Intel Xeon D-1500 Series Discussion

Notice: Page may contain affiliate links for which we may earn a small commission through services like Amazon Affiliates or Skimlinks.

destrekor

New Member
Mar 12, 2016
7
0
1
36
For my use, would a quad core model be sufficient, or would that be pushing it? 1518 or 1521 is what I'd be looking at if I'm not constraining myself too hard by doing so, otherwise that's why I figured the 6-core might be best. The pain though is that there is only an mITX board for the 1528, which constrains future expansion if I need more than just one expansion card, and I need an HBA for sure.

So I can either save like I want to with a 4 core, or I have to pay far more than I'd like to in order to get an 8 core. 6 is a nice sweet spot but I don't if it leaves me enough potential.
 

Evan

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,346
598
113
@destrekor inwoulr say for freenas, sophos, Windows the quad will be fine. I can't speak at all about DVR or transcoding though, so can't really say.
If you can wait and you don't need 12g SAS then wait to get on of the new SM boards.

On the other hand the available today 4/6/8 core boards all have 6 Sata + m.2 so with big drives (8tb WD red are now $250) and the size of Ssd increasing are you sure you really need a hba ? (Unless you really want to pass it through)
If you do add a hba to the onboard pcie x16 what else could you need ? Another pcie nvme drive maybe :)
 

destrekor

New Member
Mar 12, 2016
7
0
1
36
@destrekor inwoulr say for freenas, sophos, Windows the quad will be fine. I can't speak at all about DVR or transcoding though, so can't really say.
If you can wait and you don't need 12g SAS then wait to get on of the new SM boards.

On the other hand the available today 4/6/8 core boards all have 6 Sata + m.2 so with big drives (8tb WD red are now $250) and the size of Ssd increasing are you sure you really need a hba ? (Unless you really want to pass it through)
If you do add a hba to the onboard pcie x16 what else could you need ? Another pcie nvme drive maybe :)
Well with ESXi, I'd have no choice but to use pass through, so the question becomes: can I pass through an integrated HBA, or must I use an add-on card?

As for the right CPU: if I can get a 4 core to handle the VMs as well as Plex transcoding within FreeNAS, then I'd be very happy. But if the transcoding on top of the VM requirements needs more, it'd help to know if anyone has that experience.
 

JimPhreak

Active Member
Oct 10, 2013
553
55
28
@destrekor inwoulr say for freenas, sophos, Windows the quad will be fine. I can't speak at all about DVR or transcoding though, so can't really say.
If you can wait and you don't need 12g SAS then wait to get on of the new SM boards.

On the other hand the available today 4/6/8 core boards all have 6 Sata + m.2 so with big drives (8tb WD red are now $250) and the size of Ssd increasing are you sure you really need a hba ? (Unless you really want to pass it through)
If you do add a hba to the onboard pcie x16 what else could you need ? Another pcie nvme drive maybe :)
Where are you seeing 8TB WD Reds for $250? They are $350 to pre-order from what I can see. Unless you are referring to the thread where about buying the external drives they now sell with the 8TB reds in them but those drives come with no warranty.
 

Evan

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,346
598
113
Yep the externals, but if you take the duo version it's easy to get the drives out, they would never know... Ok for $275 if you buy the duo model

My Book Duo - Premium RAID Storage
Scroll to bottom to see just how 'user serviceable, or am I wrong ? (I have never purchased a duo but was going to for drives)
 

JimPhreak

Active Member
Oct 10, 2013
553
55
28
Yep the externals, but if you take the duo version it's easy to get the drives out, they would never know... Ok for $275 if you buy the duo model

My Book Duo - Premium RAID Storage
Scroll to bottom to see just how 'user serviceable, or am I wrong ? (I have never purchased a duo but was going to for drives)
I'm pretty sure they would. For example in the article @Patrick did about the Toshiba drives that he pulled from external enclosures to get a 25% discount, those drives are not RMA-able when you try to look them up on their website. I guess it's possible that it's different with WD but I'd want confirmation from someone on that before purchasing a bunch of the MyBook Duo's for the 8TB Reds.
 

