So that is why the T420 does memory sorts and the mini does disk sorts.
I'd start looking at why memory sorts on the T420 is so slow. Check your numa settings, etc (as already mentioned).
For a drastic test, disable the 2nd socket on the dell, and just use one (eliminate any numa/QPI costs) and see how it compares to the no-numa MacMini.
the command
dmesg | grep -i numa
doesn’t display me anything. I think T420 hasn’t NUMA on it. Is there a way to enable it from Ubuntu? I don’t have immediate access to BIOS (server is in another location).
For QPI I don’t know what to do. Please, can you give me more details?
If you want to see how bad the NUMA/QPI is, play with stream to benchmark memory performance.