Dell, the DELL logo, PowerEdge, EqualLogic, PowerVault, PowerConnect, OpenManage, KACE, and ReadyRails are trademarks of Dell, Inc. Intel and Xeon are registered trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. Microsoft, Windows, Windows Server, SQL Server, BitLocker, ActiveX, Internet Explorer, and Hyper-V are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. SUSE is a registered trademark of Novell, Inc.
Table of contents 1 System overview ................................................................................................................................................................. 6 Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................................ 6 New technologies ...............................................................................................................
Appendix B. Standards compliance ............................................................................................................................. 58 Appendix C. Additional resources................................................................................................................................. 59 Appendix D. System board block diagram ...................................................................................................................61 Table 1. Table 2.
Figure 12. Rack network daughter card (NDC) ................................................................................................................ 32 Figure 13. 750W power supply unit ................................................................................................................................... 38 Figure 14. Sliding rails with optional CMA .........................................................................................................................41 Figure 15.
The Dell™ PowerEdge™ R720 and R720xd are Dell’s latest 2-socket, 2U rack servers that are designed to run complex workloads using highly scalable memory, I/O capacity, and flexible network options. Both systems feature the Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600 product family, up to 24 DIMMS, PCI Express® (PCIe) 3.0 enabled expansion slots, and a choice of NIC technologies. The PowerEdge R720 is a general-purpose platform with highly expandable memory (up to 768GB) and impressive I/O capabilities to match.
simplify the lifecycle of deploying, updating, monitoring, and maintaining your Dell PowerEdge servers. New technologies featured on the PowerEdge R720 and R720xd systems are detailed in Table 1. New technologies Detailed descriptions Intel Xeon processor E5-2600 product family This new family of Intel processors has embedded PCIe lanes for improved I/O performance. See the Processors section for details.
New technologies Detailed descriptions Fresh Air cooling Dell has tested and validated an integrated data center solution that enables you to operate at higher temperatures or even chiller-less. See the Power, thermal, and acoustics section for details.
Compared to the previous generation of Dell PowerEdge servers, the R720 and R720xd have more drive bay options, more PCIe slots, a larger memory footprint, flexible I/O, Express Flash PCIe solid-state drives, and advanced system management. The R720 also supports optional dual internal RAID controllers and up to four optional internal GPUs. The PowerEdge R720 and R720xd are replacements for the predecessor R710 system, three systems which are compared in Table 2.
Feature PowerEdge R710 Dell OpenManage Systems Management PowerEdge R720 PowerEdge R720xd OpenManage Essentials Dell Management Console IT Assistant Dell OpenManage OMSA Agent Dell Management Console OpenManage Power Center Lifecycle Controller 1.x (requires iDRAC7 Enterprise iDRAC6 (Express or Enterprise) with Lifecycle Controller) with Lifecycle Controller 1.
Feature Specification R720 drive bay options: Up to 16 x 2.5“ Up to 8 x 2.5” + 8 x 2.5” (with dual RAID controllers) Up to 8 x 2.5” Up to 8 x 2.5” + 4 x 2.5” Express Flash Up to 8 x 3.5” Hard drives (hot-plug) R720xd drive bay options: Up to 24 x 2.5” (front) + 2 x 2.5” (back) Up to 12 x 3.5” (front) + 2 x 2.5” (back) Hard drive options: 2.5” SAS SSD, SATA SSD, SAS (15K, 10K), nearline SAS (7.2K), SATA (7.2K) 2.5” Express Flash PCIe SSD (R720 only) 3.5” SAS (15K), nearline SAS (7.
Feature Specification (Telco) racks ® Microsoft Windows Server 2012 ® Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, x64 (includes Hyper-V v2) ® Microsoft Windows HPC Server 2008 Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2011 ® ® SUSE Linux Enterprise Server ® ® Red Hat Enterprise Linux Operating systems Optional embedded hypervisors: ® ® Citrix XenServer VMware vSphere including ESX™ and ESXi ® Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization For more information on the specific versions and additions, visit Dell.com/OSsupport.
The Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd implement a new chassis design which supports an increased number of DIMMs, PCIe slots, and hard drives, relative to their predecessor servers. The following sections provide external and internal views of the systems and describe the chassis features. For information on features and descriptions for these systems, see the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner's Manual on Support.Dell.com/Manuals.
