Dell PowerEdge R740 Buyer's Guide — Gen 14 2U HPC & Virtualization Server
The 2U Platform for Data Warehouses, Database Servers, HPC, and Virtualization
Data Warehousing & Analytics — Dual 28-core Xeon Scalable processors with 24 DIMM slots, Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory up to 7.68 TB, and up to 16 hot-plug drive bays deliver the memory bandwidth and storage throughput required by large-scale analytical queries in Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, SAP HANA, and Hadoop clusters
Enterprise Virtualization — The 2U chassis accommodates up to 8 PCIe Gen 3 expansion slots, 3 TB DDR4, and up to 16 drives — giving the R740 significantly deeper I/O channel capacity than 1U alternatives for VMware ESXi or Hyper-V hosts running dense multi-tenant virtual machine estates
High Performance Computing (HPC) — Intel UPI fabric between the two Xeon Scalable processors, AVX-512, Intel Deep Learning Boost, and up to 24 NVMe PCIe SSDs provide the workload density for scientific simulation, computational fluid dynamics, and financial analytics in co-located HPC clusters
GPU-Accelerated Inference & Rendering — Up to three double-width 300 W GPUs or six single-width 150 W GPUs in the 2U chassis enable AI inference acceleration, VDI rendering, and real-time video transcoding without requiring a dedicated GPU appliance
Database Servers (OLTP) — Intel Optane DCPMM in App Direct Mode provides byte-addressable persistent storage at DRAM latency for in-memory Oracle, SQL Server, and PostgreSQL OLTP deployments demanding high transactions-per-second with sub-millisecond response times
Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) — Dell EMC ReadyNode configurations pre-validated for VMware vSAN and Nutanix combine the R740's deep PCIe expansion for NVMe SSDs with its 16-drive bay capacity for vSAN All-Flash and Hybrid Tier configurations in standard HCI cluster layouts
E-Commerce & Web Application Servers — High memory bandwidth, persistent memory support for in-memory session caching, and N+1 redundant cooling and PSUs provide the availability requirements of business-critical e-commerce platforms and web application server farms
Dual 2nd Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable — Up to 28 Cores and 2933 MT/s Memory
2nd Gen Xeon Scalable (Cascade Lake-SP) — Dual LGA 3647 sockets for the full Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Platinum lineups; flagship Platinum 8280 delivers 28 cores at 2.7 GHz and 205 W TDP for the highest single-socket performance density in the Gen 14 portfolio
Up to 56 Cores Total — Dual Xeon Platinum 8280 configuration delivers 56 cores / 112 threads, enabling dense VM consolidation at scale or parallel computational workloads across a high core-count 2U chassis without liquid cooling
Intel C620 Chipset — PCH provides ACPI 4.0, PCIe 3.0 lanes, xHCI USB 3.0, Intel Active Management Technology, Trusted Execution Technology, VT-d, and Rapid Storage Technology Enterprise for a comprehensive enterprise security and I/O baseline
Up to 48 PCIe 3.0 Lanes Per CPU — 96 total PCIe lanes across both Xeon Scalable processors feed the R740's 8-slot PCIe expansion fabric, NDC, and PERC slot simultaneously without lane contention — critical for configurations combining GPU, NVMe, and high-speed networking
Intel UPI Up to 11.2 GT/s — Up to 3 × Intel Ultra Path Interconnect links between CPUs replace the QPI of the prior generation, improving inter-socket coherent bandwidth for NUMA-sensitive database and analytics workloads running across both processor sockets
Intel AVX-512 & Deep Learning Boost — AVX-512 FMA units accelerate matrix computation, compression, and floating-point workloads; VNNI Vector Neural Network Instructions run INT8 inference fast in the CPU without requiring a GPU offload for lighter AI models
Single-CPU Supported Configurations — The R740 operates with a single CPU in Socket 1; memory and blank fillers for Socket 2 are required for thermal compliance, and only Riser 1 slots plus Riser 2B remain active in single-processor configurations
24-Slot DDR4 — Up to 7.68 TB with DCPMM and Full LRDIMM Population
24 DDR4 DIMM Slots — Twelve slots per CPU organized into 6 channels with 2 DIMMs per channel; all 24 slots active only in dual-processor configurations for maximum memory bandwidth across all 12 processor channels
Up to 3 TB LRDIMM — 24 × 128 GB LRDIMMs achieve 3 TB maximum DDR4 system memory capacity for in-memory analytics and virtualization platforms that cannot use persistent memory modules
