Desktop workstations always bring a sense of excitement when they hit our bench, especially when one arrives with a 96-core AMD Threadripper Pro 9995WX processor, 512GB (yes, gigabytes) of memory, and dual Nvidia RTX Pro 6000 “Blackwell” professional graphics cards, each with 96GB of dedicated video memory. Dell’s Precision 7875 (starts at $6,714.02; roughly $92,000(!) as tested) is an unapologetically high-end machine, delivering highly scalable performance while meeting enterprise requirements for security, reliability, and extensive Independent Software Vendor (ISV) certifications. With near-limitless options for datacenter-class hardware in a tower that fits on a desk, the Precision 7875 delivers in every measurable way. For high-end workstations, it’s a natural Editors' Choice award winner.

Configurations: Enterprise Reliability, Exceptional Scaling

As desktop workstations go, the base Precision 7875 configuration is intentionally barebones, designed for scaling to the intended workload. In our review sample's case, that means data science and heavy AI development. True, the $86,000 price difference between the entry-level and fully configured models will make the average consumer shudder. But this pricing carries far less shock in the enterprise world, where productivity, reliability, and uptime are paramount. That kind of mammoth investment means that buyers want a machine for mission-critical work, particularly in an era when component shortages continue to constrain availability and impact pricing. (To see why the configuration we tested is so pricey, consider that just the eight 64GB DDR5 ECC RDIMMs in our system ring up at $27,850.)

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The Threadripper Pro platform at the Precision's heart enables remarkable scaling. Processor options range from 12 to 96 cores, paired with eight memory channels that support up to 2TB of error-correcting (ECC) RAM and an impressive 144 PCIe channels. For context, AMD’s and Intel’s flagship non-workstation processors, the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X and Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, top out at just 24 PCIe lanes. All that bandwidth lets the Precision 7875 run multiple high-end GPUs alongside speedy PCIe storage and specialized add-in cards without throttling bandwidth.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Security and integrity also underpin the Precision 7875’s design. The machine leverages Dell’s SafeBIOS and Trusted Device Stack to cryptographically validate its BIOS and other low-level firmware against known-good signatures in Dell’s cloud infrastructure. (Translation: It helps identify otherwise undetectable tampering.) Dell’s tightly-controlled supply chain also reduces the risk of mischief before a system reaches a customer, a valuable consideration for high-security and regulated industries. In addition, the system provides self-encrypting storage, a lockable chassis, intrusion detection, and Dell’s ControlVault hardware-based security solution, which stores and processes sensitive data, such as credentials, outside the operating system.

As expected from a high-end workstation, the Precision 7875 has a full suite of ISV certifications, which guarantee stability with many professional apps. (See Dell’s website for a full list.) The standard warranty gives you three years of coverage with on-site service.

Design: Built for Serious Workloads

Dell’s Precision 7875 maintains the brand’s professional, minimalistic look. It's big—17.4 by 6.8 by 18.3 inches (HWD)—but its nondescript design doesn't hint at the powerful hardware inside. Depending on the configuration, the machine weighs between 40 and 56 pounds, making the front carry handle more of a requirement than a convenience. The sturdy chassis combines rolled steel with plastics that contain up to 41% post-consumer recycled material. A small but thoughtful touch: The system can operate vertically or horizontally, with extra rubber feet on the right panel.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Front-panel connectivity is practical and arranged well. Here, you’ll find two USB-C (10Gbps) ports, two USB-A (5Gbps) connections, a headset jack, and a full-size SD-card reader, with the power button at the top. Our unit also features a slimline DVD+/-RW optical drive. Above it, the Precision 7875 includes two FlexBays configured for storage, each housing a 4TB SSD. You can order the bays with locks, and the drives are quickly removable for secure environments.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

The Precision 7875 also gives you excellent rear I/O: three USB-C (10Gbps) ports, three USB-A (5Gbps) connections, dual Ethernet jacks (1Gbps and 10Gbps), line-out audio, and optional Serial and PS/2 ports. Our unit has an added PCIe USB-C/DisplayPort card and an Intel X710-DA2 adapter providing dual 10GbE Small Form Factor pluggable (SFP+) connections. For monitor hookups, each RTX Pro 6000 features four DisplayPort outputs.

