SuperMicro M11SDV-8C-LN4F

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wpg_moe

New Member
Jun 27, 2019
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I've purchased a SuperMicro M11SDV-8C-LN4F after reading the reviews on this website. Unfortunately I'm having a really hard time getting the motherboard to POST. The PSU fan spins loudly for about half a second and then it stops... I never see any video and the power LED on the motherboard turns on. There are no error LEDs on. The BMC module works just fine.. I can login and initiate a power ON and it returns saying that the command failed.

I decided to RMA my first motherboard thinking it was defective but the 2nd one which just arrived today is doing the exact same thing.

At this point I'm not certain the motherboard is to blame given 2 of them do the exact same thing.

I'm powering the motherboard with the 250W PSU that came with the SuperMicro CSE-721TQ-250B case.

I've attempted to power the motherboard with a 620W PSU and it behaved exactly the same way so I'm not convinced it's the PSU. I've tried to post without any devices or ram connected and it behaves the same with with or without ram.

I'm using a 16GB Crucial DDR4-2666 RDIMM in the correct slot (DIMMA2 - Blue).

I've attempted to attach a speaker to the speaker pins but don't hear any beeps (not sure if I have the correct speaker). The Post Snooping says the code is "FF". Not sure what that means...

Anyone have any ideas of what I can try next to get this Motherboard going?

Thanks in advance... I'm going to connect with SuperMicro support (again) tomorrow.

Thanks,

Moe
 

Rand__

Well-Known Member
Mar 6, 2014
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FF is usually the point where it should boot into the OS iirc - I assume it went through the whole lot from 00 via B2/7 to FF?
Are you sure the graphics output is enabled (Jumper VGA enable, manual page 49). No video on BMC either?
Have you tried running it outside the case just with power /bmc connected (and memory) (start via IPMI or bridging appropriate pins) ?
 

wpg_moe

New Member
Jun 27, 2019
2
0
1
Wow.. I feel pretty dumb. It turns out that I only had the 4 pin power attached to the motherboard. There was also an 8pin power connector. My PSU didn't have an 8pin output but it did have two 4 pin outputs. I couldn't connect both to the motherboard as the connector wouldn't allow them both but I was able to connect one of the 4pin connectors to the far right 4pins (of the 8pin plug). Once I did that I was able to see video though the KVM and out the video port.

After all that trial and error I did with my first motherboard and the RMA I went through thinking it was defective, I finally got this working!

I was under the impression that the power to the motherboard was one connector (4pin) OR the other... (8pin).. but not a combination of both! I think in my case the motherboard didn't have enough power to POST and that's why only the BMC was working.

Live and learn... I'm still glad I found these forums. Looking forward to working with this motherboard!
 

maes

Active Member
Nov 11, 2018
102
69
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I was under the impression that the power to the motherboard was one connector (4pin) OR the other... (8pin).. but not a combination of both! I think in my case the motherboard didn't have enough power to POST and that's why only the BMC was working.
AFAIK, the small 4-pin one doesn't have any of the main 12V 'power' lines, only the 5V standby voltage (for standby USB, the BMC, wake-on-lan, etc) and the signaling lines to control ATX power supplies. Glad you got the problem sorted out!

Let me know how that motherboard works out for you, I'm looking at the 8CT model as a NAS upgrade.
 

JBrickley

New Member
Jul 8, 2020
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I was confounded by the power supply connections as well and initially I couldn't find the cable adapter online. Fortunately, Supermicro included a 24pin -> 4 pin adapter cable in the box. I just didn't notice it among the SATA cables. I set that stuff aside as I will be using a PCIe HBA with SAS cables. I am using a FLEX ATX 350W power supply from Silver Stone and it has the 8 pin power which is also required. So the one 8pin cable plus the 24 -> 4 pin cable and that gives you the required ATX power.

IF YOU BUY THIS MOTHERBOARD USED, MAKE SURE YOU GET THE 24pin -> 4pin ADAPTER CABLE

The PDF manual has a very small blurb explaining the power connection requirements.

1.6 Power Supply Page 21:

Note: The M11SDV-4C/4CT/8C/8CT/8C+-LN4F motherboard supports either 12V DC in power input or ATX power input. The 12V DC IN power input requires an 8-pin 12V DC IN connection to the JPV1 header. ATX power input requires an 8-pin 12V connections to JPV1 header and PJ1 a 4-pin power connector of an ATX power supply by power cable (24-pin ATX to 4-pin power cable for PJ1, Supermicro P/N: CBL-PWEX-1063). PJ1 allows motherboard control of the 5VStby, power on, power good, and ground signals from the ATX power supply.​

So far, very happy with this little monster. It's quite powerful for such a small thing and 30%+ cheaper than Xeon-D. Makes for a wonderful small home private cloud lab and NAS, etc. I am dropping it into a Norco ITX-S8 case with a hot swappable SATA backplane that offers two SAS connections straight into the LSI PCIe HBA. I have the M11SDV-8C+-LN4F model with the included fan. The clearance between the bottom of the drive cage and the cooler fan in this case is a bit tight (about .6") but airflow is good. It's running about 20C at idle and I've been stress testing and not able to get it above 48C under heavy loads.