Up to 7.68 TB with DCPMM + LRDIMM — 12 × Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory 512 GB DIMMs combined with 12 × 64 GB LRDIMMs reach 7.68 TB total addressable memory for in-memory SAP HANA, Oracle Database In-Memory, and SQL Server In-Memory OLTP deployments
Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory Modes — Memory Mode uses DRAM transparently as cache for DCPMM storage capacity; App Direct Mode exposes DCPMM as byte-addressable persistent memory for PMem-aware applications with data retention across power loss
NVDIMM-N — Up to 192 GB — Up to 12 × 16 GB NVDIMM-N modules (192 GB total) provide battery-backed DRAM-speed persistent memory for write journal logs, key-value stores, and metadata structures that must survive system power loss without filesystem flushing
DDR4-2933 Peak Speed — 2nd Gen Xeon Scalable with a single RDIMM per channel achieves 2933 MT/s; dual-DIMM per channel runs at 2666 MT/s; DCPMM modules operate at up to 2666 MT/s in both Memory and App Direct modes
Advanced RAS: Mirroring, Sparing, FRM — Memory Mirroring duplicates writes across two channels for transparent failover; Single and Multi-Rank Sparing pre-allocates spare ranks for hot-swap error recovery; Dell Fault Resilient Memory zones protect VMware ESXi guests from DIMM faults
Up to 16 × 2.5-Inch or 8 × 3.5-Inch Hot-Swap Drive Bays — 122.88 TB Max
16 × 2.5-Inch SFF Chassis — Maximum density front-accessible SFF configuration supporting up to 16 hot-plug SAS/SATA/NVMe drives with a max raw capacity of 122.88 TB using high-density 2.5-inch SSDs — ideal for database servers and analytics nodes where drive slots translate directly to IOPS
8 × 2.5-Inch SFF Chassis — Mid-range SFF configuration for deployments where 8 hot-plug SAS/SATA/NVMe drives balance drive density and cost without the additional backplane complexity of the 16-bay option
8 × 3.5-Inch LFF Chassis — Large-form-factor configuration supporting 8 hot-plug 3.5-inch SAS/SATA HDDs up to 16 TB each for maximum bulk storage capacity; max raw capacity 128 TB at 16 TB per bay — suited to backup repositories, NAS gateways, and archive tiers
NVMe PCIe SSDs — Up to 24 — Express Flash NVMe SSDs in 375 GB, 1.6 TB, 3.2 TB, 3.84 TB, and 6.4 TB capacities connect CPU-direct for the lowest-latency storage path; specific riser configurations enable NVMe in the R740 front bays alongside SAS/SATA for tiered flash deployments
SAS, SATA, and NVMe in the Same Chassis — SAS 12 Gbps (7.2K, 10K, 15K, SSD), SATA 6 Gbps (HDD and SSD), and NVMe PCIe coexist in the same R740 chassis via hardware RAID (H740P) for SAS/SATA and CPU Direct Attach for NVMe simultaneously
Optical Drive Support — The R740 supports one internal DVD-ROM or DVD+RW optical drive in the ODD bay; the R740xd does not support internal optical drives — a key distinction for legacy OS installation or data archiving workflows still dependent on optical media
External Tape Drive Integration — LTO-5 through LTO-7 SAS and FC tape drives connect to the R740 via external SAS HBA or FC HBA for enterprise tape backup and long-term archival compliance with ML6000, TL4000, and TL2000 tape library enclosures
BOSS M.2 SATA RAID Module and IDSDM for Dedicated OS Boot Storage
BOSS Card (Boot Optimized Storage Subsystem) — Dedicated PCIe module hosts two M.2 SATA 6 Gbps SSDs on an independent low-profile half-height controller; does not use any front drive bay, ensuring all 8–16 data bays remain available for workload storage
240 GB or 480 GB M.2 SATA Drives — Both BOSS M.2 slots support either 240 GB or 480 GB SATA drives providing OS boot volumes of up to 480 GB per mirror; 480 GB BOSS for Windows Server or Linux installs requiring more boot partition space for logs and temporary files
Hardware RAID 1 Mirror — Integrated BOSS RAID controller operates without calling the OS driver stack; automatically mirrors both M.2 drives in hardware at all times — a single M.2 drive failure is transparent to the OS with no administrator intervention required
Preferred for Full OS Deployments — For environments deploying Windows Server, RHEL, SLES, or Ubuntu to bare metal, BOSS keeps the full OS installation on the mirror volume while all NVMe and SAS/SATA drives are dedicated to workload I/O
IDSDM — Internal Dual SD Module — Supports 2 × microSD cards (16/32/64 GB each) in hardware-mirrored IDSDM mode for VMware ESXi and other hypervisor-only deployments where the complete boot image fits in a compact flash device
vFlash Module (16 GB) — A third microSD slot on the IDSDM card provides 16 GB of iDRAC vFlash storage for OS deployment ISO images, RACADM scripts, firmware staging, and iDRAC Virtual Media without requiring external USB media
