I was going to send a direct message to @RolloZ170 but then I decided the entire community would be better served by making it a public post.
This board, and @RolloZ170 specifically, appear to be the gurus of the planet on Skylake SP B1 stepping processors. There isn't any discussion outside servethehome on the subject, which is rare. I made a low ball offer to an eBay seller for three P-8136 which was accepted. I am hoping I don't regret the purchase. I intentionally went with the P-8136 because it does not require any VRM mods. To my understanding, the only barrier to functionality is microcode, but I am hoping to get more clarity on these chips from the community.
I have three Supermicro X11SPL-F motherboards. I know how to use MMTool and UBU Bios editor. I have opened and studied every BIOS released for the SM board from 1.0 to the present 3.6. None of the releases include 50653 microcode for the P-8136's B1 stepping. ES support for B0 stepping was removed beginning with 3.0. 2.1 is the last release with pre-production 50650, 50651, and 50652 microcodes. Of course, that doesn't really matter to me since I am not using a 50650, 50651, or 50652 ES chip. I can easily inject the 50653 microcode into either 2.1 or 3.6 bios... but my question is if support ends at 2.1. I have read on this forum that CPU initialization changed with 3.0 BIOS which blocks B0 stepping chips from working on BIOS after 2.1, even if you mod the BIOS to re-add the microcode, but I am not sure if the same is true for B1 stepping. Somewhat shockingly, Intel is still fully supporting the B1 chips with a new microcode released as recently as 03-14-2022.
Questions:
1. Do I need to do anything other than add 50653 microcode to BIOS for the P-8136 to work on an X11SPL-F motherboard?
2. What is the newest BIOS revision which will function with injected microcode, ie 2.1 or 3.6?
3. Is there anything I am not thinking about or missing? What else do I need to know about these chips?
4. Does anyone know what changed from B1 to H0? I realize stepping changes can vary from minuscule to significant. Curious if anyone had any insight at all as to what was changed or improved from the OEM-only B1 stepping prior to retail release H0.
Thank you all in advance!
This board, and @RolloZ170 specifically, appear to be the gurus of the planet on Skylake SP B1 stepping processors. There isn't any discussion outside servethehome on the subject, which is rare. I made a low ball offer to an eBay seller for three P-8136 which was accepted. I am hoping I don't regret the purchase. I intentionally went with the P-8136 because it does not require any VRM mods. To my understanding, the only barrier to functionality is microcode, but I am hoping to get more clarity on these chips from the community.
I have three Supermicro X11SPL-F motherboards. I know how to use MMTool and UBU Bios editor. I have opened and studied every BIOS released for the SM board from 1.0 to the present 3.6. None of the releases include 50653 microcode for the P-8136's B1 stepping. ES support for B0 stepping was removed beginning with 3.0. 2.1 is the last release with pre-production 50650, 50651, and 50652 microcodes. Of course, that doesn't really matter to me since I am not using a 50650, 50651, or 50652 ES chip. I can easily inject the 50653 microcode into either 2.1 or 3.6 bios... but my question is if support ends at 2.1. I have read on this forum that CPU initialization changed with 3.0 BIOS which blocks B0 stepping chips from working on BIOS after 2.1, even if you mod the BIOS to re-add the microcode, but I am not sure if the same is true for B1 stepping. Somewhat shockingly, Intel is still fully supporting the B1 chips with a new microcode released as recently as 03-14-2022.
Questions:
1. Do I need to do anything other than add 50653 microcode to BIOS for the P-8136 to work on an X11SPL-F motherboard?
2. What is the newest BIOS revision which will function with injected microcode, ie 2.1 or 3.6?
3. Is there anything I am not thinking about or missing? What else do I need to know about these chips?
4. Does anyone know what changed from B1 to H0? I realize stepping changes can vary from minuscule to significant. Curious if anyone had any insight at all as to what was changed or improved from the OEM-only B1 stepping prior to retail release H0.
Thank you all in advance!