Dell's New Gaming PC is Cool, Literally

I got a peek at the Dell XPS 710 H2C Edition, the water-cooled gaming system that Michael Dell announced at his CES keynote address. It's really big, really quiet (as far as I could tell in a hotel room), and--based on the components I saw loaded inside--should be pretty darn fast. At $5499, it's pretty expensive too.

The Dell XPS 710 itself isn't new. That gaming machine was released last year. What's new is the H2C water-cooling system. A Dell spokesperson explained that this two-step cooling system combines a liquid radiator, similar to what's used in cars, with a ceramic plate technology, akin to the cooling system used in space satellites.

He said that the combination can cool the processor environment to 23 degrees centigrade with minimal noise. You can read more about H2C cooling on the Dell XPS 710 H2C Edition product Web page.

The unit I saw had a "piano black" finish on an angled case with a black grill on the front. It houses an Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 processor overclocked to 3.2-GHz, 4GB of dual-channel 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM, and two 160GB 10000-RPM drives that can be upgraded to a maximum 2TB of storage. Two Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX graphics boards each have 768MB of memory, and a Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeMusic sound card rounds out the package.

The XPS 710 H2C Edition comes with a 20-inch display for this price. Dell was showing the PC with the $1399 2707WFP, a beautiful 27-inch flat-panel display with a 3000:1 contrast ratio. This PC is available now for order.

My colleague Melissa J. Perenson also saw this Dell
and here are her impressions.

Dell decided to add a watercooling system to its flagship XPS 710 gaming PC--because if your desktop is tricked out with the latest processor and graphics card(s) it can get hot inside.

The XPS 710 H2Ceramic Edition marks Dell's first foray into a watercooling system, previously the realm of boutique gaming systems.

The design of its cooling system is more elegant than other implementations I've seen; and, it's Dell's own, patent-pending design. The intention of the system, says Dell, is to better cool the processor to help the system run more reliably, even when the system is overclocked.

Another first: Dell will be shipping the system with its Intel Core Extreme QX6700 quad-core CPU overclocked at the factory to 3.2-GHz; Dell warranties the CPU against failure.

Dell's technology is a two-stage process. According to the company, the first step is a liquid-to-air heat exchanger that works like a car's radiator removes does to remove much of the heat generated by the processor.

Then a fluid chiller takes yet more heat away, using ceramic-based thermoelectric cooling modules, such as those used in NASA's space shuttle. Internal sensors regulate the temperature to keep the CPU at healthy level.

For more up-to-the-minute blogs, stories, photos, and video from the nation's largest consumer electronics show, please visit PC World's CES 2007 Live Coverage Infocenter.

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