Combined IDSDM + vFlash Module — The R740 supports IDSDM, vFlash, or both IDSDM and vFlash cards simultaneously in the module slot — up to three microSD cards total for combined persistent OS mirror boot plus vFlash storage
PERC H740P, H730P, H330, H350, HBA330, HBA350i, and S140 Software RAID
PERC H740P (Premium Performance) — 12 Gbps SAS/SATA hardware RAID with 8 GB NV cache for RAID 0/1/5/6/10/50/60; delivers maximum rebuild speed and IOPS for 16-bay 2.5-inch and 8-bay 3.5-inch dense storage configurations with mixed SAS HDDs, SSDs, and SAS expander-connected drives
PERC H730P (Value Performance) — 12 Gbps hardware RAID with 2 GB NV cache; proven for mid-range mixed workload environments running SAS/SATA pools with hardware-accelerated parity RAID without the premium NV cache cost of the H740P
PERC H330 / H350 (Entry — R740 Only) — H330 provides 12 Gbps RAID 0/1/5/6/10/50/60 without NV cache for cost-optimized deployments; H350 adds SAS 12 Gbps expander support; both controllers are available as mini-mono internal or adapter form factors for R740 — not supported on R740xd
HBA330 / HBA350i (Non-RAID Pass-Through) — JBOD-mode SAS HBAs for software-defined storage platforms (Ceph, Gluster, XtremIO) and OS-managed RAID where the SDS hypervisor needs direct block-device access without PERC RAID layer interference
H750 / HBA350i Adapter Form — Full-height PCIe adapter versions of PERC H750 RAID and HBA350i SAS HBA for R740 configurations where the mini-PERC slot is occupied by another controller or where a second independent RAID domain is required
S140 Software RAID — Intel chipset-based software RAID supports RAID 0/1/5/10 on SATA and NVMe drives using CPU cycles instead of a dedicated controller chip; recommended for entry-level deployments with lighter I/O requirements where hardware RAID controller cost is not justified
H840 / 12 Gbps SAS HBA External — External RAID H840P and non-RAID 12 Gbps SAS HBA connect SAS disk shelves, LTO tape library strings, and external JBOD enclosures via SAS cable from the R740's rear PCIe slot — expands usable storage capacity beyond the front-panel bay count
Up to 3 × Double-Width 300 W GPUs or 6 × Single-Width 150 W GPUs in 2U
3 × Double-Width 300 W GPUs — Three full-height, double-slot 300 W GPU cards (e.g., NVIDIA A100, A30, Tesla V100) in the R740's 2U chassis deliver massive parallel compute for deep learning training, seismic processing, and financial Monte Carlo simulation workloads requiring high-bandwidth GPU memory
6 × Single-Width 150 W GPUs — Six single-slot 150 W GPU cards (e.g., NVIDIA T4, A10) in 2U for AI inference, virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), and video transcoding farms where per-card efficiency and slot density outweigh peak single-card throughput
Double That of the Prior Generation — The R730 generation supported 2 × 300 W double-width or 4 × 150 W single-width GPUs; the R740 increases this to 3 × 300 W or 6 × 150 W — a 50% GPU density improvement in the same 2U rack slot
FPGA Accelerator Support — Up to 3 × double-width or 4 × single-width FPGA cards (Intel Xilinx variants) supported in the same PCIe expansion slots for hardware-accelerated packet processing, encryption/decryption offload, and custom algorithm acceleration
NVMe Coexistence Constraints — GPU and FPGA options are available on the 24 × 2.5-inch NVMe chassis of the R740xd; up to 2 GPUs supported in R740xd NVMe configurations where NVMe drives share PCIe resources with the GPU riser
PCIe Gen 3 x16 GPU Slots — Each GPU card slot is a full-height full-length Gen 3 x16 PCIe lane bundle directly connected to a Xeon Scalable processor for maximum GPU-to-CPU memory bandwidth in high-throughput deep learning training pipelines
Validated Thermal Envelope — Dell EMC's 2U chassis thermal design validates GPU cooling at standard 30°C recommended inlet temperature for all supported GPU configurations; the expanded Fresh Air range (5–40°C) has configuration-specific limits detailed in the R740 installation documentation
Up to 8 PCIe Gen 3 Slots Across Multiple Riser Configurations
Up to 8 PCIe Gen 3 Slots — The R740 offers a maximum of 8 PCIe Gen 3 expansion slots in full 3-riser configuration, with a maximum of 4 × x16 slots; this represents the largest PCIe expansion fabric available in any Gen 14 dual-socket 2U rack platform
Riser 1A — Slots 1 + 3 — Slot 1: full-height full-length x16 (CPU1); Slot 3: full-height half-length x16 (CPU1); optimized for high-speed InfiniBand, 25GbE, or HBA cards requiring CPU1 proximity and full-height bracket clearance
