Supermicro X10QBL fitting case? (Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra maybe?).

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x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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Hey guys.

I'm the fresh new (and proud too!) owner of a magnificent X10QBL motherboard from Supermicro, however I am having a hard time locating a fitting case for this bad boy.

After hours of intensive googling, it appears the only case that could potentially accept that board could potentially be the Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra.

I've searched on the STH forums and saw a thread where the owner managed to fit in a X9 board I believe but my X10 seems to be even larger than his, according to the specs page, the X10QBL is even larger than the X9s previous generation, 16.79" x 16.4" (42.6cm x 41.7cm).

Here is a link to the product specs off the official site to make it even easier for you guys:

Supermicro | Products | Motherboards | Xeon® Boards | X10QBL

So two questions here:

- 1) What are the odds the Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra could accept this motherboard?
- 2) Which other "super tower" chassis/case could accept this motherboard in case the 1st question answer is a negative?

Thank you for your attention.
 

britinpdx

Active Member
Feb 8, 2013
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First off, welcome !

In terms of the "odds that a chassis will support this" my initial reaction was "I don't think so" .. that motherboard is an absolute monster !!

Having looked at the photos in the X10QBL motherboard manual (pg 1-2) as well as the photos of the Blackhawk Ultra on the Newegg web site, I'm now firmly in the "extremely doubtful" camp.

Looking at the approximate placement of the I/O plate on the motherboard and the case, there just doesn't seem to be enough vertical space (to the right of the motherboard rear I/O area) in the case. The mounting points on the motherboard also look to be somewhat unique, although drill and tap can often get around that issue.

From the manual, Chapter 1 / Overview / Checklist it does state "Note 1: The X10QBL(-CT) motherboard was designed to be used with a Supermicro-proprietary chassis as an integrated server platform. It is not to be used as a stand-alone product and will not be shipped independently in a retail box."

I think that either the Supermicro SC828TQ-R1K43LPB or the 748TQ-R1K43B are your only SM options ..
 
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x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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Hey britinpdx.

Thanks a lot for your input.

In regards to finding a cheap case, it appears I'm having very few/limited options to chose from...

It makes me wonder whether I should attempt to mount it against the wall hanging above my desk or something (never done a such thing before but I think it is somehow possible to do) instead of looking for a case, it would be harder but it would definitely be a cheaper option as well it seems.

Oh wait, what about a LEGO made "case" then? :)

Regards.
 

britinpdx

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Feb 8, 2013
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I got to thinking ... SM have produced a number of quad CPU motherboards, both AMD and Intel, so just for grins I took a look on eBay ..

I have no idea if the rev of these chassis will work with your particular motherboard, (so its probably time for some research), but in your situation I may be tempted to roll the dice and consider something like ..

Supermicro 2U Server SATA / SAS CSE-828 SAS828TQ Chassis (looks like it has no power supplies, but the price is right!!)
or
Super Chassis SAS828TQ 2x PWS-1K41F-1R (this one looks to have power supplies)
 

x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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Those eBay links are interesting to say the least... unfortunately I'm based in the European Union.

Importing fees (21% of the declared value) coupled with additional international shipping fees makes it all unpractical, I'm afraid.
 

Patriot

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Apr 18, 2011
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I shoved a MEB and EEB into mine... you will have to tap some holes but you can make many things work in that case...
If you have specific dimensions of the board... distance from edge to io plate etc... I can measure the case.
 

x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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Hey Patriot, thanks for your input.

At the moment the only dimensions I can supply you guys with are the official ones from the Users's manual, they only mention the format is proprietary 16.79" x 16.4" (42.6cm x 41.7cm) and that's about it.
 
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cesmith9999

Well-Known Member
Mar 26, 2013
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6 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-TR3F
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
7 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-C0R3FT
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
8 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-C0R4FT
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
9 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 4U | 8048B-TR4F
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
10 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-TR4F
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
11 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 4U | 8048B-C0R4FT
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
12 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 4U | 8048B-C0R3FT
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
13 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 4U | 8048B-TR3F
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
14 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-C0R3FT
Integrated Board Super X10QBL
15 Supermicro | Products | SuperServer | 2U | 8028B-TR3F


you can see which chassis are available from the above SKU's

Chris
 
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x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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Hey Chris thanks for your input.

My intent was to avoid relying on Supermicro chassis as they generally speaking are "ugly" looking cases and are expensive (overpriced) as f*ck.

Let alone the fact they're being complete jerks to power end-users and home consumers/enthusiasts, if you knew how "far" I went and what great lengths it took me to get the board alone, you'd be surprised.

