Dell OptiPlex 7040 Micro: Teardown - Upgrade - Benchmarks

[@danielkerovec5950]

These Dell are the best ever, it can handle anything I throw at it. Mostly my music studio and everyday use. Defo recommend these to anyone with limited space in their room.

[@nguyhen4wd]

Finally the best video that i saw for this product, very detailed ! awesome job, man !

[@birddroppings32]

This is a great video with the way you show all the info and specs that are often harder to find for older machines! Things like the label on the PSU etc. Thanks!

[@lukasdoerr]

Small info, if you want to clean a disk in diskmgr - just open a cmd with admin rights, type diskpart -> list disk -> select disk X -> clean - and it should easily cleanup the whole disk for you

[@nheng6913]

Great video. Nice and clear video and voice. Also, a nice pace.

[@TaylorMMontgomery]

This is a great little machine to tuck under a counter or desk for POS or reception duties - pair it with a nice big monitor and it's a great value!

[@jensdbe]

Totally agree. I somehow like these tiny machines that are more than capable.

[@googleuser6875]

Great video. I recently picked up one of these, and actually impressed considering it's age. (Shows how old I am LOL)

[@LoftBits]

I got myself one of those during the lockdown, when WFH (my main PC - a Dell Precision wth countless Xeons - was too power hungry). I never looked back since, works perfect with W10 (I gave it 32GB RAM, Samsung SSD980 NVMe). Even some games are OK on the built-in Intel graphics: perhaps not the Call of Duty, but I could play Minecraft Java ed. with my daughter :-)

[@carlospetruccicp]

Got a renewed one today and I'm checking all this... some dust here and there but nothing too serious. I'll get an WD Green 480GB SSD drive (storage) and a nvme 128gb m.2 for the OS (it came without the wifi card but that can be fixed with an usb wifi adapter)

[@Gillysaurxx]

Love this. Also super easy to upgrade

[@johnnieadelby6913]

I just ordered a 7040 i5-6500T with SSD 256 Intel NVMe and 16GB DDR4 RAM because I need a "slave". It costs PHP 4,350 which is equivalent to US$ 74.42 Greetings from a Dane in the Philippines. :)

[@frankmolina2076]

I have a 3050 and use Linux mint on it for the garage mancave. It really is super fast with Linux.

[@florider_hd]

Its actually upgradable at that size?? how amazing

[@zoomosis]

I wish laptops were this easy to work on!

[@helifynoe9930]

I have a DELL 7070 SFF version. Geekbench results are Single core = 1430, and Multi-core = 5285. AJA System test MB/Sec Write = 2772, and Read = 1703. AJA F/Sec Write = 525, and Read = 322. Some of these results are bizarre. In many different types of tests, the Write function is always much faster than the Read. Any ideas ???

[@dalemacdonald201]

Nice video. Very informative. What is the access door on the bottom of the case used for?

[@jeremylindemann5117]

Is the mounting for the cooler a standard pattern? I'm wondering if I can put a better aftermarket cooler on it if I move the board into a bigger case.

[@jensdbe]

As far as I can see everything is pretty custom-made/proprietary for this machine.

[@lylyhoussem3396]

You have to upgrade m2 nvme 2280 juste pul thz sticker and you can move the screw back the white line show that posqible for 2280 nvme

[@kasunseneviratne5754]

Can this pc use normal desktop processor instead of T model processor. Ex: i5 desktop processor instead of using i7 7700T...

[@asrarullahkhan7970]

Very very best video can I use i5 6500 CPU without t series

[@sayonakoh6672]

Hi what's your idle temperature and full load temperature with ambient room?

[@nil3010]

Is it possible to upgrade the wifi to wifi 7 ?

[@zTech300]

great video

[@MdImtiyaz-yn5uf]

Thanks for informative video, does it’s display port and Hdmi port support 4K? If not then what’s max resolution it can support.

[@jensdbe]

For sure the DisplayPort supports 4K@60Hz, not sure if that is also the case for the HDMI port as it is has a HDMI 1.4 port which should be able to do 4k@24Hz

[@Milena-ix5mq]

What is the chip bellow the SSD bracket for? Perhaps the chipset... Shouldn't it be heat-isolated as well?

[@jensdbe]

That's indeed the chipset but doesn't seem it needs any cooling

[@gino3286]

Hi thank you for the very valuable testing I have a question How do you rate its video performance ? does it play youtube full hd 1080p content smoothly ? Speaking of disk i think it supports NVME disks ... great option

[@jensdbe]

It plays full HD and even 4K (for example from KZbin) perfectly fine. It does support NVMe, which is definitely a nice boost in performance.