Evan

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,346
598
113
I'm pretty sure they would. For example in the article @Patrick did about the Toshiba drives that he pulled from external enclosures to get a 25% discount, those drives are not RMA-able when you try to look them up on their website. I guess it's possible that it's different with WD but I'd want confirmation from someone on that before purchasing a bunch of the MyBook Duo's for the 8TB Reds.
Your right I think, probably can't ram just the drive but you can put it back in the now unused duo case and rma it that way. Maybe also they will allow the drive by itself, maybe somebody here has experience.
 

JimPhreak

Active Member
Oct 10, 2013
553
55
28
Your right I think, probably can't ram just the drive but you can put it back in the now unused duo case and rma it that way. Maybe also they will allow the drive by itself, maybe somebody here has experience.
Yea I'm interested to see if anyone whose bought one has tried to lookup the warranty status of the drive on WD's website. Because if I was buying a bunch of these I wouldn't want to have to hang on to all the external enclosures and keep track of which drives go with which enclosure (for serial number ID).
 

Evan

Well-Known Member
Jan 6, 2016
3,346
598
113
Yea I'm interested to see if anyone whose bought one has tried to lookup the warranty status of the drive on WD's website. Because if I was buying a bunch of these I wouldn't want to have to hang on to all the external enclosures and keep track of which drives go with which enclosure (for serial number ID).
How to replace the enclosure, replace drives inside the enclosure, and get warranty service for a My Book Live Duo or Thunderbolt Duo | WD Support

Says you can rma a drive, just use the drive serial no.
Somebody must have practical experience I would guess...
 

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
5,792
113
Guys - I have this on my plan for early next week. I am not sure that helps anyone but it is on the schedule.
 
  • Like
Reactions: croakz

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
5,792
113
We kind of hijacked the thread, what's on plan @Patrick ?
Power results for new SM boards ?
I was going for the WD 8TB extraction, but there will be more SM board power consumption figures in each review of the platform.
 

Davewolfs

Active Member
Aug 6, 2015
339
32
28

MiniKnight

Well-Known Member
Mar 30, 2012
3,072
973
113
NYC
I asked support about this, they said SR-IOV will not work with 1540 and 10G only 1G or external card. So same situation as before which @Patrick has already confirmed.
Yea, I am not sure what to say. @Patrick confirmed there was a silicon rev so it is not a simple BIOS update issue. There were actually supposed to be way more Xeon D chips released earlier if you read his launch pieces but the rev plus the supply constraints meant that the D-1540 and D-1520 were the only ones released until November 2015.

The flagship customer for these Facebook, was not using the 10Gb NIC and was instead using a 2x 25Gb Mellanox multi-host adapter (one per 4 Xeon D nodes) so fixing this was not being pushed by a big customer.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Patrick

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
5,792
113
Yea, I am not sure what to say. @Patrick confirmed there was a silicon rev so it is not a simple BIOS update issue. There were actually supposed to be way more Xeon D chips released earlier if you read his launch pieces but the rev plus the supply constraints meant that the D-1540 and D-1520 were the only ones released until November 2015.
Exactly. @Davewolfs that is correct per the above ^.

I did know about the SR-IOV issue for a bit before getting the confirmation from Intel but I wanted to make sure I was reporting correctly which is why I got Intel to confirm.
 

JimPhreak

Active Member
Oct 10, 2013
553
55
28
Is SM not releasing any 1541 or 1567 boards at all? I doesn't seem like they have any higher frequency CPU options (besides the 1587) on the newer boards with SFP+ onboard.
 

EffrafaxOfWug

Radioactive Member
Feb 12, 2015
1,394
511
113
Dunno if this has been posted elsewhere but ASRock have got another PDF of their upcoming products:
http://www.asrockrack.com/general/Catalog2016.pdf

Updated Xeon-D kit includes:
D1541D4U-2T8R (D1540 > D1541 revamp)
D1541D4I-2L2T (ditto for ITX model, also includes a 1521 option)

Although possibly even more interesing is the C236 WSI4 which uses a BGA Xeon E3v5 complete with Iris Pro graphics and four NICs, but obv. that's for another thread.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Patrick