The left door uses a lockable latch and supports optional intrusion protection. Inside, a large airflow guide dominates the view, channeling air across the Threadripper Pro’s massive heatsink and its eight flanking memory DIMM slots. Two rear fans to extract heat from the airflow guide. The top-mounted 1,350-watt power supply is optional; dual GPUs require more power than the standard 1,000W unit offers. Importantly, the Precision 7875 operates on a standard 15A wall outlet with a C13 plug—no need for the 18A/C19 connectors sometimes seen in high-end workstations.

(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)

Dell's proprietary motherboard uses an AMD Pro 695 chipset rather than the consumer-grade WRX90E. It delivers truly impressive expansion potential: two M.2 2280 drive slots and six full-height PCIe slots (one Gen5 and one Gen4 x16, one Gen5 x8, and three Gen4 x8). Dell offers many options to fill these slots, including the dual RTX Pro 6000 Max-Q Workstation Edition GPUs, Intel X710 10GbE network cards, USB-C I/O cards, SATA/SAS RAID controllers, and PCIe storage modules. Naturally, you could add your own aftermarket components as well.

Serviceability is important for maximum uptime, and you can swap most of the Precision 7875’s components in minutes without tools. You can even remove the front fans without tools, and the GPUs feature quick-release levers. Throughout my testing, the cooling system remained quiet and composed, even with the CPU fully stressed for extended periods—no easy feat, given that the Threadripper Pro 9995WX calls for 350W of power.

Performance Testing: 96 Cores and Two GPUs Make One Dragster of a Workstation

As we said, the Precision 7875 configuration we tested is a spectacular example of what this tower can do. AMD’s 96-core Threadripper Pro 9995WX is the foundation, backed by 512GB of eight-channel RAM and equipped with dual Nvidia RTX Pro 6000 Max-Q Workstation Edition GPUs. For storage, it packs a pair of 4TB M.2 2280 SSDs in the FlexBays configured in RAID 0, with Windows 11 Pro installed on the volume.

Our comparison lineup is equally formidable, though none is a true apples-to-apples match for the Precision 7875. You can configure workstations in countless ways, so these systems serve as points of reference rather than direct competitors. The 2025 Falcon Northwest Talon ($30,137 as tested) pairs the same Threadripper Pro 9995WX chip, albeit liquid-cooled, with a single RTX Pro 6000 and 256GB of RAM. The $12,223 Lenovo ThinkStation PX configuration represents one of the few remaining dual-socket workstation towers, with dual Intel Xeon server-class chips. The remaining systems are entry-level workstations: The Dell Pro Max Tower T2 ($14,349 as tested) and the $6,766 Lenovo ThinkStation P3 Tower Gen 2 configuration. Both use consumer-grade Core Ultra 9 Series 2 processors instead of proper workstation chips.

Pricing varies widely across this category, and most of these systems are purchased (often in volume) through enterprise channels. As a result, we’ll avoid direct pricing comparisons and instead focus on performance characteristics and relative positioning.

Productivity and Content Creation Tests

Our primary overall benchmark, UL's PCMark 10, puts a system through its paces in productivity apps ranging from web browsing to word processing and spreadsheet work. Its Full System Drive subtest measures a PC's storage throughput. (PCMark 10's main test wouldn’t run on the Precision 7875, but that’s not unusual for a system equipped with hardware this specialized.)

Three more tests we rely on are CPU-centric or processor-intensive: Maxon's Cinebench 2024 uses that company's Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene; Primate Labs' Geekbench 6.3 Pro simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning; and we see how long it takes the video transcoder HandBrake 1.8 to convert a 12-minute clip from 4K to 1080p resolution.