[@gino3286]

@@jensdbe hi thank you so much for your very kind and valuable reply i will get one soon i was thinking to the Raspberry but i like this one too much its form factor is perfect from my needs Thanks again and kind regards Gino

[@khurramchaudhry7325]

@@jensdbe but ony 4k at 30Hz due to HDMI 1.4?

[@dimitrikatsaros9212]

Thank you so much for this! One pair of questions I have remaining is about the M.2 slot currently occupied by that network card: Can it be populated with a second SSD instead (if you use ethernet for networking, ofc)? If so, is it possible to run two SSDs in raid configuration or must they remain as separate drives?

[@jensdbe]

As far as I know, the second slot can't be used for an SSD. it's wifi/bluetooth exclusive.

[@dimitrikatsaros9212]

@@jensdbe Drat... it would be interesting to find out how the connection or supporting circuitry is different that makes mounting a drive not possible. Not everyone needs wifi, but anyone could use more storage. 🙂

[@stephencox4224]

@@dimitrikatsaros9212 Look at some later ones like the HP 800 G3 or 800 G4 that support the 7th gen and 8th gen Intel CPU's both have 2 NVME slots as well as 2.5 inch drive bays. Some models such as the Lenovo Tiny P 330 P 320 P 340 etc also have what is a laptop Video card on an PCI expansion slot both HP and Dell have similar options in the I litre size then there are the 2.7 Litre sizes sold as Workstations like the HP Z2 Mini series

[@puppy_BYTE]

1. How quiet?, 2. can NVME can be used to boot?

[@jensdbe]

1) It's not as quiet as a Mac Mini as you can hear the fan from time to time during higher workloads. 2) Sure

[@suspiciousstew1169]

My dad used to have a mac mini and that computer was one of the loudest I heard in my entire life (with the exception of me replacing the stock cooler on my old desktop with a shitty thermaltake one that I later reverted) Haven’t really stress tested it but I remember the mini constantly being pegged at max fan while the optiplex just chills

[@testos2701]

I got another Dell micro that stopped working after a few years, it has an I7 CPU, can I use that on the one I'm using now which is the Dell Optiplex 7040 micro PC and has the i5-6500T CPU?

[@jensdbe]

Only 6th generation Intel Core CPUs are supported and for the 7040 micro specific, only the T-version sue to yhe limited cooling options. Also it's not because it is an i7 it is necessarily faster than this i5

[@Alex-lg3xb]

​@@jensdbeCan you please tell me the chipset in the installed Q170 motherboard? If yes, then the official Intel website states that 6th and 7th generation processors are supported, are you able to check this?

[@etow8034]

Would have liked to see the performance of the built in graphics adapter as it is the weak point of these micro PCs as you cannot upgrade as per a regular PC. I am thinking of using one of these as my main PC as they are quiet, energy efficient and an inexpensive non proprietary power supply unlike on their other SFF PCs.

[@jensdbe]

In general, don't expect a lot of the graphics performance. If you like, I can still run the compute benchmark in Geekbench 5 (which uses the iGPU) and share the results here :)

[@etow8034]

@@jensdbe If the built in Intel HD graphics adapter is on par with a Nvidia Quadro 2000 then it is more than enough for me.

[@stephencox4224]

Lenovo P 330 P 320 P340 in 1 Litre size use a dedicated laptop based Graphics card as they also run a PCIE expansion slot then there are the 2.7 litre sized HP Z 2 series which are still small but can use workstation graphics cards they usually come with standard, These cards are surprisingly good compared to traditional Gaming cards

[@MangoOverHeaven]

Hi, so I got one today and I'm having a problem where it doesn't connect to my monitor. The cable isn't the problem since I used the same one to connect to a different pc and monitor, and the monitor isn't the problem since it connected just fine to my other pc. Which leaves the Micro PC itself to be the problem. Each time I'd connect it to the monitor it'd say no signal before the screen went black. And I can't go into the monitors menu to switch outputs. I wanted to know if there is a easy fix for this.

[@mudit1]

Try swapping the ram in a different slot or try to use only single ram with either slot which ever works if this don't work then try with new ram and replace the CMOS battery with new one and try reseating the cpu. And also try display port And if all this don't work your motherboard is dead , transfer the cpu storage ram to a new cabinet and motherboard

[@hagener87]

Hi, Is there an upgrade CPU fan? The fan noise is getting on my nerves. Even if it has few Rpm.

[@legitxe8491]

very nice video. because of you i could add an extra nvme 500 GB apart from 1 TB HDD. i want to know what maximum graphics card can i upgrade to. any suggestion will be greatly helpful. thanks :)

[@jensdbe]

There isn't really a way to upgrade the graphics in this tiny machine as there are no PCIe slots. It is using the built-in graphics from the CPU. In theory you can add an eGPU but I have no experience with that at all.

