dell optiplex 790

Lynne Desrochers · November 27, 2012, 08:26:23 AM

I bought a bunch of Dell Optiplex 790's at the end of last year. This morning my third one is refusing to boot and just showing the number 3 on the front of the tower. So annoying. Has anyone else seen this? They recommend trying to re-seat the CPU, but in the end they come out with a new motherboard and power supply.

Gene Foraker · November 27, 2012, 10:47:08 AM

Dells are definitely not made like they used to be long ago. I'm not familiar with the 790, but when they cut the line very close to the price barrier, sometimes thing happen with certain batches.

Jeff Zylstra · November 27, 2012, 11:01:24 AM

I've got a few 780s and have not experienced any problems like this, but I don't think that I have any numbers that display on the front of the machine like the 790 does. The "good" news is that even though Dells have become more proprietary, the Optiplex lineup is pretty stable, and parts and support are available for a few years, rather than a year or two as in some of the cheaper lines.

Mark · November 27, 2012, 12:19:24 PM

We bought 25 760's a few years back and out of the 25 one had bad RAM within a very short time period (measurable in days) and another had to have the whole motherboard and CPU replaced within about a year or so.

I still buy Dell. I wont buy HP and don't really like the alternatives. At least I know what to expect from Dell from purchase to to warranty/service, etc.

Just always get the warranty and don't keep them longer than 5 years.

Lynne Desrochers · November 28, 2012, 08:57:30 AM

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

Charlie Charbonneau · November 28, 2012, 09:52:25 AM

I'll carbon Alice's *sigh* (from the Vertafore post)

I have Dells in production that are pushing 9 Years... We've added Ram and changed Office versions... Slowly retiring them as they'll let me,but thats a drawn out project...

Mark · November 28, 2012, 09:54:16 AM

Quote from: Charlie Charbonneau on November 28, 2012, 09:52:25 AM
I'll carbon Alice's *sigh* (from the Vertafore post)

I have Dells in production that are pushing 9 Years... We've added Ram and changed Office versions... Slowly retiring them as they'll let me,but thats a drawn out project...

Yeah, we are on a 3-5 year cycle with workstations and 5 years with servers. I'm not going to mess around with old stuff or out of warranty junk. Think the intention was 3 years for the workstations, but we may push 4 but don't want workstations and servers to come up at the same time. Warranty is out, so if they start dropping, I'll start quoting! lol

Charlie Charbonneau · November 28, 2012, 10:04:13 AM

Quote from: Mark on November 28, 2012, 09:54:16 AM
Yeah, we are on a 3-5 year cycle with workstations and 5 years with servers. I'm not going to mess around with old stuff or out of warranty junk. Think the intention was 3 years for the workstations, but we may push 4 but don't want workstations and servers to come up at the same time. Warranty is out, so if they start dropping, I'll start quoting! lol

That's my response everytime we discuss, but I don't hold the purse strings around here. We're slowly starting to replace some of the older stations finally!

Mark Rowe · November 28, 2012, 11:02:50 AM

In Production I have:

1 - 2010
2 - 2009
2 - 2008
1 - 2006
3 - 2003

All Dell Optiplex except 1 of the 2003's. Our original plan was to replace every 3 years....how's that working out.....

Charlie Charbonneau · November 28, 2012, 11:07:53 AM

It's nice on paper huh Mark?

Quote from: Mark Rowe on November 28, 2012, 11:02:50 AM
Our original plan was to replace every 3 years....how's that working out.....

Jim Jensen · November 28, 2012, 11:33:49 AM

I think we can get longer times from workstations now. We don't gain much from speed on updated models at the workstation level. Failure rate would be the driver now on length of service. Granted very old units will have a tougher time running the bloat of newer Office products, but not much of a problem until you have to upgrade Office for newer versions of TAM.

Mark · November 28, 2012, 11:37:15 AM

Maybe. But it's more of a budgetary thing, at least to some extent. Managing unexpected expenses, keeping current with technology, balancing downtime, etc. I'd hate to have out of warranty machines dropping like flies in the same budget year as new servers or other high dollar IT projects (or even non-IT projects for that matter).

BUT, we've had these for 3 years now and haven't discussed replacing them yet -- even though we let the warranty expire.

Billy Welsh · November 28, 2012, 11:43:03 AM

That's how I try to look at it - cost of down time and potential above average support time vs. cost of new unit with on-site warranty from Dell. IMHO if you can get your head out of the weeds, the new machine is ultimately cheaper. But only if you actually have the downtime and/or extra support time. If everything is running fine, then the dice were kind when you rolled.

We were in the same boat last year with a number of machines past their prime and warranty. Fortunately we were able to upgrade most of those. In this particular instance those users went from XP to WIN 7, which alone was worth it.

Mark · November 28, 2012, 11:46:22 AM

Yeah. I convinced them that we should have a 3 year life-cycle plan. But right now... I can't justify new machines. I'd like to eventually go to virtual desktops (VDI). Maybe I'll be re-purposing these machines instead of replacing them in the near future. Much to consider and much to work out.

Jim Jensen · November 28, 2012, 03:21:13 PM

An alternative to consider is to run them as long as you reasonably can but don' t just let the budget dollars drift away - escrow it for the future purchase. As time goes by, you can release the un-needed funds back into the general budget. If you do stretch a 3 year machine to 6, then you put the cost of the machine back into the budget in full either over 3 years or when it's cycle came back around and it was still there.