DELL PowerEdge R740xd2 2U Rack Server 2x Xeon Platinum 8260 2.4GHz 512GB DDR4 26x 8TB HDD H730P

High-density 2U rack server

The Dell PowerEdge R740xd2 packs twenty-six 8 TB SATA hard drives and dual Xeon Platinum 8260 processors into a 2U chassis. It targets organisations that need maximum raw capacity for backup repositories, media archives or software-defined storage clusters. The system ships with 512 GB of DDR4-2933 ECC memory and a PERC H730P controller supporting RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, 50 and 60.

Build integration needs

Two redundant 1100 W hot-swap power supplies feed the platform, so the rack must provide matching PDU outlets and sufficient cooling for sustained drive activity. Network connectivity comes from an integrated dual-port 1 GbE LOM plus a Broadcom 57414 dual-port 10/25 GbE SFP28 OCP 2.0 mezzanine card, leaving standard PCIe slots free for additional controllers. iDRAC 9 Enterprise enables remote deployment and monitoring without a local console.

Sustained-load behaviour

Twenty-four cores per socket at 2.4 GHz, with 3.9 GHz turbo, deliver steady throughput for long-running analytics or replication jobs while the 7.2 K drives maintain sequential bandwidth across all twenty-six bays. The H730P battery-backed cache protects in-flight writes during unexpected power loss. Memory can grow to 1 TB across sixteen slots if workloads expand beyond the factory 512 GB configuration.