ES Xeon Discussion
- Thread starter britinpdx
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Yes it's second gen. What do you mean the board has old BIOS? Project Olympus supports second gen as well?
do you have BIOS update files ? i found none. if it supports ES,it is old BIOS for Skylake only.
No. The spec is available, but the firmware isn't. I should be able to dump them though when I get it, if that's of interest to you.
But I did find this. Someone had some Cascade Lake QR8Ps that they had from a unit with the board. They dumped the firmware on the next page, but sadly the files have been deleted.
Also here's a document with the motherboard design in it that mentions Cascade Lake support.
Edit: oops forgot I'm not on reddit, fixed links
yes that would be nice. can you dump with a USB programmer ? its not easy to get all of the BIOS using the OS.
first the OS dump will be OK, but to modd the BIOS and reflash back we need the complete dump.
means QQ8M(50655) will work. skylake ES like QL1M not.
unfortunaly i don't have this BIOS, only saved the screeshot from winrad forum.
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some say it works. i don't know. but you should note: the microcode of the QQ8M is not supported by intel anymore since 2019.
no corrections of errata or vulnerabilities.
Oh yeah that's how I planned to dump it anyway. I don't have a CPU.
There's also this weird connector:
Labelled "BIOS_FLASH". I can't even make out what type of component/connector that is. It weirdly looks like a female and male connector already joined on the board. Do you have any idea? Would I be able to easily grab the firmware from there?
Oh nice I missed that.
The person I spoke to on reddit said that they were using their Microsoft motherboard with Skylake ES. I'm guessing that it will depend on what firmware I get it with then? And I might have to try and hunt down the Cascade Lake firmware.
If I don't have the right BIOS, should it be moddable?
Ahh ok. I've heard that most Skylake ES have serious issues with virtualization, so I'd rather avoid that (and Skylake QS are harder to find for cheap).
Oh that's neat. Should make it much easier.
Thank you for the help! It should arrive next week. I'll get back to you when it arrives.
Edit: oh I noticed there's two BIOS chips, #0 and #1 (and also BMC FLASH). Do you think it's just a backup, or should I dump both?
maybe you can switch between. better both dumps. who knows ? maybe its one for ES and one for Cascade Lake LOL.
very difficult. the QQZ3 is not a standard ES, its out of complete Intel Evaluation Servers, not provided as single processor.
thanks for that. if i ever will need to unlock more PCIe slots, then i should look for a new matched pair..
Oh one more question. What power supply would you recommend for dual QQ8M's? Both in terms of wattage, and any specifics? That motherboard only has +12V input by the way, so the +12V rail is really what's important, it doesn't use 5V etc at all.
Edit: might be better to find some second hand server power supply, and modify that to the pinout of the connector? As of course server PSUs are often 12V only.
Here's the pinout of the motherboard's 24 pin connector, it's just +12V the one side, and GND the other. The 8 pin and 4 pin connectors on the board are all outputs for SATA etc.
Edit 2: Would a 100A 12V server PSU be fine to run these? Or is that pushing it too close? Based on this article it seems some of them can hit 650W+ for one processor? What about if I instead went with a Skylake QS, would 100A be enough then?
Edit: might be better to find some second hand server power supply, and modify that to the pinout of the connector? As of course server PSUs are often 12V only.
Here's the pinout of the motherboard's 24 pin connector, it's just +12V the one side, and GND the other. The 8 pin and 4 pin connectors on the board are all outputs for SATA etc.
Edit 2: Would a 100A 12V server PSU be fine to run these? Or is that pushing it too close? Based on this article it seems some of them can hit 650W+ for one processor? What about if I instead went with a Skylake QS, would 100A be enough then?
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PL4 if the QQ8M is 160W, max, is 307W which you will never see, it is ES with lower frequencies.
500W PSU will be enough just for the two CPU, add the Watts of your GPU and other devices.
I know i've asked this on my own thread, but maybe this time i will get more information 
. So i bought dell t7820 and would like to ask if ES cpu's would be supported. On my own thread, i've got an answer that only cascade lake ES cpu's would work(QQxx) but maybe there's a possibility to run first gen ES cpu's ? maybe by modding bios or something like that ?. Thanks for answers in advance.
. So i bought dell t7820 and would like to ask if ES cpu's would be supported. On my own thread, i've got an answer that only cascade lake ES cpu's would work(QQxx) but maybe there's a possibility to run first gen ES cpu's ? maybe by modding bios or something like that ?. Thanks for answers in advance.try this oldest available BIOS 7X20T_1.0.3
edit:
If you have BIOS 2.x.x on your system, you can not downgrade to 1.x.x