Supermicro X9DRi-F - Xeon E5 v2 support?

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hippyhappo

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Oct 3, 2016
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I've read reports that some revisions of the Supermicro X9 boards don't support the v2 processors (even with a BIOS update), even though Supermicro says they do. Does anybody have any experience with the X9DRi-F? I downloaded the manual and it says for E5-2600 v2 processors, BIOS version 3.0 or above is required. I assume you can simply flash to the latest BIOS if need be (worst case scenario, a Sandy Bridge processor might be required for the initial flash)? Are there any particular revisions of this board to avoid, or should they all work with the v2 processors with a BIOS flash?

Thanks
 
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B

bood

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Mar 20, 2019
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I have an X9DRi-F with dual E5-2530 v2 processors running right now. Granted, they're ES, and I updated to the latest BIOS before I received them, but it works fine.
 
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hippyhappo

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bood said:
I have an X9DRi-F with dual E5-2530 v2 processors running right now. Granted, they're ES, and I updated to the latest BIOS before I received them, but it works fine.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the info. What revision is yours? The one I'm looking at is revision 1.11a. Just want to make sure it will work before I buy it.
 
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bood

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Mar 20, 2019
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hippyhappo said:
Thanks for the info. What revision is yours? The one I'm looking at is revision 1.11a. Just want to make sure it will work before I buy it.
Click to expand...
Sorry my dude, if it's silk screened on the motherboard, I can't see it - all of the expansion slots are populated. None of the software I tried reported any motherboard revisions, CPU-Z and HWiNFO. Their website doesn't mention anything about different HW revisions affecting V2 compatibility, only BIOS revisions.

Besides, even if it shows up with a BIOS revision older than 3.0, they have a BIOS recovery feature and you can update it. FWIW, if these boards do have a jumper that disables IME, I sure as hell couldn't find it. Have flashed the BIOS twice without jumping the non-existent header with no ill effects. Disabling IME in the BIOS makes Windows BSOD and reboot.

Code: 
================================================
BIOS Recovery (see user's manual for details)
================================================

Recovery BIOS with a USB Drive

If the BIOS file is corrupted and the system is not able to boot up, this feature will allow you to recover the BIOS image using a USB-attached device.  A USB flash drive or a USB CD/DVD ROM drive may be used for this purpose.  Please note that the USB hard disk drive is NOT supported at this moment.  Follow the procedure below to recover the BIOS.

1. Use a different system, copy the standard BIOS binary image file into a USB flash drive or a writable CD/DVD disc's Root Directory, and rename the file to “SUPER.ROM”.

2. While the system is turned off, insert the USB device that contains the new BIOS binary image (“SUPER.ROM”).

3. Right after powering on the system, press and hold <Ctrl> and <Home> keys together until the USB device's LED indicator comes on.  This may take a few seconds or up to one minute to start the process.

4. Once the USB device's LED is on, release the <Ctrl> and <Home> keys.  The system may generate beep codes to indicate that the BIOS ROM firmware is being reprogrammed, and a message may also be displayed on the screen.  DO NOT INTERRUPT THIS PROCESS UNTIL IT’S FINISHED!

5. After the Boot Sector Recovery Process is complete, the system will reboot automatically.

6. Boot into USB drive again.  When DOS prompt appear, please type AMI.BAT BIOSname.### to start BIOS update, just like in standard procedure.

7. Do not interrupt the process until the BIOS update is complete.

8. After you see the message of BIOS has completed the update, unplug the AC, clear the CMOS, and then plug in the AC, power on the system.  Go to the BIOS configuration, load the default setting, save and exit the BIOS.


Notes:

** There will be additional beeping after flashing the BIOS, due to the JPME1 and JPME2 jumper location changes.

*** If the BIOS flash failed, you may contact our RMA Dept. to have the BIOS chip reprogrammed.  This will require shipping the board to our RMA dept. for repair.  Please submit your RMA request at http://www.supermicro.com/support/rma/.
If it interests you, I've been playing with modifying the BIOS - trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation actually working. No luck with that yet, but now I can see the AVAGO LSI menus that should normally appear in EFI mode (according to Avago). Not really sure why they do now, and why they didn't before.

