken! Seriously though, it is your call and I respect
that, but I'm happy to try and help as necessary. I felt nervous the first
time it did this but it is designed to come apart as per the manual.
In fact the first time I took the side panel off, I noticed that the light
on the network adapter was still flashing. and I realised the PSU has a
hefty storage capacity, so when you want to work inside the case either wait
a few minutes after switch off, or pull out the mains from the rear of the
case and then do a switch on to discharge it. Better safe than sorry!
These comments are not aimed to worry you - just re-assure you and pass on
safety awareness. I'm assuming you have worked on other computers and added
extra bits. This is no different, just bigger and better!


That is how I feel now, but I wish I knew why it was not working.

I just tried to boot to memtest3.4a, but the T7500 does not like it.
It goes through the controller bios, then regular bios, then started
to start memtest, then goes back to the Dell splash and starts over.



put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot
1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously your
call.

Also I did not see any PCIe power cables. The cheap video card I got
for it is powered by the mother board. I will need to get some
converters to get power from the other connections. More research
to be done.


I haven't looked for extra cables to supply power to video cards as the PCIe
bus seems able to power two separate PCIe x16 video cards, along with the
other slots. Anyway, there should be power to spare as it is an 1100 watt
psu!. I guess you could use an adapter on one of the spare power leads from
any unused front 5.5 inch bays.

That is what I will need. They make them. There are a lot of spare
power cables, just none that fit my cards.

--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

I'm off to bed now, but happy to chat further over the weekend if you wish.
Take care and see you further down the group.


Yes, you are up late, if you are in England as I have gathered.

Thanks a lot!

ah

JR.


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

wrote in message
...
"me" writes:

wrote in message
...
"me" writes:

I believe you can get access to the MB memory slots without having to
remover the riser card. You will need to remove the riser card to put
memory on it, so I think your plan will work. Plus you should be able
to

So the whole riser assembly, with CPU, fan and memory slots?

Yes, the whole riser does come out quite easily. Once you have done it
you
can appreciate the design and engineering applied to it ;-))


Yes, it was impressive. It looked really daunting at first, but was
a snap.


I could not get the shroud off the MB memory with the riser in
there. It will not lift up, so I need to pull the riser assembly
first.

This is a trickier job than I have done before.

Sorry I should have mentioned there is a shroud over the MB CPU and DIMM
area that does need to be removed first. This seems to channel the flow
of
air from the front fan. On mine, it just pulls off with careful pressure
(some at the front fan end to release it there). It does feel reluctant,
but I've taken mine off several times now without incident. I do think
you
need to remove thiis before removing the riser card as there is a
connector
on the side of the riser that this covers whilst in situ.


I thought I needed to get the whole riser out first.
Anyway as I need to take out the riser anyway, I do that
first.

The riser assembly then comes out real easy, once you open the handle and
pull. It is a "quick release" type of mechanism that actually pushes the
riser away from the MB, This also protects the two multiway connectors
that
attach to the MB when you re-insert as it doesn't need much force to
replace. I had my case on its side and gravity does the trick.


It is a really slick design.

Attn Ben Meyers: Do you ever work inside 128? I might
chicken out of this one.

Hey, please don't chicken! Seriously though, it is your call and I
respect
that, but I'm happy to try and help as necessary. I felt nervous the
first
time it did this but it is designed to come apart as per the manual.
In fact the first time I took the side panel off, I noticed that the
light
on the network adapter was still flashing. and I realised the PSU has a
hefty storage capacity, so when you want to work inside the case either
wait
a few minutes after switch off, or pull out the mains from the rear of
the
case and then do a switch on to discharge it. Better safe than sorry!
These comments are not aimed to worry you - just re-assure you and pass
on
safety awareness. I'm assuming you have worked on other computers and
added
extra bits. This is no different, just bigger and better!


That is how I feel now, but I wish I knew why it was not working.

I just tried to boot to memtest3.4a, but the T7500 does not like it.
It goes through the controller bios, then regular bios, then started
to start memtest, then goes back to the Dell splash and starts over.


I thought I'd check back before I switched the monitors off, just in case!

I used the in-built bios mem test after boot and pressing F12 I think?
Anyway, if you do that and select the extended test it runs for 30 or 40
mins doing various "walk" tests and other stuff with the memory. After
that, I let Windows boot and checked it saw all the memory under task
manager. I surely hope she boots for you ok. Are all the connectors back
and secure on the riser? If normal boot doesn't complete, the flashing
lights on the front are a diagnostic to indicate how far the boot process
has got. Information on what they mean is in the manual under diagnostics.
One thing I know is that if she doesn't want to boot, you can remove the
riser card and boot with just one CPU. I have done it and it works. Then
you can put the memory on the MB and test it if need be.



put the one you removed from the riser into the MB slot 2. As it's
DDR3
memory, there are three channels you need to populate first (i.e. slot
1,2,3
before going onto 4,5,6, see manual for layout) and you would end up
with
two 1Gb DIMMs on the MB and two 4 Gb DIMMs on the riser, each in their
respective slot1 and slot 2. I feel that should work, but obviously
your
call.

Also I did not see any PCIe power cables. The cheap video card I got
for it is powered by the mother board. I will need to get some
converters to get power from the other connections. More research
to be done.


I haven't looked for extra cables to supply power to video cards as the
PCIe
bus seems able to power two separate PCIe x16 video cards, along with the
other slots. Anyway, there should be power to spare as it is an 1100
watt
psu!. I guess you could use an adapter on one of the spare power leads
from
any unused front 5.5 inch bays.

That is what I will need. They make them. There are a lot of spare
power cables, just none that fit my cards.

--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

I'm off to bed now, but happy to chat further over the weekend if you
wish.
Take care and see you further down the group.


Yes, you are up late, if you are in England as I have gathered.

Thanks a lot!

ah

JR.


--
Andrew Hall
(Now reading Usenet in alt.sys.pc-clone.dell...)

Well it's 03:30 here and I must bail - sorry. I'll catch up later and hope
all is well.

Goodnight from Gloucestershire, England.

wrote:

I am a bit confused by the documentation for my new T7500.


From:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...em.htm#configs

====beg quote====
Dual CPU configurations (6 DIMM slots on MB plus 6 DIMM slots on Riser)

* If configuration contains DIMMs of all the same size, populate in
the following order: MB_DIMM1, Riser_DIMM1, MB_DIMM2, Riser_DIMM2,
MB_DIMM3, Riser_DIMM3, MB_DIMM4, Riser_DIMM4, MB_DIMM5,
Riser_DIMM5, MB_DIMM6, Riser_DIMM6.
* If configuration contains DIMMs of mixed sizes, populate the
larger DIMMs in the dual-processor riser.

=====end quote=======

I got my system with 2gig installed(two rdimms), presumably in:

MB_DIMM1 and Riser_DIMM1

I am adding two 4gig Crucial rdimms.

Should I put both in the riser as the 2nd point seems to indicate?
Or 4 in MB1, 1 in MB2 and 4 in R1 and 1 in R2?

Some of the wording on the documentation seems to indicate that the
MB memory is for CPU1 and Riser memory is for CPU2 (both are quad cores,
but that probably does not matter).

I've been following this discussion just in case it might apply to the
T3500 that just arrived. But one question - What is a "riser card"?

*TimDaniels*