[@legitxe8491]

@@jensdbe Thank you bro for your reply

[@JAFOpty]

HI! is the m.2 slot SATA only or could you install a newer nvme drive?

[@DutchVanDerLindo]

U can instala nvme drive too

[@ArunRaj-kq9ov]

Please let me know whether we could connect old SATA based HDD to read data to this PC?

[@jensdbe]

Sure it has space and connection for a 2,5" SATA HD or SSD. That should work fine.

[@hatemkamal1682]

Is the wireless card AC?

[@TheXbox720]

What's the difference between i5 6500 and i5 6500t? Can we put i5 6500 in this?

[@jensdbe]

I cover the differences in detail at kzbin.info/www/bejne/j3Koq3ylZqidr8U in the video. Regarding upgrading, as a regular i5 6500 has a TDP of 65W on its own and the machine comes with a 65W power supply for the whole system, I don't think this will work.

[@TheXbox720]

@@jensdbe yeah, I was thinking the same!

[@siilias7345]

I have an exact one like this, but my fan seems to run randomly on high-low speeds. Can you change the fan speeds in windows? I am running ubuntu and at the moment the only way to change that is to reconfigure it myself.

[@gdiaz8827]

Might try checking in BIOS

[@kiranjoshi2025]

Nice comprehensive technical review. Thanks for sharing. Can you pls suggest highly reliable dell optiplex, I want following requirements 1) i3 8th gen 2) maximum USB 3.0 ports 3) USB type C port 4) NVMe gen3 or gen4 M.2 Ssd slots 5) SATA port 6) windows 11 plus office licence I am looking for refurbished pc. Pls suggest which is better for reliability ~ micro, mini or SFF. Thanks.

[@haiderm1384]

Can the wifi card be replaced with hard drive instead and be used as the boot?

[@jensdbe]

I haven't tried it myself but as far as I know M.2. SSDs can't be just plugged in the same slot. I know there are adapters available that would have a short cable to a slot that does work with an M.2 SSD. Since that Wifi M.2 connector has less PCIe lanes, performance wouldn't be ideal either. So in general it makes more sense to replace the main storage SSD with a bigger/better model instead.

[@silvanigra]

No thermal paste on CPU? Is that how it's supposed to be?

[@jensdbe]

There was thermal paste on the CPU before and I put fresh thermal paste before putting back the heatsink (see kzbin.info/www/bejne/j3Koq3ylZqidr8U). Always better to do this properly for sure.

[@gunaldo7]

Can an amd radeon rx6400 fit in this and if not what other gpus can fit?

[@jensdbe]

@@gunaldo7 nothing really that would fit in the enclosure. You could opt for an eGPU but not sure if you really want that due to the overhead and separate case and power supply.

[@bertvantol9669]

2 questions: 1. Does this Mini PC support Windows 11 ?? 2. Does this Mini PC support M2 NVMe ??

[@DIMONSE123]

I buy this and have preinstalled windows 11. So no problem here Yea, i put one works fine. For linux work don’t forget disable intel raid support in sata section bios

[@DutchVanDerLindo]

Supports win11 and nvme drive

[@RTB8978]

How were thermals when testing?

[@jensdbe]

In general pretty good but the fan noise is higher than what I expected. Nothing too disturbing but noisy in comparison with an iMac for example.

[@destes100]

So you can do an cpu upgrade for that motherboard?

[@jensdbe]

You can upgrade to another 6th gen CPU with a maximum TDP of 35W. Which brings this down to the i7 6700T. Only the performance difference is minimal compared to the currently installed 6500T unfortunately.

[@miaso130]

Theoretically you can upgrade to 65w non-T cpu (at least since 7050 generation) and it was even a factory option. But the heatsink for 65w was different, so if you don’t already have it - it’s not worth all the trouble for extra 20% performance and 2x fan noise.

[@andrewmcnulty0]

Whats the largest capacity 2.5 hdd you can put in this dell 7040?

[@jensdbe]

According to the spec sheet, the maximum supported is 2TB although I see multiple people that used 4TB without issues.

[@miaso130]

There is no limitation on TB size of the drive, but currently drives 5TB and up only come as “fat” 15mm height drives. Plastic mounting bracket will only fit up to 9.5mm drives. So without messing with the mounting 4tb is your max.

[@songsmusicstrackworld6864]

we can use laptop ram in Dell OptiPlex mini ?

[@jensdbe]

Sure, its exactly that type of RAM

[@TheUrbanRebel]

I wonder if it's possible to install a the normal i5-6500 processor?

[@jensdbe]

In contrary to the OptiPlex 7060, I don't think it is possible here. The maximum mentioned power supply is 65W while the TDP for an i5 6500 alone is that full 65W.

