Cheap chinese x79 mobos

[wildpig1234]

Sorry, I meant I'm interested in getting a board someone linked earlier in the thread.

US $80.96 60% OFF|PLEXHD X79 Turbo motherboard LGA2011 ATX USB3.0 SATA3 PCI E NVME M.2 SSD support REG ECC memory and Xeon E5 processor-in Motherboards from Computer & Office on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group

Not too many ram slots.. only 4 so just depends on how much ram you plan to use, might have to get 16gb dimms.

Also hoping that whatever the new upgraded ver is actually going to let you use more than 2 pcie x16 slots at once. on the older boards you can't use more than 2 x16 slots at once

also hoping that the nvme slot isn't just for showing. i don't think i ever saw any of the older x79 boards with nvme slot so i hope they actually have it working.. on my x79 board i got it has a msata slot which doesn't work at all...lol...

 

[iamtelephone]

Greedily bought more Ivy Bridge CPU's than I have motherboards.
Interested in the x79 PLEXHD, has anyone found any other issues with it? It seems like the best china mobo to purchase at this time.
Is there a board suitable for overclocking as well as supporting RDIMMs ?

I have multiple Huanan X79 v2.49 boards and one PlexHD (X79T) board. I have not used a Xeon in the PlexHD board yet as it's housing a i7-4820k at the moment. But it does overclock/unlock the CPU on the i7 with UDIMM sticks.

I can say that the Huanan X79 v2.49 board overclocks great on a E5-1650 v2. On the stock BIOS you can unlock the multiplier to 4.2 GHz, if you want higher you'll have to use the Russian modded BIOS. I've also had no trouble overclocking RDIMMs (1866 in BIOS on 1333 RDIMMs).

Also if you have a look at the new Huanan v2.49 boards, they look almost identical to the PlexHD boards. So I'd say the PlexHD manufacturer did something right .

also hoping that the nvme slot isn't just for showing. i don't think i ever saw any of the older x79 boards with nvme slot so i hope they actually have it working.. on my x79 board i got it has a msata slot which doesn't work at all...lol...

The NVMe slot is not for show on any of the Chinese X79 boards that I've tried. Sometimes I've had trouble with DRAM-less NVMe drives, but using an adaptor instead of the internal slot solves that problem.

 

[DoinStuff]

Anyone have any hands-on experience with these OEM motherboard with x79 chipset on eBay?

I like that they support registered memory which I have some lying around and are cheaper to buy. I also like that they come in M-ATX form factor for a smaller build.

The only question is longevity and whether they will last with 247 operation and for how long? So far I haven't found any "reviews" that's worth the time it takes to watch or read it.

Some people say they fail after 2 month or 6 months, but who knows? They LOOK like they could be pretty quality. I don't know enough about motherboard designs to know if the parts are good quality parts or not.

 

[DoinStuff]

I stuck with the Intel motherboards - DX79TO, DX79SR, S2600CP4, S2600CP2J... they are all finiky, give me errors and problems no matter what memory I use, and the desktop boards Intel stopped supporting long ago, but the server boards are just now starting to be discontinued support from Intel. Paying for a Server board for Intel at least pays off in support.

I am very curious about these cheap Chinese boards, how they would stack up to my Intels when they are running...

X79 does not support NVMe, only X99 and above... I don't think an add-in card will help that. I have an X99 Mobo with an E5-2618L v3 that runs NVME great. If you can afford v3 go that route! If not, buy the Motherboard for v3&4 like as nice Intel now, which are not that expensive, stick it in the closet for two years, then you can afford the cheap CPU when the motherboards are going for $600 because they are out of stock and obsolete.

I have all Xeon processors running on my Mobos, E5-2660 v2's, E52648L's, and I just bought a couple more on eBay to play with.

 

[e97]

One data point: my X79Z has been running 24/7 as a NAS, machine learning server since Jan 2018 with 100% uptime.

X79 has a high chance to support NVMe boot if you have a UEFI BIOS and mod it to add in the NVMe DXE module. I confirm it works on X79Z and also updated to the latest Intel microcode.

 

[wildpig1234]

hopefully we will soon get the 4th gen of these boards with fully impletemented nvme built in support and proper sleep support?

 

[nerdalertdk]

LTT did a video abort these cards and they booted up on NVMe on there’s

 

[raimond]

Any chance there was someone here in this forum who bought one of the 50+ Alienware X79 motherboard I sold on ebay?

The said board is by far the best we have in my location, you can get the said board in our area for around $48. I think better quality compared to the China boards.

 

[e97]

Sold some stuff and upgraded to this:

JINGSHA X99 with E5-2678v3

 

[itronin]

@e97 that seems like a nice mix of features esp with the DDR3 on the e5-v3 ... I see on the ebay listing that it says ecc and non-ecc memory. Does it actually take advantage of ecc? Are you using the PCIE storage as a boot device? any oddities? board build quality thoughts. What has your experience been with the the board?

Looks like a great board!

 

[e97]

@e97 that seems like a nice mix of features esp with the DDR3 on the e5-v3 ... I see on the ebay listing that it says ecc and non-ecc memory. Does it actually take advantage of ecc? Are you using the PCIE storage as a boot device? any oddities? board build quality thoughts. What has your experience been with the the board?

Looks like a great board!

Received it yesterday so still putting it through the gauntlet.



