Motherboard for Xeon E5-2640V4 (LGA2011-3 socket) recommendations

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thimplicity

Member
Jan 11, 2022
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Hi everyone,
I am in the process of building a home server and settled on the Xeon E5-2640v4, which seems to have a good balance of cores, clock speed, PCIe lanes, TDE etc. Unfortunately it seems there are not a ton of boards on the market (at least not from the usual suspects SuperMicro and Asrock Rack) that offer IPMI and M.2 (and in the optimal case 10Gbe) in an mATX form factor. I would take ATX as well, if I have to.

Maybe someone has a recommendation. Thanks in advance!
 

ericloewe

Active Member
Apr 24, 2017
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M.2 was still a bit of a niche option early in the Haswell-EP lifecycle. What you should probably look at is a board that can bifurcate a x8 slot into x4/x4 or a x16 into x4/x4/x4/x4. Then use any of the passive PCIe x16 to quad M.2 cards.
Technically, most (all?) Xeon E5 v3/v4 boards should support this with a modified BIOS, so that can broaden the pool if you're feeling adventurous.

Or if you want a single M.2 slot, get any board and a cheap adapter card.
 
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thimplicity

Member
Jan 11, 2022
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M.2 was still a bit of a niche option early in the Haswell-EP lifecycle. What you should probably look at is a board that can bifurcate a x8 slot into x4/x4 or a x16 into x4/x4/x4/x4. Then use any of the passive PCIe x16 to quad M.2 cards.
Technically, most (all?) Xeon E5 v3/v4 boards should support this with a modified BIOS, so that can broaden the pool if you're feeling adventurous.

Or if you want a single M.2 slot, get any board and a cheap adapter card.
This is great advise, thanks! Will check it out. On a separate card it might provide add. flexibility with virtualization

Would you make IPMI a priority? I found some X99 options that seem pretty good, but mostly without IPMI
 

bonox

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Feb 23, 2021
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do you have a KVM setup that easy for the box or not? Do you bury the box in a corner somewhere or in a rack? Do you want to be able to load iso's remotely from boot? Do you want monitoring and power management?

Only you can answer those, but i won't live without ipmi these days :)
 

thimplicity

Member
Jan 11, 2022
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do you have a KVM setup that easy for the box or not? Do you bury the box in a corner somewhere or in a rack? Do you want to be able to load iso's remotely from boot? Do you want monitoring and power management?

Only you can answer those, but i won't live without ipmi these days :)
I think it is VERY handy. I am essentially in between the Xeon mentioned above and a Ryzen 5 3600x. The mainboard situation is similar, as both have few models. Those are with IPMI, but without 10GBe and the Xeon without M.2.

So for both mainboards, that are currently on my shortlist, I am currently researching, whether I have enough PCIe lanes to add a 10 GBe card, a M.2 quad card and a HBA card. Although 10GBe and HBA can wait, as both have dual 1GB and at least the Ryzen MB has one M.2 slot.

I am looking at those boards:
Asrock Rack X570D4U (Ryzen)
Asrock Rack EPC612D4U-8R (Xeon)


Which platform would you pick?
 

bonox

Member
Feb 23, 2021
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if you're planning a need for PCIe 4 expansion, then the decision is made for you. Otherwise, i'd pick the cheapest or the set with lowest energy consumption. Can't help you much i'm sorry since i'd not personally pick either of them.
 
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Stephan

Well-Known Member
Apr 21, 2017
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My current fav is ASRock Rack > B550D4-4L because will work with a 5900X/5950X which runs coolest of the high-end Zen 3 Ryzens. ECC support. IPMI. 4x Intel 210 ethernet. No chipset fan. Punish Intel in the market place for allowing ECC only in expensive Xeon tiers. PCIe 4.0, m.2 slot, x16 and x8 for expansion. ATX size though. But which is good so you can fit large but quiet CPU coolers.
 
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TLN

Active Member
Feb 26, 2016
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Well, I've already responded in another topic. I went with EPC612D4U-2T8R. That board hits both requirements (HBA and 10G card), and still leaves you with three spare ports. I'm running 3060Ti in mine (Passed through into VM) and PM1725 SSD.
Xeon is not the best option for gaming, but I can run lots of games in 1080 in my living room.
 
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