Riser 1B — Slots 1 + 2 + 3 — Slot 1: FH/FL x8; Slot 2: FH/FL x8; Slot 3: FH/HL x8; three-slot riser for denser lower-bandwidth add-in cards such as 10GbE NICs, management cards, or additional SAS HBAs
Riser 1D — Slots 1 + 2 + 3 (x16/x8/x8) — Slot 1: FH/FL x16; Slot 2: FH/FL x8; Slot 3: FH/HL x8; provides one x16 slot alongside dual x8 slots for configurations pairing one high-bandwidth card with two lower-bandwidth expansion cards from CPU1
Riser 2 Options (Slots 4–6) — Riser 2A/2D/2E/2F: Slot 4 FH/FL x16, Slot 5 FH/FL x8, Slot 6 LP/HL x8 (CPU2); Riser 2B: Slot 4 LP/HL x8; Riser 2C: Slot 4 LP/HL x16 — select based on required card heights and link widths for CPU2-connected devices
Riser 3A / 3B (Slots 7–8) — Slot 7: FH/FL x8 (CPU2); Slot 8: FH/FL x16 (CPU2); 3-riser configuration 1A+2A+3A or 1A+2E+3B delivers maximum 8-slot expansion for HPC workloads combining InfiniBand, NVMe HBAs, and FPGA in the same chassis
No Rear Storage with 3-Riser Configs — Riser 1A+2A+3A and 1D+2A+3A configurations are not compatible with rear drive bay options; 1B+2B and 1B+2C configurations preserve rear drive bay support for customers requiring both maximum PCIe expansion and rear storage simultaneously
rNDC Up to 2 × 25GbE — Dedicated iDRAC9 Management Port
4 × 1GbE rNDC — Four-port 1 Gigabit Ethernet network daughter card for standard host connectivity in deployments not requiring high-speed storage networking; frees all PCIe expansion slots for dedicated storage, accelerator, or secondary NIC cards
2 × 10GbE + 2 × 1GbE rNDC — Mixed-speed card with two 10GbE (SFP+ or BaseT) uplinks for primary workload traffic plus two 1GbE ports for secondary management networks, heartbeat, or IPMI over LAN (IPMI/KCS) traffic isolation
4 × 10GbE rNDC — Quad 10 Gigabit rNDC provides maximum bandwidth for dense hypervisor hosts running vSAN storage, VM migration, and application traffic simultaneously without consuming any general-purpose PCIe expansion slots
2 × 25GbE rNDC — Dual 25 Gigabit rNDC for the highest available rNDC bandwidth; pairs with 25GbE top-of-rack switches in spine-leaf fabrics for NVMe over Fabrics, HPC MPI messaging, and AI/ML data ingestion pipelines
iDRAC9 Dedicated 1GbE Management NIC — Completely isolated out-of-band NIC powered independently of the host power plane; management access survives host OS crashes, network saturation events, and planned OS shutdowns during maintenance windows
PCIe NIC & InfiniBand Options — Additional PCIe expansion slots support Mellanox ConnectX InfiniBand EDR (100 Gb/s) for HPC cluster MPI fabric, 25GbE or 100GbE OCP/PCIe NICs from Dell-validated network vendors, and RDMA over Converged Ethernet (RoCE) adapters
NIC Partitioning (NPAR) — 10GbE and 25GbE rNDC options support NIC partitioning to present multiple logical network interfaces to the host with guaranteed bandwidth guarantees per partition for mixed-workload traffic isolation in multi-tenant hypervisor environments
Hot-Plug Redundant PSUs — 495 W to 2400 W Platinum, Titanium, and DC
1+1 Hot-Plug Redundancy — Two hot-swappable PSU bays with 1+1 redundancy; a PSU failure is replaceable under full load without interrupting any running workload, hypervisor, or active network connection in the chassis
495 W Platinum — Right-sized for single-socket Silver or Bronze configurations with minimal drives and no GPU; 100–240 V AC auto-switching at 1908 BTU/hr thermal output for the most power-constrained deployments
750 W Platinum and Titanium — Standard dual-socket Gold configurations with 8 drives and light PCIe loads; 750 W Titanium achieves 94–96% peak efficiency for facilities targeting 80 PLUS Titanium efficiency contracts and PUE improvement initiatives
1100 W Platinum — Handles fully-loaded dual-socket Platinum configurations with 16 SFF drives, PCIe cards, and no GPU; 1100 W HVDC mixed-mode variants for China- and Japan-specific 380 V DC-bus rack deployments at 4100 BTU/hr
1600 W and 2000 W Platinum — Required for GPU-loaded configurations and high-TDP Platinum CPUs; 2000 W (7500 BTU/hr) for triple-GPU deployments at full load or configurations combining 205 W CPUs, 16 drives, and 3 GPUs simultaneously
2400 W Platinum — Highest-wattage option at 2400 W (9000 BTU/hr) for future-proofing maximum-density GPU and NVMe configurations in chassis that need PSU headroom for workload power bursting; 100–240 V AC at 16 A per PSU
DC Power Options — 1100 W Gold –48 V DC PSU for telecommunications racks running –48 V DC bus; 750 W Mixed Mode Platinum covering both AC and 240 V DC for China-specific power infrastructure standards
Up to 6 Hot-Plug N+1 Fans with Open + Closed Loop Thermal Control