The R720xd supports up to 24 2.5-inch or up to 12 3.5-inch front-accessible, hot-plug hard drives that are secured by a removable front bezel. Other front-panel features include an LED control panel, a USB connector, and a video connector. The R720 back panel includes features such as redundant hot-plug power supply units (PSUs), 4 Ethernet connectors, PCI expansion slots, and many other features that are described in the rest of this guide.
In addition to the R720 back-panel features, the R720xd also includes 2 optional 2.5-inch hot-plug drives in the back of the system. The chassis design of the R720 and R720xd is optimized for easy access to components and for airflow for effective and efficient cooling. The R720 and R720xd support up to 24 DIMMs, 2 processors, hot-plug redundant fans, and many other components and features that are described in this guide.
For additional system views, see the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner’s Manual on Support.Dell.com/Manuals. Table 4 lists the chassis features for the R720 and R720xd systems. For additional information on these features, see the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner’s Manual on Support.Dell.com/Manuals.
Feature Description LCD control panel Provides user access to buttons, display, and I/O interfaces (R720 only) LED panel Indicates the status of system conditions (R720xd only) Hard drives Front-accessible, hot-plug hard drives plus two optional back-accessible hot-plug hard drives (R720xd only) Optical drive (optional) The R720 supports one optional slimline SATA DVD-ROM drive or DVD+/-RW drive; R720xd does not support an internal optical drive System identification panel Slide-out label panel f
The R720xd LED panel is located on the front of the chassis to indicate the status of system conditions. For more information on the R720xd LED panel, see the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner's Manual on Support.Dell.com/Manuals. A useful feature included with Dell PowerEdge 12th generation servers is the Quick Resource Locator (QRL)—a model-specific Quick Response (QR) code that is located on the server (shown in Figure 11).
Look up your service tag so you can quickly gain access to your specific hardware configuration info and warranty information Contact Dell directly (by link) to get in touch with technical support and sales teams and provide feedback to Dell These codes provide an easy way to retrieve the critical support information you need when you need it, making you more efficient and effective in managing your hardware.
The Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd feature the Intel Xeon processor E5-2600 product family, offering an ideal combination of performance, power efficiency, and cost. These processors provide high performance no matter what your constraint is—floor space, power, or budget—and on workloads that range from the most complicated scientific exploration to crucial web-serving and infrastructure applications.
The R720 and R720xd support up to two processors with up to eight cores per processor. Table 6 lists the Intel Xeon processors supported by the PowerEdge R720 and R720xd. For the latest information on supported processors, visit Dell.com. Model Speed Cache QPI Cores Turbo TDP E5-2690 2.9GHz 20M 8.0GT/s 8 Yes 135W E5-2680 2.7GHz 20M 8.0GT/s 8 Yes 130W E5-2670 2.6GHz 20M 8.0GT/s 8 Yes 115W E5-2667 2.9GHz 15M 8.0GT/s 6 Yes 130W E5-2665 2.4GHz 20M 8.
The R720 can connect to the PowerEdge C410x through a host interface card (HIC) and an iPass cable. Both the NVIDIA® and Dell x16 HIC require one x16 PCIe slot. Each HIC can support up to four GPUs. The R720 can support up to four GPUs maximum. For a list of supported GPU HICs, see Table 18. Some operating systems have not been validated to support GPUs. See Table 24 and Table 25 for more information on operating system support of GPUs.
More memory options are available than ever before with the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd— greater capacities, higher frequencies, and more flexibility. The R720 and R720xd support up to 768GB of memory (24 DIMMs) and speeds up to 1600MT/s, providing high performance in a variety of applications. High memory density means there is no compromise when it comes to virtualization. Increase your uptime and reduce data loss due to Dell’s focus on reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) features.
Table 8 lists the DIMMs supported on the R720 and R720xd. For the latest information on supported memory, visit Dell.com. Only Capacity (GB) Speed (MT/s) Type Ranks per DIMM Data width SDDC support Voltage 2 1333 RDIMM 1 x8 Advanced ECC 1.35 2 1333 UDIMM 1 x8 Advanced ECC 1.35 2 1600 RDIMM 1 x8 Advanced ECC 1.5 4 1333 RDIMM 2 x8 Advanced ECC 1.35 4 1333 RDIMM 1 x4 All modes 1.35 4 1333 UDIMM 2 x8 Advanced ECC 1.35 4 1600 RDIMM 2 x8 Advanced ECC 1.
