Supermicro X11SCA X11SCA-W and X11SCA-F for Xeon E-2100 Workstations

[chrisk2305]

Hi, I just installed this Board in my Linux server and I am not able to boot off my Intel M.2 SSD (6600p). In previous SM Boards I could always choose "Load native AMI NVMe Firmware" and then booting was no issue at all. I cannot find that option on this board (BIOS 1.0a). Can somebody help me shed some light on this. Thanks!

 

[croakz]

For those wondering about PCI-E overlap:
M2_1 shares with U.2.
M2_2 shares with the PCI-E X4 slot

Anyone know if shared means one or the other? Or shared bandwidth? For example, if I have a card in M2_1 can I also have a drive plugged into U.2? Or if I have a card in M2_2 can I also have something else (hba, raid, network, etc) installed in the shared PCI-E X4 slot? Thanks.

 

[RoboSteveJackson]

Anyone know if shared means one or the other? Or shared bandwidth? For example, if I have a card in M2_1 can I also have a drive plugged into U.2? Or if I have a card in M2_2 can I also have something else (hba, raid, network, etc) installed in the shared PCI-E X4 slot? Thanks.

I take it as "shares" bandwidth.

 

[croakz]

From Supermicro Support, "No, M.2#2 and U.2 cannot be used at the same time. You can only use one of them."

Bummer.

 

[croakz]

Also, M.2#1 and the PCI-e x4 slot can not be used at the same time.

 

[ReturnedSword]

Anyone know if shared means one or the other? Or shared bandwidth? For example, if I have a card in M2_1 can I also have a drive plugged into U.2? Or if I have a card in M2_2 can I also have something else (hba, raid, network, etc) installed in the shared PCI-E X4 slot? Thanks.

Based on my understanding of current Intel chipset architecture, shared means they share bandwidth, although this should be confirmed in the manual.

 

[Theodore]

Some thoughts on the X11SCA-F:
Good:
UEFI Support is good
No host machine incompatibilities with Adaptec 7 series card I am using (This is often a problem)
AS2500 IPMI is a big step forward over older implementations (IMHO)
Even an I3-8300 seems speedy
ECC support is good on an I3
No Stability issues
Layout is nice

Bad:
In Bios 1.0 - Broken ACS implementation (Very limited PCI Passthrough)
In Bios 1.0 - Intel Graphics not initialised properly when AST is primary. This means using Intel as secondary graphics in OS or passthrough for VM doesn't work. (There may be more to this than I know but currently this is what seems to be source of the problem as disabling the AST allows it to work and VGA Arb is set correctly)
In Bios 1.0 - Linux reports ACPI bios bugs (DSDT related I think)
5 Fan Header is not enough (IMHO)

Summary: Bios needs work; lets hope V1.1 sorts a lot of the above. In its current state it is good for standard server use but not VM work if PCI passthrough or SRIOV is needed (SRIOV on my Intel X540 is broken by ACS too). If you intend to use it for a workstation with AST for remote manage the current graphics initialisation probs rules out this board too.

Have you managed to enable SR-IOV on the platform?
I have an HPE DL20 Gen10 with E2176G and I have SriovSupport=MissingAcs message on Hyper-V.
HPE says "SR-IOV is not supported on coffee lake processors" but I think that it is only a constraint of their bios.

 

[denywinarto]

Any idea how to use IPMI with monitor simultaneously with this board?
They seem to cancel each other, if the other one is active, the other will show blackscreen, and vice versa
i have tried almost all settings on the BIOS, my cpu is intel i5-8400t