Trying to build a modern (TRX40, x570, PCIe 4.0 etc) 16-core rackmounted server for my home lab and network and would welcome input. The setup would run ESXi and/or Hyper-V & Storage Spaces, several Linux VMs - the bonus being if it is able to run a Windows 10 VM with a GPU for passthrough (to stream games). IPMI is a must as the rack is in the basement. Also 10GbE or NBASE-T is another must-have since it is hooked up to a multi-gig switch and several nodes are connected at 5 gigabit.
Initially I had considered the Ryzen 3950x and Xeon-W - what I found was that:
AsRock also has the Rome motherboard ASRock Rack > ROMED8-2T - same problems, not available anywhere
Then we come to Supermicro and TYAN. Supermicro has H12 motherboards at last - H12SSL-NT | Motherboards | Super Micro Computer, Inc., but it's "coming soon"
Tyan has the S8030 range which has IPMI and looks quite decent actually without the oculink stuff that Supermicro wanted to put on all its new motherboards - https://www.tyan.com/Motherboards_S8030_S8030GM4NE-2T
CPU: I'm considering the AMD EPYC 7282. It has only half the memory bandwidth BUT costs $700 retail. It actually is the cheapest $/core amongst EPYC processors - thanks to this brilliant analysis https://www.servethehome.com/amd-epyc-7002-sku-list-and-value-analysis/. The equivalent single processor 7302P is $900 retail !
MOTHERBOARD: Considering the Tyan S8030 because I don't know how long the SuperMicro will take to show up in the channel https://www.tyan.com/Motherboards_S8030_S8030GM4NE-2T. I'd expect this to be $550
RAM: would start off with 4 x 16GB DDR4-3200 ECC RDIMMs - or 4 x 32GB ones - the EPYC 7278 is 1/2 the bandwidth so will it benefit from populating all 8 channels?
CASE: NorcoTek RPC-4308. Eight drive bays, supports ATX and an ATX PSU (side mounted). Also has a 2 x SFF-8087 backplane for the eight drives
PSU: SilverStone 850W Platinum
Storage: Reusing my 6 x 4TB array, at some point want to put some NVMe drives and convert to tiered Storage Spaces
Questions - what is everyone's opinion on TYAN vs Supermicro? Is their IPMI as good or worse than Supermicro? What about BIOS quality and support? Running Hyper-V or ESXi on consumer grade motherboards is never fun but it gets progressively worse on server grade motherboards if the manufacturers don't expose the correct BIOS settings ...
Would welcome everyone's input !
Initially I had considered the Ryzen 3950x and Xeon-W - what I found was that:
- Ryzen motherboards with IPMI just aren't that common and neither are ThreadRipper ones
- Intel Xeon-W and other chips are just too expensive per-core
- Going for EPYC ones seems the logical choice considering a good x570 motherboard costs just 25% less - to approximately the same as a server motherboard
- ECC enabled UDIMMs are costlier than if not the same price as RDIMMs
AsRock also has the Rome motherboard ASRock Rack > ROMED8-2T - same problems, not available anywhere
Then we come to Supermicro and TYAN. Supermicro has H12 motherboards at last - H12SSL-NT | Motherboards | Super Micro Computer, Inc., but it's "coming soon"
Tyan has the S8030 range which has IPMI and looks quite decent actually without the oculink stuff that Supermicro wanted to put on all its new motherboards - https://www.tyan.com/Motherboards_S8030_S8030GM4NE-2T
CPU: I'm considering the AMD EPYC 7282. It has only half the memory bandwidth BUT costs $700 retail. It actually is the cheapest $/core amongst EPYC processors - thanks to this brilliant analysis https://www.servethehome.com/amd-epyc-7002-sku-list-and-value-analysis/. The equivalent single processor 7302P is $900 retail !
MOTHERBOARD: Considering the Tyan S8030 because I don't know how long the SuperMicro will take to show up in the channel https://www.tyan.com/Motherboards_S8030_S8030GM4NE-2T. I'd expect this to be $550
RAM: would start off with 4 x 16GB DDR4-3200 ECC RDIMMs - or 4 x 32GB ones - the EPYC 7278 is 1/2 the bandwidth so will it benefit from populating all 8 channels?
CASE: NorcoTek RPC-4308. Eight drive bays, supports ATX and an ATX PSU (side mounted). Also has a 2 x SFF-8087 backplane for the eight drives
PSU: SilverStone 850W Platinum
Storage: Reusing my 6 x 4TB array, at some point want to put some NVMe drives and convert to tiered Storage Spaces
Questions - what is everyone's opinion on TYAN vs Supermicro? Is their IPMI as good or worse than Supermicro? What about BIOS quality and support? Running Hyper-V or ESXi on consumer grade motherboards is never fun but it gets progressively worse on server grade motherboards if the manufacturers don't expose the correct BIOS settings ...
Would welcome everyone's input !
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