Up to 6 Hot-Plug Fans — Six hot-plug cooling fans in N+1 redundant configuration allow one fan failure without triggering a system shutdown; failed fans are replaceable under full production load in seconds without removing the chassis from the rack
Open + Closed Loop Hybrid Control — Open-loop pre-computed tables set initial fan speeds from system BOM at startup; closed-loop feedback from CPU, DIMM, PCH, GPU, inlet air, HDDs, and PCIe NVMe temperature sensors continuously refines fan speed to the minimum necessary for thermal compliance
Standard 10–35°C Operating Range — Full component support including all PSU tiers and GPU configurations within the standard range; DAPC "Performance Per Watt" fan profile minimizes fan power while maintaining all thermal margins
Extended Fresh Air Cooling (5–40°C) — Continuous operation up to 40°C ambient for thermal-compliant configurations; above 30°C the recommended inlet temperature, specific GPU and NVMe configurations have additional de-rating limits documented in the R740/R740xd support documentation
GPU Thermal Validation — 2U chassis airflow specifically validated for triple double-width 300 W GPU and sextuple 150 W GPU configurations alongside dual high-TDP Xeon Scalable CPUs; higher overall airflow than 1U alternatives enables sustained GPU operation without thermal throttling
PCIe SSD Acoustic Impact — Express Flash NVMe PCIe drives require higher airflow than SAS/SATA drives; configurations with many NVMe cards generate higher fan speeds and dBA levels; acoustic footprint can be reduced by limiting NVMe count per system or using DAPC fan profiles
User-Configurable Thermal Profiles — iDRAC9 BIOS thermal settings include Performance Per Watt (DAPC/OS), Performance Optimized, and Maximum Performance modes; Max Exhaust Temperature and Fan Speed Offset are configurable for environments with strict cooling budgets
Dual Front USB 2.0, Optional USB 3.0, Front VGA, and iDRAC Direct
Front USB 2.0 × 2 — Two USB 2.0 ports on the front control panel (right side) for OS installation media, USB diagnostic tools, and temporary portable storage without accessing the rear of the 2U chassis while racked
Front USB 3.0 (Optional) — An optional USB 3.0 upsell module adds a USB SuperSpeed 5 Gbps port at the front; the module cable connects to the internal USB port on the system board — provides faster transfer speeds for large installation ISOs and field service drives
Front iDRAC Direct (Micro-AB USB) — Dedicated Micro-AB USB port with LED indicator for direct laptop connectivity to iDRAC9 without requiring network access; the LED illuminates when the iDRAC Direct cable is attached and an active management session is running
Front VGA — 1 × VGA port on the right front control panel for monitor console access during POST diagnostics, BIOS configuration, RAID setup, and OS installation at the rack without routing cables to the rear panel
Rear USB 3.0 × 2 — Two SuperSpeed USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) ports on the rear panel for persistent keyboard/mouse, external USB drives, long-term USB storage attachments, and KVM adapter dongles
Rear VGA, Serial, and iDRAC NIC — 1 × VGA and 1 × DB-9 serial port for legacy serial console redirect through iDRAC9 BIOS/SOL (Serial-over-LAN); 1 × iDRAC9 dedicated 1GbE RJ-45 management port for out-of-band management traffic isolation
Optional LCD Bezel — Integrated LCD bezel option with navigation buttons displays system ID, IP address, power state, iDRAC health, and alert summaries at the front panel; compatible with the security bezel lock accessory for physical drive access control
Cyber Resilient Architecture — Silicon Root of Trust, TPM, and Secure Erase
Silicon Root of Trust — Factory-burned cryptographic identity in iDRAC9 silicon validates every firmware component before any host CPU instruction executes; hardware-anchored trust chain is immune to software-layer attacks that bypass OS-level firmware validation
Cryptographically Signed Firmware — All firmware packages — BIOS, iDRAC, PERC, NIC, PSU — carry a Dell-issued certificate verified by Lifecycle Controller at install time; Lifecycle Controller rejects modified or unsigned firmware, preventing supply-chain firmware injection
UEFI Secure Boot — Verifies bootloader signatures before the operating system security stack loads; prevents rootkits, unauthorized OS, and malware from executing during the pre-OS phase when traditional security products are not yet resident
TPM 1.2 / 2.0 and TCM 2.0 (Optional) — Pluggable TPM module provides hardware-rooted key storage for BitLocker, vTPM, platform attestation, Intel TXT, and TrustZone workloads; TCM 2.0 available for China-specific regulatory compliance