ECC: Yes, likely multi-bit like my X79 NAS (older sibling motherboard). I'll post dmidecode and stuff later

Using a 1TB NVMe PCI-E 3.0 x4 with heatsink. Speeds match specs and tests in other boards.

Quality seems on par with any other vendor.

I like the ATX and EPS layout + DR DEBUG is in a good location vs being covered up by GPU on other boards. Wish mfgs would put RAM front to back.

Socket hold down is a tarnished color, not silver like the pics, so is the back plate -- like a gunmetal color so it may be a design thing. No rust or anything.

Looks like BIOS has overclocking features and sleep support - would be nice if a hackintosh can hibernate without issue. Updated the BIOS cpu microcode without issue.

Building a custom compact ATX case so will be busy. Thats why the GPU is where it is. Will post benches when I can.

Initial impressions pretty good and vendor is helpful in answering questions.

Enjoy the weekend!

 

[itronin]

thank you for the mini review. One more question.

What was the shipping time to your approximate locale? States? Aus? EU? etc.

 

[e97]

thank you for the mini review. One more question.

What was the shipping time to your approximate locale? States? Aus? EU? etc.

You're welcome. Folks help me out on this forum so I like to share my findings as well.

Shipping was about $40 through DHL from Shenzhen, China to Michigan, USA and took about 4 days.

Superbuy, a shipping agent, has a helpful international shipping cost/time calculator: superbuy logistics freight inquiry

 

[fossxplorer]

@e97
You probably haven't come so far to test this, but i'm asking: does this board support IOMMU/Intel VT-d?

 

[e97]

@e97
You probably haven't come so far to test this, but i'm asking: does this board support IOMMU/Intel VT-d?

Yes -- the BIOS is pretty raw -- like a debug OEM version so ton of options. Waiting to hear back from mfg on some settings to optimize things.

Board POSTS and installed debian lighting fast with E5-2678v3.

 

[itronin]

Yes -- the BIOS is pretty raw -- like a debug OEM version so ton of options. Waiting to hear back from mfg on some settings to optimize things.

Board POSTS and installed debian lighting fast with E5-2678v3.

Bench case or custom motherboard tray for a custom case? In either case really neat esp with the water cooling loop and repurposed power supply!

What are you doing for storage? Any plans to use the nvme? any indication that booting is supported with the nvme?

 

[e97]

@e97
You probably haven't come so far to test this, but i'm asking: does this board support IOMMU/Intel VT-d?

@fossxplorer forgot to attach this

Bench case or custom motherboard tray for a custom case? In either case really neat esp with the water cooling loop and repurposed power supply!

What are you doing for storage? Any plans to use the nvme? any indication that booting is supported with the nvme?

Thanks!

Prototype for a custom case, will likely become my goto bench case.

The PSU is 94% platinum efficiency @ 220V = less power consumption and compact.

Overall dimensions are 17" x 13.5" x 7". Next version will be even smaller with full cover.

Booting off 1TB Phison E12. Its hidden under the heatsink right under the GPU slot. Barely fits with 1.5 mm clearance : D

 

[itronin]

Edit - was informed that there is a limited set of v3 cpu's that supports ddr3.

@e97 how is the rest of your testing going?
I saw over on Win-Raid that you have ECC support working. Any other hiccups?
Are you using RDIMM or LRDIMM?
Do you know if there is support for LRDIMM?
Do you know if the manufacturer has released additional CPU support?
Did you purchase direct from the manufacturer or via eBay or Alibaba?

Sorry for all the questions, I'm contemplating getting one of these boards and a CPU for my next workstation life cycle upgrade.

TIA.

 

[e97]

Edit - was informed that there is a limited set of v3 cpu's that supports ddr3.

@e97 how is the rest of your testing going?
I saw over on Win-Raid that you have ECC support working. Any other hiccups?
Are you using RDIMM or LRDIMM?
Do you know if there is support for LRDIMM?
Do you know if the manufacturer has released additional CPU support?
Did you purchase direct from the manufacturer or via eBay or Alibaba?

Sorry for all the questions, I'm contemplating getting one of these boards and a CPU for my next workstation life cycle upgrade.

TIA.

Won't know about long term stability until its been running few months but I'm quite pleased after getting ECC working. For now everything is great!

One tiny thing is after waking from Sleep the LED turns back on but I think thats a BIOS misconfig on my part.

I'm also working on porting CoreBoot to this for open source BIOS / UEFI.

Using RDIMMs.

LRDIMM support in BIOS, set to Auto - not sure if its functional. I would think since RDIMMs with ECC work correctly on every OS I've tested + memtest, if the CPU supports LRDIMMs, they should work. Unless LRDIMMs have quirky trace requirements above and beyond RDIMMs that I'm unaware of.


I got it on Alibaba (Alipay, paypal equivalent, now accepts all major credit cards so its as easy as ebay) with purchase protection (30 days): Intel X99 Mainboard on Alibaba.com ~ $130 with express DHL shipping

Ask for Diego and tell him "the professor" recommended the board to you.


UPDATE (2019-09-22):

seller said they can give a discount, use this link:
SZMZ X99-8D3 LGA 2011v3 DDR3 Intel motherboard on Alibaba.com

 

[itronin]

Just saw your edit on the discount as I was going to order the board today. wow! way to go @e97 and the seller! Not quite sure how to contact Diego? If there's a message space for the order I'll drop that in there! eBay bucks coming in October so that will be the time to order the CPU!