[@TheUrbanRebel]

@@jensdbe thanks👍🏻

[@jeroensmaal]

I have one that came with an i5-6500. It did also come with a 135W power supply (just a normal Dell laptop power supply). It's running absolutely fine.

[@indioarmani8209]

Can you add low profile vga?

[@jensdbe]

No, there is no PCIe slot in this machine and even if there would be, the whole device is about the size of a low profile GPU :)

[@deathnsd6953]

could I use just the two M2 slots with 2 M2 PCIe NVMe SSD's one 2280 and a 2230 one for boot and one for storage? maybe install heatsinks and loose the blue plastic?

[@jensdbe]

As far as I know, the WLAN M.2 cannot be used for storage unfortunately. So you can only use the left one for NVMe or SATA M.2 SSD

[@mikepxg6406]

I am running MacOS on mine.

[@jensdbe]

Nice to hear. I do plan on looking into a Hackintosh as well. Just need to find some time for that.

[@yarednevarez7388]

Is there a way to get an external GPU connected to this little PC?

[@jensdbe]

There is no PCIe slot in the device and not Thunderbolt ports so I'm afraid there isn't any option to have an eGPU here.

[@yarednevarez7388]

@@jensdbe thanks!

[@WhackTony]

where is the gpu can it be upgraded?

[@jensdbe]

There isn't really a way to upgrade the graphics in this tiny machine as there are no PCIe slots. It is using the built-in graphics from the CPU. In theory you can add an eGPU but I have no experience with that at all.

[@WhackTony]

@jensdbe thanks for clarifying 👍

[@pf2858]

I'm sorry to say but Microsoft Windows 11 is not supported on 6th gen Intel CPU'S. It may be installed and work at moment but Microsoft will eventually turn off any security updates on unsupported hardware at any time. Rendering your PC vulnerable. Only Intel 8th gen and AMD Ryzen 3000 and above are supported. Just friendly advice.

[@maximschitik8029]

Who runs Win11 anyway

[@MOLDIA1]

That a lie because I got this exact same NUC from my job for free and installed windows 11 on it right away and run it as a server

[@jesperlundbyrasmussen7844]

Same. Have forced it on the machine but it was buggy as hell

[@meric7118]

Can we put 6tb hhd in this

[@jensdbe]

Sure, that shouldn't be an issue

[@danielpixa2305]

What RAM did you use?

[@jensdbe]

two times 8GB DDR4 2133Mhz SoDIMM

[@danielpixa2305]

@@jensdbe Thanks! do you think that CPU cooler can be replaced with Noctua NH-L9i (low profile)? I see that in the original cpu fan there is this small funnel that covers the heatsing, probably creating necessary airflow. So i am bit worried if I put noctua there, it will destroy the airflow. Or maybe I could change thermal paste, after all its 2015 model and it could be a bit dried out (My fan makes quite a noise, thats why I wonder what to do). My temperature is around 60 Celsius normally. But noise is quite annoying

[@toast4065]

do you think i could put a ryzen 9 in it?

[@jensdbe]

The chipset won't support that and the socket is different, so afraid that's not an option.

[@toast4065]

@@jensdbe no workarounds?

[@jensdbe]

@@toast4065 it physically doesn't fit in the socket

[@toast4065]

@@jensdbe whoever designed this better count them days bruh i just bought a ryzen 9 to see if it would work

[@jensdbe]

@@toast4065 there are no machines/motherboards out there at all that support both Intel and AMD CPUs. This is just never possible in any machine. It's been since the Socket 7 days (1990's) that was possible. Hope you can send the Ryzen back :)

[@Raidergeek34]

can it support 3200MHz?

[@DutchVanDerLindo]

Yup

[@GigaChadGaming1293]

what cpu is there

[@jensdbe]

This box has an Intel Core i5 6500T

[@nathanruben3372]

Far better than running raspberry pi

[@jensdbe]

Its a bit of a different use case but yeah, for most applications this is a lot more powerful.

[@ajingolk7716]

No gpu 😢

[@laurencejohnson4106]

A neat computer. Perhaps this will be of interest, the link below shows a video about an older type of mini pc., the HP., Compaq 8200, it's a bit larger than your computer and it has two fans, it's maximum amount of ram., is 16 gig., of ddr3, it's younger sibling the 8300 can also take 16 gig., of ddr3 and it has usb 2 and usb 3 ports. I have found those computers simple to overhaul and upgrade and that they work well with a Linux OS., installed. kzbin.info/www/bejne/monLlJWMoNZnrpo

[@Anjumshireen]

Bro can we play pubg game in it ??

[@ADHD_Gamer]

This is not designed for gaming old gaming yes! Modern gaming and MMOs no