System Lockdown — OpenManage Enterprise-enforced policy prohibits all hardware and firmware configuration changes from BIOS, iDRAC, RACADM, and WS-Man until the lockdown token is removed by an authorized administrator — prevents unauthorized configuration drift in locked-down environments
System Erase (Secure Erase) — NIST 800-88-compliant cryptographic and overwrite erase available for all internal storage media including SSDs, HDDs, NVMe drives, NVDIMM flash, IDSDM microSD, and optionally CPU volatile memory for complete secure decommissioning
Physical Security — Chassis cover intrusion switch, front-panel power-button disable, optional locking security bezel, and toolless cover latch restrict unauthorized physical access to drives, DIMMs, PCIe cards, and system internals
iDRAC9 with Lifecycle Controller, RESTful Redfish API, and Quick Sync 2
iDRAC9 Embedded Controller — Dedicated out-of-band management processor runs on its own power plane with an independent NIC; provides persistent hardware inventory, health alerting, remote KVM console, and 1% power monitoring accuracy regardless of host OS state
Lifecycle Controller 3.x — Agent-free system provisioning, OS deployment, firmware baseline update, hardware configuration, and log collection operate entirely through iDRAC without an installed OS — enables touch-free bare-metal deployment from a remote console
iDRAC RESTful API with Redfish — Full DMTF Redfish 1.0 standards-based JSON REST API enables infrastructure-as-code automation from Ansible Playbooks, Terraform modules, ServiceNow workflows, Python scripts, and PowerShell DSC for fleet-scale R740 lifecycle management
Quick Sync 2 Wireless Module (Optional) — BLE + Wi-Fi wireless bezel module allows iDRAC9 inventory read, RACADM command push, and firmware update trigger from the Dell OpenManage Mobile app on a smartphone at the server front panel without requiring a dedicated laptop
OpenManage Enterprise — Single-console lifecycle management for multiple generations of PowerEdge servers including automated discovery, firmware compliance reporting, policy push, alert escalation to ticketing systems, and power usage dashboards across all R740 fleet nodes
Ecosystem Integrations — OMIVV for VMware vCenter manages R740 health and firmware from within the vSphere client; OpenManage Ansible Modules automate PowerEdge provisioning in CI/CD pipelines; OpenManage Integration with ServiceNow routes automated health alerts directly to ITSM tickets
SupportAssist Embedded — Proactive and predictive diagnostics engine embedded in iDRAC9 automatically creates Dell Support cases, dispatches replacement parts, and generates AI-based health failure probability scores for drives, DIMMs, and fans before unplanned outage events occur
Windows, Linux, VMware ESXi, SLES, Oracle Linux, and Citrix Certified
Windows Server 2019 / 2016 LTSC with Hyper-V — Full Hyper-V host certification for R740 with Windows Admin Center browser-based cluster management; iDRAC Service Module (iSM) provides host-to-iDRAC health and power reporting integration without an external management agent
VMware ESXi — VMware Hardware Compatibility Guide (HCG) certified; OMIVV for vCenter plugin manages R740 health, firmware compliance baselines, and lifecycle operations directly from the vSphere web client without leaving the VMware management console
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) — RHEL 7 and 8 certified for long-term enterprise Linux workloads including OpenShift Container Platform host nodes; RHEL SAP HANA configurations validated with DCPMM App Direct Mode for large in-memory SAP instance deployments
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) — SLES certified including SLES for SAP Applications; DCPMM-enabled SAP HANA scale-up in SLES on the R740 achieves multi-terabyte in-memory SAP systems in a single 2U chassis without external memory expansion devices
Canonical Ubuntu Server LTS — Ubuntu LTS for OpenStack Compute nodes, Kubernetes bare-metal worker hosts, and developer-facing workloads; long-term security update cadence aligns with R740's operational lifespan in production data centers
Oracle Linux — Certified for Oracle Database, Oracle RAC (Real Application Clusters), and Oracle Middleware on Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) for Oracle co-support eligibility on certified Dell PowerEdge hardware
Citrix Hypervisor (XenServer) — Citrix Hypervisor support for VDI (Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops), hosted private cloud, and multi-tenant application delivery on the R740's GPU-equipped (up to 6 × 150 W for vGPU) platform
