ASRock Rack GENOAD8X-2T/BCM spec confusion

[galvesribeiro]

Hello folks!

I'm considering buy the ASRock Rack GENOAD8X-2T/BCM to pair with a AMD EPYC 9754 for my homelab. I've found the review from STH site (btw, thanks STH! Awesome review and show that this board seems very versatile!) and also read the manual to the end and one thing is not matching to me.

The review mention that the MCIO connectors are PCIe 5 x4, however the manual say it is x8 in some spots, like in the motherboard layout description, and x4 in other places.



Did anyone have tested this board and know what exactly it is? I think it is x4 if we count the lanes that are rerouted from the PCIe slots to it if they are used, but I just wanted to be sure.

I plan on use those MCIO connectors with breakout cables to SATA SSDs while I leave the slots for 1x Dual 100G ConnectX-6 Dx, 4x RTX 4000 Ada and 4x NVMe M.2 in a bifurcation board.

Any clue would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[RealPjotr]

Spec page is clear. There are 4x MCIO x4. Two replace Slot7 PCIex8. Another two take x8 of the Slot1 x16 slot, making that slot x8 only.

Board has 7x16 slots + 1x8 + 2xNVME x4, total 128 PCIe 5.0 lanes, which is what SP5 has. (Plus 8x PCIe 3.0)

 

[galvesribeiro]

Spec page is clear. There are 4x MCIO x4. Two replace Slot7 PCIex8. Another two take x8 of the Slot1 x16 slot, making that slot x8 only.

Board has 7x16 slots + 1x8 + 2xNVME x4, total 128 PCIe 5.0 lanes, which is what SP5 has. (Plus 8x PCIe 3.0)

Thanks. Makes sense. I guess the manual if broken then.

Now I'm trying to convince myself to use that single slot mobo or go with the Gigabyte MZ73-LM0, which has dual socket. However, it only has 4x PCI Gen 5.0 x16 which is a bummer leaving lanes on the table.