The R720 and R720xd support memory speeds of 1600MT/s, 1333MT/s, 1066MT/s, and 800MT/s depending on the DIMM types installed and the configuration. All memory on all processors and channels run at the same speed and voltage. By default, the systems run at the highest speed for the channel with the lowest DIMM voltage and speed. The operating speed of the memory is also determined by the maximum speed supported by the processor, the speed settings in the BIOS, and the operating voltage of the system.
Reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) features help keep the system online and operational without significant impact to performance, and can decrease data loss and crashing due to errors. RAS aids in rapid, accurate diagnosis of faults which require service. Table 10 describes the memory RAS features supported on the R720 and R720xd.
The Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd provide storage expandability that allows you to adapt to your workload and operational demands. With comprehensive storage options, the R720 and R720xd offer various drive types, internal and external storage controllers, and different chassis and backplanes for varied numbers of drives.
Table 12 lists the internal hard drives supported by the R720 and R720xd. For the latest information on supported hard drives, visit Dell.com/PowerEdge. Form factor 3.5” 2.5” Type Speed (rpm) Capacities SATA (3Gb) 7.2K 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB Nearline SAS (6Gb) 7.2K 1TB, 2TB, 3TB SAS (6Gb) 15K 300GB, 600GB SATA (3Gb) 7.2K 250GB, 500GB, 1TB Nearline SAS (6Gb) 7.
The R720 and R720xd support the external storage devices types listed in Table 13. For more storage information, see Dell.com/Storage.
Table 14 lists the RAID controllers supported on the R720 and R720xd.
The PowerEdge R720 supports one of the following internal optical drive options: DVD-ROM DVD+RW The R720xd does not support an internal optical drive. The R720 supports the Dell PowerVault RD1000 internal backup device on the 2.5-inch chassis only. Internal tape drives are not supported on the R720, and the R720xd does not support any internal backup device.
The Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd offer balanced, scalable I/O capabilities, including integrated PCIe 3.0-capable expansion slots. Dell Select Network Adapters, Dell’s network daughter cards, let you choose the right network fabric without using up a valuable PCI slot. Pick the speed, technology, vendor, and other options, such as switch independent partitioning, which lets you share and manage bandwidth on 10GbE connections.
Table 15 lists the available Select Network Adapter options and supported features for the R720 and R720xd.
Local or remote re-configuration of any NIC, physical or virtual PXE boot enabled on all LOM and NDCs for ease of use Boot from SAN (iSCSI, FCoE) configuration for networking devices through the Lifecycle Controller GUI For information on card installation, requirements, and slot priorities, see the PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner’s Manual on Support.Dell.com/Manuals. The R720 and R720xd provide greatly expanded PCIe slot capability over their predecessor servers.
Type Adapter ® Brocade BR1020 2x10Gb SFP+ QLogic QLE2460 4Gb QLogic QLE2462 4Gb QLogic QLE2560 8Gb FC4/FC8 HBAs QLogic QLE2562 8Gb ® Emulex LPe12000 8Gb Emulex LPe12002 8Gb Brocade BR815 8Gb Brocade BR825 8Gb In addition to the NICs and HBAs listed in Table 17, the supported PCIe expansion cards for the R720 and R720xd are listed in Table 18.
Lower overall system-level power draw is a result of Dell’s breakthrough system design. PowerEdge servers maximize performance per watt through a combination of power and cooling, energy efficient technologies, and tools. Additionally, PowerEdge servers have an extensive collection of sensors that automatically track thermal activity, which helps regulate temperature thereby reducing server noise and power consumption.
Feature Description uninterruptible power supplies. Intel Node Manager is an embedded technology that provides individual server-level power reporting and power limiting functionality. Dell offers a complete power management solution comprised of Intel Node Manager accessed through Dell iDRAC7 Enterprise and OpenManage Power Center that allows policy-based management of power and thermals at the individual server, rack, and data center level.