Finally, workstation maker Puget Systems' PugetBench for Creators rates a PC's image-editing prowess through a variety of automated operations in the seminal photo editor Adobe Photoshop 25.

Starting with storage testing, the 7875 delivered an excellent result, trailing only Dell’s Pro Max Tower and posting one of the highest scores we’ve recorded. Cinebench is the only CPU test that fully exploits the Threadripper Pro’s vast core and thread count, and the Precision 7875 didn’t disappoint here. It finished essentially tying Falcon Northwest’s Talon, with both systems producing the highest scores we’ve ever recorded.

HandBrake tells a different story: This test doesn’t leverage more than a dozen or so cores, which explains why Dell’s Pro Max Tower and Lenovo’s ThinkStation P3 could keep pace with the far more formidable Precision 7875. Geekbench scales better, and the Precision 7875 and Talon again posted similar scores, well ahead of the Pro Max Tower and ThinkStation P3. Photoshop also failed to leverage the Precision 7875’s immense resources, but come on—no one's buying this beast for photo editing.

Graphics Tests

We challenge all systems’ graphics with a quintet of animations or gaming simulations from UL's 3DMark test suite. The first two, Wild Life (1440p) and Wild Life Extreme (4K), use the Vulkan graphics API to measure GPU speeds. The next pair, Steel Nomad's regular and Light subtests, focuses on APIs more commonly used for game development to assess gaming geometry and particle effects. Last up, we turn to 3DMark Solar Bay to measure ray-tracing performance.

These tests primarily measure gaming performance with consumer-class GPUs—not the rendering accuracy that professional workstation drivers prioritize—but they still serve as a useful indicator of raw horsepower. Falcon’s Talon and, more notably, Dell’s Pro Max Tower, beat out the Precision 7875. It’s not surprising: The Precision 7875 uses the RTX Pro 6000 Max-Q Workstation Edition, which is limited to 300W, while the others leverage the full-fat 600W version. Note also that none of these tests leverages the second GPU, leaving the Precision 7875’s potential mostly untapped. The true use case for these dual GPUs is AI development, with large models that would exceed the 96GB footprint of one card.

Workstation Tests

We use several more benchmarks to measure workstation performance. First is SPECviewperf 2020 (version 3.1), which renders, rotates, and zooms in and out of solid and wireframe models at 1080p resolution. The three subtests represent PTC's Creo CAD platform, Autodesk's Maya modeling and simulation software for film, TV, and games, and Dassault Systèmes' SolidWorks 3D rendering package.

Next up is Blender, an open-source 3D content creation suite for modeling, animation, simulation, and compositing. We record the time it takes for Blender 4.2 to render three distinct scenes to measure CPU and GPU rendering performance.

Finally, we also use PugetBench for Creators to test DaVinci Resolve Studio 18 video editor performance on systems suitable for that challenging app. As with Adobe Premiere, these automated tasks and features push the CPU and GPU, letting us gauge real-world media creation speeds. (We normally also conduct an Adobe Premiere Pro benchmark via PugetBench, but it would not run on this system.)

The Precision 7875’s SPECviewperf numbers largely repeat what we saw in 3DMark, with the system trailing behind the Talon and Pro Max Tower T2 due to its lower-wattage RTX Pro 6000 configuration, save for that minor victory over the Tower T2 in the Maya viewset. This pattern held in Blender’s GPU tests. On the CPU side, however, the Precision 7875 proved competitive with the Talon, with both systems decisively outpacing the rest, thanks to their enormous core counts.

Stepping back, none of our standard tests fits the mission of this particular Precision 7875 configuration: AI research and development and large-scale data processing, workloads that can scale across the Threadripper Pro and, especially, dual RTX Pro 6000 GPUs. With a combined 192GB of ECC VRAM, the Precision 7875 is effectively a desk-side supercomputer, yet you can plug it into a standard outlet.