ReadyRails Sliding and Static for All 4-Post and 2-Post Rack Types
ReadyRails Sliding — Standard (Drop-In) — Tool-less drop-in installation in 19-inch square or unthreaded round-hole 4-post racks; tooled install for threaded racks; full extension out of rack for DIMM, drive, fan, and PCIe card servicing without pulling the 2U chassis; square-hole adjustment range 631–868 mm
ReadyRails Sliding — Stab-In/Drop-In (New for Gen 14) — New 14th Gen stab-in design required for Dell EMC Titan and Titan-D racks; supports square, round, and threaded round-hole racks at 603–915 mm adjustment range; recommended for mixed rack environments with both Dell and non-Dell cabinets
Optional Cable Management Arm (CMA) — CMA attaches to the sliding rail rear bracket and keeps all rear cable bundles organized during full-extension chassis service; minimum rack depth with CMA is 845 mm (sliding) requiring a 1000 mm deep rack for safe extraction
ReadyRails Static — Stab-in installation for the widest rack compatibility; supports 19-inch square, round, and threaded 4-post plus 2-post Telco racks; no CMA compatibility; minimum rail depth 622 mm; square-hole adjustment range 608–879 mm
2U Chassis Profile — 86.8 mm (3.4 in.) height occupies exactly two rack units; 715.5 mm depth (bezel to rear) and 678.8 mm without front bezel; 482.0 mm full-width chassis fits standard 19-inch EIA-310-E compliant racks without adapters
Weight Considerations — Maximum weight 26.3 kg (57.98 lb) for 2.5-inch HDD R740 and 28.6 kg (63.05 lb) for 3.5-inch LFF R740; 2-person lift required per OSHA ergonomic guidelines for chassis removal and reinstallation during top-of-the-rack service events
Dell Rack Compatibility — Stab-in/drop-in rails required for Dell EMC Titan and Titan-D rack enclosures; standard sliding rails for PowerEdge-series compatible Dell racks; static rails for non-Dell third-party cabinets where sliding rail depth is insufficient
R740 vs R730 — More NVMe, More GPUs, More PCIe, DCPMM, and iDRAC9
2nd Gen Xeon Scalable vs E5-2600 v3/v4 — Xeon Scalable replaces Broadwell-EP / Haswell-EP; 50% more memory channels per socket (6 vs 4), Intel UPI replacing QPI, AVX-512, Intel Deep Learning Boost, and DCPMM/NVDIMM support not available on any E5-2600 SKU
Up to 24 NVMe Drives vs 4 PCIe SSDs — R730 supported up to 4 PCIe Express Flash SSDs only via a PCIe bridge card; R740 supports up to 24 CPU Direct-Attach NVMe SSDs — a 6× NVMe density improvement in the same 2U enclosure with no PCIe bridge latency overhead
Up to 8 PCIe Slots vs 7 — R740 adds one additional PCIe Gen 3 slot over the R730's maximum of 7 (or 6 in some configs); all Gen 14 PCIe slots are Gen 3 vs mixed generations on some R730 configurations
Triple Double-Width or Six Single-Width GPUs vs 2/4 — R740 supports 3 × 300 W double-width or 6 × 150 W single-width GPUs; the R730 was limited to 2 × 300 W or 4 × 150 W — a 50% GPU density increase enabling a new class of AI inference and VDI density per rack unit
DCPMM and NVDIMM (New) — R740 supports Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory (up to 6.14 TB) and NVDIMM-N (up to 192 GB) — both technologies unavailable on R730 — opening SAP HANA In-Memory, Oracle IMO, and persistent key-value store workloads impossible on the prior generation
BOSS M.2 Boot Module (New) — R740 adds the BOSS card for dedicated M.2 SATA RAID 1 OS boot; R730 had no equivalent, requiring a dedicated drive bay for OS boot regardless of PERC tier used — R740 BOSS frees all data bays for workload storage
iDRAC9 vs iDRAC8 — iDRAC9 adds Silicon Root of Trust, Redfish RESTful API, Quick Sync 2 wireless management, Server Lockdown, System Erase, and DCPMM health monitoring — management capabilities entirely absent from the iDRAC8 on R730
| Feature | R730 (Gen 13) | R740 (Gen 14) |
|---|---|---|
| Processor Family | Xeon E5-2600 v3 / v4 | 2nd Gen Xeon Scalable (Cascade Lake) |
| Memory Interconnect | Intel QPI | Intel UPI up to 11.2 GT/s |
| Max DIMM Slots | 24 DDR4 RDIMM/LRDIMM | 24 + DCPMM / NVDIMM-N |
| Max NVMe Drives | 4 via PCIe bridge | Up to 24 CPU Direct Attach |
| Max PCIe Slots | 7 (or 6) | 8 (max 4 × x16) |
| Max GPU — Double-Width | 2 × 300 W | 3 × 300 W |
| Max GPU — Single-Width | 4 × 150 W | 6 × 150 W |
| Intel Optane DCPMM | Not supported | Up to 12 × 512 GB DIMMs |
| BOSS M.2 Boot Module | Not supported | 2 × M.2 SATA 240/480 GB RAID 1 |
| Remote Management | iDRAC8 | iDRAC9 |
ProSupport Plus with SupportAssist and ProDeploy for R740 Deployments
ProSupport Plus — Dell's highest-tier support plan with SupportAssist automated monitoring, predictive failure scoring for drives, fans, DIMMs, and PSUs, and an assigned Services Account Manager for proactive R740 fleet management and performance baseline recommendations