Figure 13 shows a 750W power supply unit extended from an R720 system. The PowerEdge R720 and R720xd support up to two AC or DC power supplies with 1 + 1 redundancy, auto sensing, and auto-switching capability. Dell PSUs have achieved Platinum and Titanium efficiency levels as shown in Table 20. Form factor Redundant 86mm Output Efficiency targets by load Class 10% 20% 50% 100% 495W AC Platinum 82.0% 90.0% 94.0% 91.0% 750W AC Titanium 90.0% 94.0% 96.0% 91.0% 750W AC Platinum 82.
inventory for system configurations. Temperature monitoring includes components such as processors, DIMMs, chipset, the inlet air ambient, hard disk drives, NDC, and GPU. Open and closed loop thermal fan speed control: Open loop thermal control uses system configuration to determine fan speed based on inlet air ambient temperature. Closed loop thermal control method uses feedback temperatures to dynamically determine proper fan speeds.
> > > > Using a GPU card: This results in an increase in overall system acoustics. PCIe controller-based SSD drives: Drives such as Express flash drives and Fusion-io cards require greater airflow for cooling, and result in significantly higher noise levels. Systems with an H310 PERC: This configuration may be quieter than those with an H710 PERC with battery backup. However, higher noise levels result when a system is configured as non-RAID.
The rack rail systems for the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd provide tool-less support for 4-post racks with square or unthreaded round mounting holes, including all generations of Dell racks. Compared to the predecessor R710 sliding rails that required the use of adapter brackets, the sliding rails for the R720 and R720xd now offer native support for threaded-hole racks with the new ReadyRails II mounting interface.
The static rails (shown in Figure 15) support a wider variety of racks than the sliding rails, but do not support serviceability in the rack and are not compatible with the CMA. One key factor in selecting the proper rails is identifying the type of rack in which they will be installed. Both the sliding rails and the static rails support tool-less mounting in 19”-wide, EIA-310-E compliant square hole and unthreaded round-hole 4-post racks.
The optional cable management arm (CMA) for the R720 and R720xd organizes and secures the cords and cables exiting the back of the server and unfolds to allow the server to extend out of the rack without having to detach the cables.
The Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd support a wide range of industry-standard operating systems and virtualization software. Table 24 lists the primary operating systems supported on the R720 and R720xd. For the latest information on supported operating systems, see Dell.com/OSsupport.
Support of the operating systems listed in Table 25 is limited to a virtual environment as a guest operating system. Please contact the software vendor for additional support or questions about running the operating system in a virtualized environment.
Whether your IT environment consists of a few servers or a few thousand servers, Dell OpenManage systems management solutions provide comprehensive management for evolving IT environments. OpenManage is based on open standards and provides agent-based and agent-free server lifecycle management functionality for Dell PowerEdge servers. OpenManage solutions help you automate and streamline essential hardware management tasks.
The Dell OpenManage systems management portfolio includes powerful hardware and software management tools and consoles. OpenManage simplifies the lifecycle of deploying, updating, monitoring, and maintaining your Dell PowerEdge servers. The Integrated Dell Remote Access Controller 7 (iDRAC7) with Lifecycle Controller is the heart of the second generation of Dell PowerEdge server embedded management functionality.
iDRAC7 Enterprise is available for the PowerEdge R720 and R720xd, and Dell also offers an option of iDRAC7 Express. A detailed feature comparison for iDRAC7 Enterprise and iDRAC7 Express is shown in Table 28. iDRAC7 Enterprise iDRAC7 Express Local configuration with Lifecycle Controller GUI ∞ ∞ IPMI 2.
iDRAC7 Enterprise Feature (function) Virtual flash partitions ∞ Virtual media ∞ Virtual folders ∞ Remote file share ∞ Crash video playback ∞ Boot record/playback ∞ Power capping ∞ Enterprise group power management ∞ Directory services (AD, LDAP) ∞ PK authentication ∞ Two-factor authentication 2 iDRAC7 Express ∞ 1 Requires OMSA agent on target server 2 ® ® Uses Microsoft ActiveX on Internet Explorer only Most systems management solutions require pieces of software, called agent
and to create asset reports. OpenManage Essentials also communicates health status alerts for Dell servers, storage, and network devices to the Dell KACE™ K1000 service desk. OpenManage Essentials is available as a no-charge software download from Support.Dell.com. Dell Management Console—Dell Management Console (DMC) offers sophisticated data-center management capabilities with comprehensive reporting features.
Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration (DLCI) for Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM)—This pack contains Dell Lifecycle Controller Integration (DLCI), which integrates OpenManage functions in SCCM to manage the Dell PowerEdge servers, including auto-discovery, operating system deployment and configuration of hardware elements, (RAID, NIC, BIOS, iDRAC), OS and hypervisor agnostic updates, firmware management, and system viewer utilities.