Even the product page lists "motherboard not sold separately" and "not available for retail resale", the board I got was delivered through a legitimate company via a FedEX delivery and to be sure it couldn't be used as a retail product, the card-box had no manuals, no drivers medias, no SATA cables and not even it's I/O shield.

It was shipped as, a bare box, a motherboard in an anti-static bag and that's it. It's intended to be used as a replacement board in case the original one went faulty.

As far as I know, they ceased selling their products to individuals since 2009'ish.

Morale of the story: Screw Supermicro, I'll avoid them and their shady sales mispractices as much as I can, they aren't getting my shiny money for an ugly looking case no matter what.
 
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cesmith9999

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You are on the extreme end of the spectrum. Even where I work, 4 processor servers are a rare beast. I know of 15 servers that have 4 processors in them. Most of them are for large SQL servers. One was a test BUILD machine to test out if more procs helped out our build process. let's just say... for one of the 4 processor server we could buy 4 * 2 proc servers and spread the build load... and finish 3x faster...

So for the enthusiast market... This is not a normal server to buy. Looking at the size. I would expect you to need to buy a SM case... because it is a very proprietary MB layout.

Chris
 
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x10qbl

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Apr 3, 2016
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I'll keep looking for extra feedback from other Rosewill Blackhawk Ultra owners or look-out for a LEGO "chassis" solution I guess.
 

Patrick

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Dec 21, 2010
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I wrote a long post but let me condense it:

$195 even if it costs 3x for import duties and shipping in the end is going to be less hassle/ cheaper than buying one of these other cases, power supplies and doing all the mods. That board has 4x CPU power connectors which I cannot think of many PSUs that can handle that without having to make/ buy adapters and hope for the best. I have done enough work trying to fit old 4P AMD Opteron G34 platforms into cases that I would not even try this myself.

If you have a barebones E7 V3 system for under $2000 that will be amazing. I somewhat want to buy a Dell R930 just for the RAS features. The E7 line (especially 4 socket and below) is really for scale out memory and reliability applications. If you are trying to mod PSUs and chassis to make it work, you are undermining that second point.

With all that said, if you do build it, I would love to hear how much it costs and see the modifications required. It would be a cool project.
 
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x10qbl

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Hey Patrick, thanks a lot for your input.

Unfortunately it appears I might have to stick with a SM chassis that can be used as a tower then, sigh.

As for how much the system cost me this far, parts-wise we're looking at $1750 (new, 3 years manufacturer warranty) for the board itself and then 4x $410 for each E7 4890 V2 (ES/Refurbished ones). I know they are only V2 (0.22 microns) from two generations ago but they're 15C/30T each and have rather higher clocks than their V3 counterparts with being at 2.8 GHz with Turbo Modes throttling all the way to 3.4 GHz.

As for the memory all I have so far are 4x Samsung RDDR3L ECC 8GB sticks for a total of 32 GB which perfectly fits my needs for now and I got them for free. Speaking of which, I intended to open a different separate topic but since we're here...

Do you guys know how should I populate the memory banks when having only 4 sticks at my disposal? Is it even possible? Would the system even boot at all with just 1 stick installed per physical processor for a total of 4?

Thanks again guys, your help is appreciated.
 
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PigLover

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Each cpu has to have local memory. So with just 4 sticks you should populate slot A0 of each cpu. On most SM motherboards the sockets for group A will be blue.

You'll also likely be very disappointed by performance this way. You'll be limited to 25% of the expected memory throughput and with 15 cores per cpu you'll be constantly waiting for memory. Do yourself a favor and buy 12 more sticks of ram...
 
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x10qbl

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Of course I will be getting more RAM as soon as possible. Maybe it was a poor choice of words or a poorly phrasing from me, I don't know.

I was handed those 4 sticks as a freebie thrown in just to "get started".

My general question more likely was along the lines of "Will it even boot up as is with only 4 sticks?" along with "How do I populate the banks over time?" whenever I get more sticks and "Will cheaper non ECC and non Registered mixing work?", etc, etc, etc...

Of course only 4 filled banks out of the 32 will look rather empty and silly, definitely not what I want on the long run. ;-)
 
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William

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May 7, 2015
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Very nice board !

If you have not gotten CPU's yet be sure to double check just which ones will work, maybe email Supermicro and get a supported CPU list.
I remember back when I had a similar system we had issues with CPU's, I know it should be rather straightforward but E7's can be rather tricky on what they designed the boards for.

It says
Quad socket R1 (LGA 2011) supports
Intel® Xeon® processor E7-8800 v3 /
E7-4800 v3 family (18-Core), w/ QPI up to 9.6 GT/s

We went through several sets of CPUs and found none would fit the socket, the notches were different vs the socket.

Just giving a little heads up to help avoid any issues.