Black Tower Reduced to Goop on PowerEdge 2850 Motherboard?

It looks like compound used to fix parts in place to prevent damage from normal vibration. I have seen this on circuit boards before. In some instruments, the compound is white. But the function is the same.

Hello John, thanks for your comment.  I know the compound you are referring to, and i thought that to.  But whats odd is that that substance is in the place where the little pyramid/tower thing used to be in the picture, and I have haven't seen it in this quantity before in one place where there is no parts affixed to the board except for that weird little tower, its almost like it melted, or it broke down and some kind of reaction took place.  I just wish I knew what that thing is for.

I will post another picture in a bit that shows the whole board so you can see what i'm talking about.  I'm not trying to be argumentative, i just want to be absolutely sure what this is and i know the first picture i posted doesn't show to much aside from a close up of the substance.

These are (hopefully) some better pictures, one is of the whole motherboard showing the location in relation to the picture of the new mobo i uploaded, another is just me pointing at it to make sure its clear in the picture, and the third is a much clearer close up of the substance.  Based on what you are seeing does this appear to be the substance you are talking about?  I just don't understand why there is this pile of goop where the black pyramid used to be in the other picture if it is the compound you are referring to.  Unless that pyramid is some kind of vibration dampener, in which case its not a very effective one based how it appears to be affixed to the motherboard in the picture of the new mobo.
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Thanks. That is a messy job to be sure.

Look at 20171018_112129_resized and notice how the goop supports (curls around) the capacitor near it.

I cannot image what would "put"  "goop" in there improperly. I am fairly sure based on your pictures that it is an insulating compound designed to hold parts in place that might otherwise jar given inevitable server vibration.

Unless you say the server is not operating (which you have not said), I think it is what I said above. I have seen this (white) in digital oscilloscope power supplies where the fan is and where you can have vibration.

The only other question I never posed to you is: Was the server stored in its case (closed) or left open to the elements?

Yea i've see than stuff before, although i usually see rubber used most of time now, cleaner and easier to replace if it starts to fail (assuming the part is user serviceable).  The server is posting and boots up at the moment, whatever this stuff it doesn't seem to be affecting anything.  I supposed that maybe someone at dell just decided to slather it on haphazardly, i just don't understand why its in the exact same place as that mysterious little pyramid, and that stuff typically isn't applied to pieces that are permanently soldered to the motherboard because they aren't subjected to vibrations thanks to the dampeners you are speaking of on moving parts such as HDD's and fans.  Either way, lets say this is a gross QA mishap on Dell's part, do you have any idea what that little triangle/pyramid thing is in the new_mobo_pic.jpg that is circled, I have googled, checked manuals, specifications, and old forums posts and no one has ever mentioned that thing or its purpose and its driving me crazy.

Oh and to answer your last question it was running WDS in a rack in our office for years, but we haven't used that in a while and this client needed a server, so we decided to re-purpose it.

Thank you for your replies thus far.

Here is similar stuff (white) from inside an instrument of mine. If the server is running, likely nothing to worry about.
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I appreciate all comments on this question.  I decided to post in the Dell support forums and they were able to tell me that this used to be a 3M Bumpon product, most similar to part number SJ5514.  No one really knows why it melted or otherwise turned to goop.  But what they did say was that it was most likely used to support some peripheral card, that's what it looks like to me to but I can't find anything online indicating what did go there.  They also said this part is typically hard and has a high melting point, so either this was a bad batch, or Dell ordered this custom from 3M, in either case I'll never know why it happened as the standard product only would have melted if the server room was on fire or something.  There is also the possibility this was intended to be used for something, but then removed from the design and was just overlooked by the design team on this server before it was pushed into final production (a vestigial server organ if you will), that could be why I have not seen this on any other generation of PowerEdge Server.  Either way I appreciate everyone taking their time to respond to this.  Thanks!

Thank you for the detailed update.