Table 29 lists the products that are available for one-to-one and one-to-many operations, and when they are used in the server’s lifecycle: Operation One-to-one Lifecycle Controller GUI DTK SBUU Symantec Deployment Server Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter KACE K1000 Appliance Lifecycle Controller Remote Services BMC BladeLogic integration with Lifecycle Controller Dell Server Deployment Pack (DSDP) for Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager and Dell Lifecycle Controller
Operation One-to-one One-to-many iDRAC7 OMSA Dell OpenManage Essentials Dell OpenManage ITA BMC ProactiveNet Performance Management Dell OpenManage Power Center Dell Management Console Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter BMC ProactiveNet Dell Server Management Pack Suite for Microsoft System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) IPMI iDRAC7 Lifecycle Controller GUI Lifecycle Controller Remote Services Remediate: Dell Server PRO Management Pack for Microsoft System Cen
Figure 18 details the dimensions of the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd chassis. Xa Xb Y Za (with bezel) Za (without bezel) Zb Zc 482.4mm 444.0mm 87.3mm 32.0mm 18.0mm 684.0mm 723.0mm Table 30 lists the weight of the R720 and R720xd chassis at maximum configuration as well as empty of any hardware. Configuration 54 R720 (2.5” chassis) R720 (3.5” chassis) R720xd (2.5” chassis) R720xd (3.5” chassis) 29.5kg (64.9lbs) 29.2kg (64.3lbs) 29.5kg (64.9lbs) 32.5kg (71.5lbs) 11.7kg (25.
Table 31 details the environmental specifications for the R720 and R720xd. For additional information about environmental measurements for specific system configurations, see Dell.com/environmental_datasheets. Fresh Air: temperature, humidity, altitude de-rating Continuous operation Expanded operation 10°C to 35°C (50°F to 95°F) at 10% to 80% relative humidity with 26°C (78.8°F) maximum dew point (maximum wet bulb temperature).
Maximum vibration Operating Storage 0.26 Grms at 5Hz to 350Hz in all orientations 1.87 Grms at 10Hz to 500Hz for 15 minutes (all six sides tested) Maximum shock Operating Half sine shock in all operational orientations of 31G +/– 5% with a pulse duration of 2.6ms +/– 10% Half sine shock on all six sides of 71G +/– 5% with a pulse duration of 2ms +/–10%; square wave shock on all six sides of 27G with velocity change at 235 in/sec or greater Storage Altitude Operating Storage –15.
The rack rail adjustability ranges are listed in Table 34. Server R720/R720xd Rail identifier Rail type Rail adjustability range (mm) Square Round Rail depth (mm) Threaded Min Max Min Max Min Max without CMA with CMA B6 Sliding 676 868 662 861 676 883 714 845 B4 Static 608 879 594 872 604 890 622 — The adjustment range of the rails is a function of the type of rack in which they are being mounted.
The R720 and R720xd systems conform to the industry standards in Table 35. Standard ACPI Advance Configuration and Power Interface Specification, v2.0c Ethernet IEEE 802.3-2005 HDG Hardware Design Guide Version 3.0 for Microsoft Windows Server IPMI Intelligent Platform Management Interface, v2.0 DDR3 Memory DDR3 SDRAM Specification, Rev. 3A LPC Low Pin Count Interface Specification, Rev. 1.1 PCI Express PCI Express Base Specification Rev. 2.0 and 3.
Table 36 provides a list of documents and websites that provide for more information on the Dell PowerEdge R720 and R720xd. Resource Description of contents Location PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Owner’s Manual This manual is provided in HTML format on the CD provided with the R720 or R720xd systems, and also in HTML and PDF format at the Dell support site. A printed version is available in Asian languages as a customerorderable option.
Resource Description of contents Location Energy Smart Solution Advisor (ESSA) The Dell online advisor console enables easier and more meaningful estimates to help you determine the most efficient configuration possible. Use ESSA to calculate the power consumption of your hardware, power infrastructure, and storage. Dell.com/ESSA Power and cooling technologies Provides details for improving energy efficiency in the data center. Dell.
PowerEdge R720 and R720xd Technical Guide
USB2.0 Key RJ45 DELL Select Network Adapter Front Video Rear Video Two Rear USB2.0 Ports USB2.0 IDSDM One Front USB2.
