DELL PowerEdge R740xd2 26 Bay 3.5" 2U rack server 2x Xeon Platinum 8260 2.4GHz 24C 64GB DDR4 HBA330

Storage Density & Compute Power

The Dell PowerEdge R740xd2 is a 2U rack server built for data-intensive workloads that demand high storage capacity in a compact form factor. It ships with dual Intel Xeon Platinum 8260 processors, each running at 2.4 GHz with a 3.9 GHz turbo frequency and 24 cores. The system includes 64 GB of DDR4-2933 ECC registered memory across four 16 GB modules, leaving twelve slots free for expansion up to 1 TB. A Dell PERC HBA330 controller manages the 26 front-accessible 3.5-inch drive trays.

Ideal for Storage-First Deployments

This platform suits organisations building software-defined storage clusters, backup repositories or media archives where drive count outweighs PCIe expansion space. The dual 10/25 GbE SFP28 OCP mezzanine card and dual 1 GbE LOM provide high-throughput networking for distributed file systems. Buyers who require multiple full-height PCIe add-in cards, GPU acceleration or a 1U footprint should evaluate alternative chassis designs. The included iDRAC 9 Enterprise licence enables comprehensive remote management for lights-out operations.

26-Bay 3.5-Inch Drive Capacity

The defining specification is the 26 hot-swap 3.5-inch drive bays in a 2U enclosure, delivering exceptional density for SAS and SATA media. This bay count directly determines how much raw storage the server can present to applications such as Ceph, ZFS or Windows Storage Spaces. The HBA330 controller presents drives without RAID abstraction, making it suitable for software-defined storage layers that manage redundancy themselves. Power redundancy is provided by two 1100 W platinum-efficiency supplies.