Can Dell's New Workstation 3660 run Windows-7 ?

[dan99t]

Hi,

I bought a new Dell workstation 3660 with

i-7 12700
2 NVIDIA T-600 Cards To Run 8 Monitors
Win-11 Pro
3 M.2 512GB NVMe & 3 SATA 4TB 5400 RPM HDDs
Eight 24 inch Monitors ( 1920 x 1200 ) Resolution

I am facing several issues like Font size + Clipped Fonts in Windows explorer file & folder names if I try to increase Text size or scale + 2 Monitors out of 8 has different resolution, Microphone does not work or detect etc. Very similar issues faced by many people using Windows-11.

Currently I am using 10 year old Dell workstation T-7500 with 12 Monitors & Win-7 with no issues for last 10 years. But now cpu & other fans are making noise & age gets to me so I bought above new Dell 3660 Workstation.

4 different Dell engineers have been working on it for last 2 weeks with no results.

I have never used any newer versions of Windows like Win-8 or 10. I have to finish the current project that I am working & I feel very comfortable with Win-7 even without any updates since 2020.

So my question is can I install Win-7 on a different New M.2 NVMe SSD & use it in current new system that I just bought with specs shown above ? And if yes or no, what problems would I run into it ?

Thank You.

 

[jpiniero]

I looked, and nVidia doesn't have any posted Windows 7 drivers for the T600.

 

[mikeymikec]

IMO the short answer is no, based purely on the fact that Dell only lists drivers for Win10. On that point, be aware that Dell often uses Dell-customised hardware that only installs with Dell drivers.

Another thing to be aware of is that Intel have historically gone out of their way to ensure their hardware doesn't work on software platforms they don't want it to (e.g. workstation hardware with a Windows Server OS), and they're very pal'y with Microsoft who absolutely don't want you to be running Win7 (e.g. the Win7 update that disables WU on =>2017 hardware).

Also, Win11 is optimised for Alder Lake hardware (the P and E cores are utilised correctly on that version). I'd have to be really bored with my life to try and ensure that a non-compliant version of Windows is using the correct core at any given moment.

The jump from Win7 to Win11 is pretty basic. I show my customers maybe 3 things that are significantly different to what they're used to and I don't get regular call-backs for more 'OS difference' assistance. I've recently helped a couple of customers migrate from WinXP to Win11, now that's a jump

By all means try it on a hobby basis, but I assume that this is a serious production system and on that basis I'd strongly recommend against wasting your time on such a venture. I'd also expect Win11 to be better at multi-display setups and scaling than a version as old as Win7.

 

[dan99t]

I looked, and nVidia doesn't have any posted Windows 7 drivers for the T600.

You are correct.
Thank You

 

[dan99t]

mikeymikec
You seem to have extensive knowledge on everything you say & I am glad you took time to explain many issues.
(1) Can you please tell me what are 3 things that you explain your customers who jump from Win-7 to Win-11 ?
(2) I am used to having many open Windows explorer folders & Chrome icons on my taskbar in Win-7 instead of just one in Win-11 ( Please look at attachment ) How do I do that in Win-11 ?
(3) You are right, I am not going to waste my time. But if you can solve two HUGE problems in Win-11, I would be eternally grateful. (A) Tiny fonts on menu bars & windows explorer file & folder names. I tried everything like changing Text size & scale & many combinations of two but nothing works & googling I found that I am not the only one with those problems. (B) If I change Text size or scale, File & Folder names get clipped. Please look at attachments. I work with 8 ( 24 Inch ) Monitors so I have to keep a distance of 4 to 5 feet to be able to keep an eye on them. Win-7 lets me do that with 12 Monitors currently.

Please help.
Thank You

 

[mikeymikec]

1: Since Win8, Microsoft very much tries to railroad users into signing into Windows with Microsoft online accounts. The advantage of this is a more cloud-based way of thinking whereby a user can sign in to multiple Microsoft devices with the same credentials and carry information across between devices. The disadvantages are privacy-related and also an increased level of vulnerability for your personal data as it's accessible via an account stored on the Internet rather than just your own computer. As the advantage isn't relevant for me and many of my customers, I advise against signing into Windows with Microsoft accounts. If one is signing in with a traditional 'local' account (you're used to that on Win7), then MS likes to occasionally throw up messages during the login process and occasionally when firing up certain MS apps asking you whether you would like to sign in, and it's still possible to decline or to select the 'Microsoft apps only' option (e.g. you need to use Skype), so it doesn't affect the login process.

Secondly, Win10/11 has a notification system that is visible next to the clock (Win10 has a speech bubble icon, Win11 shows a blue circle with a number in when there are new notifications).

I also show customers how to shut down their computer

I think those are the normal points I cover.

2: We park our cars in the same garage I too configure Windows in that way and it gets my goat that Win11 doesn't have that option by default. It might be worth browsing the Windows / Operating Systems sub-forums here, as there's a bit of software recommended for Win11 to make changes of this sort. I don't know the software's name off the top of my head, and while I'm setting up Win11 for customers, none have specifically asked for that feature yet and I don't use Win11 myself (I migrated to Linux from Win7 and use Win10 for gaming).

3: You've gone about altering scaling in a way that logically results in that problem. Revert the settings you've changed back to their defaults (this is important!), then the single setting you need to change can be found by right-clicking on a blank part of the desktop, select 'display settings', and change the 'scale' setting to whichever percentage you want. With that setting, everything on the screen scales consistently in my experience. Immediately after changing that setting you may notice some blurrier elements on the screen, just sign out and back in and everything should look clear again and from that point on.