SupportAssist Embedded — Replaces manual, high-effort support routines with automated issue detection, case creation, and part dispatch; AI-driven predictive analysis detects storage and cooling pre-failure indicators before production impact, reducing mean time to repair
ProSupport — 24×7×365 certified hardware and software engineer access with on-site next-business-day or four-hour mission-critical parts and labor response for R740 fleets in environments where human-escalated resolution is required within defined SLO response windows
ProSupport One for Data Center — Site-wide support contract covering all R740 servers plus Dell EMC storage and networking under one agreement with assigned field and technical account managers; designed for environments with more than 1,000 assets requiring unified support coverage
ProDeploy Enterprise Suite — Certified Dell deployment engineers handle rack-and-stack (Basic Deployment), OS installation and firmware baseline configuration (ProDeploy), or full environment assessment, migration planning, application configuration, and knowledge transfer (ProDeploy Plus)
Residency Services — On-site or remote Dell experts available for SAP HANA DCPMM sizing and configuration, vSAN ReadyNode cluster deployment, NVDIMM-N battery installation planning, and GPU-accelerated inference environment setup tailored to the R740 hardware platform
TechDirect Self-Service — Online portal for self-dispatching replacement parts, troubleshooting technical cases without phone escalation, API integration with internal help desk ticketing systems, and accessing Dell certification and training resources for R740 administrators
Frequently Asked Questions — Dell PowerEdge R740
The Dell PowerEdge R740 supports up to 3 TB of DDR4 LRDIMM RAM across 24 DIMM slots at speeds up to 2933 MT/s with select 2nd Gen Xeon Scalable processors and 1 DIMM per channel. With Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory (DCPMM), total addressable memory reaches 7.68 TB using 12 × 512 GB DCPMMs plus 12 × 64 GB LRDIMMs. Up to 192 GB of NVDIMM-N battery-backed persistent memory is also supported. All 24 slots require dual-processor configuration. Configure your R740 memory at ECS.
The Dell PowerEdge R740 offers three front drive bay configurations: 16 × 2.5-inch SFF (max 122.88 TB), 8 × 2.5-inch SFF, or 8 × 3.5-inch LFF (max 128 TB at 16 TB per bay). The related R740xd — the extended storage variant — expands to up to 24 × 2.5-inch or 12 × 3.5-inch front bays plus mid-bay and rear-bay options. The R740 supports SAS 12 Gbps, SATA 6 Gbps, and NVMe PCIe drives depending on the backplane and controller configuration selected.
The Dell PowerEdge R740 supports up to 8 PCIe Gen 3 expansion slots in the full 3-riser configuration (Risers 1 + 2 + 3), with a maximum of 4 × x16 links. Multiple riser combinations are available: 1A+2A, 1A+2A+3A, 1B+2B, 1B+2C, 1D+2A+3A, and others — each optimizing the mix of full-height, low-profile, x16, and x8 slots for different card requirements. 3-riser configurations do not support rear drive bays. The R740 also has dedicated slots for the rNDC and mini-PERC that do not count against the general-purpose PCIe count.
Yes. The Dell PowerEdge R740 supports up to 3 × double-width 300 W GPUs (such as NVIDIA A30 or Tesla V100) or up to 6 × single-width 150 W GPUs (such as NVIDIA T4 or A10) in 2U. Alternatively, it supports up to 3 × double-width or 4 × single-width FPGA accelerator cards. Note: on the R740xd NVMe chassis, only 2 GPUs are supported due to PCIe resource sharing with NVMe drives. GPU options require the appropriate 2U riser combinations and PSU tier (typically 1600 W or higher for GPU-heavy configurations).
Yes. Express Computer Systems stocks professionally reconditioned refurbished Dell PowerEdge R740 servers tested and configured to your exact processor, memory, storage, and networking specifications. Whether you need a 16-bay SFF database server, a 3-GPU inference cluster node, or an 8-bay LFF storage server, ECS builds your R740 to specification and ships it ready to rack and power on. Shop refurbished Dell R740 servers at ECS.
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Express Computer Systems offers professionally reconditioned Dell PowerEdge R740 servers configured to your exact specifications — storage density, GPU configuration, or memory tier. Our team tests every unit and backs every order with our quality guarantee.
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