Since I was risking bricking the thing in the first place, I hard-coded every instance of "UEFI Only" to "UEFI First" - an option that isn't normally visible. Supermicro only gives you the option for UEFI Only or Legacy Only. That's kind of annoying because I'm using a mishmash of stuff, my Radeon Pro only has a UEFI OpROM, it is completely non-functional in legacy mode - and since I'd jumped the onboard VGA to disabled, resetting the BIOS meant no video or no post unless I re-enabled it or IPMI worked to change the BIOS to UEFI Boot. My MegaRAID card works fine in UEFI mode, but I was left without access to it pre-boot. Now it's integrated itself into the EFI menus.

I haven't tried booting anything that only supports MBR/BIOS booting, and the MegaRAID BIOS (and the Intel RSTe one) still doesn't show up on screen because it's a legacy OpROM and I'm not using the onboard video. Oh, and now the splash screen no longer looks like this:



It looks like this:



X9DRi8
 
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H

hippyhappo

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Oct 3, 2016
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bood said:
Sorry my dude, if it's silk screened on the motherboard, I can't see it - all of the expansion slots are populated. None of the software I tried reported any motherboard revisions, CPU-Z and HWiNFO. Their website doesn't mention anything about different HW revisions affecting V2 compatibility, only BIOS revisions.

Besides, even if it shows up with a BIOS revision older than 3.0, they have a BIOS recovery feature and you can update it. FWIW, if these boards do have a jumper that disables IME, I sure as hell couldn't find it. Have flashed the BIOS twice without jumping the non-existent header with no ill effects. Disabling IME in the BIOS makes Windows BSOD and reboot.

Code: 
================================================
BIOS Recovery (see user's manual for details)
================================================

Recovery BIOS with a USB Drive

If the BIOS file is corrupted and the system is not able to boot up, this feature will allow you to recover the BIOS image using a USB-attached device.  A USB flash drive or a USB CD/DVD ROM drive may be used for this purpose.  Please note that the USB hard disk drive is NOT supported at this moment.  Follow the procedure below to recover the BIOS.

1. Use a different system, copy the standard BIOS binary image file into a USB flash drive or a writable CD/DVD disc's Root Directory, and rename the file to “SUPER.ROM”.

2. While the system is turned off, insert the USB device that contains the new BIOS binary image (“SUPER.ROM”).

3. Right after powering on the system, press and hold <Ctrl> and <Home> keys together until the USB device's LED indicator comes on.  This may take a few seconds or up to one minute to start the process.

4. Once the USB device's LED is on, release the <Ctrl> and <Home> keys.  The system may generate beep codes to indicate that the BIOS ROM firmware is being reprogrammed, and a message may also be displayed on the screen.  DO NOT INTERRUPT THIS PROCESS UNTIL IT’S FINISHED!

5. After the Boot Sector Recovery Process is complete, the system will reboot automatically.

6. Boot into USB drive again.  When DOS prompt appear, please type AMI.BAT BIOSname.### to start BIOS update, just like in standard procedure.

7. Do not interrupt the process until the BIOS update is complete.

8. After you see the message of BIOS has completed the update, unplug the AC, clear the CMOS, and then plug in the AC, power on the system.  Go to the BIOS configuration, load the default setting, save and exit the BIOS.


Notes:

** There will be additional beeping after flashing the BIOS, due to the JPME1 and JPME2 jumper location changes.

*** If the BIOS flash failed, you may contact our RMA Dept. to have the BIOS chip reprogrammed.  This will require shipping the board to our RMA dept. for repair.  Please submit your RMA request at http://www.supermicro.com/support/rma/.
If it interests you, I've been playing with modifying the BIOS - trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation actually working. No luck with that yet, but now I can see the AVAGO LSI menus that should normally appear in EFI mode (according to Avago). Not really sure why they do now, and why they didn't before.

Since I was risking bricking the thing in the first place, I hard-coded every instance of "UEFI Only" to "UEFI First" - an option that isn't normally visible. Supermicro only gives you the option for UEFI Only or Legacy Only. That's kind of annoying because I'm using a mishmash of stuff, my Radeon Pro only has a UEFI OpROM, it is completely non-functional in legacy mode - and since I'd jumped the onboard VGA to disabled, resetting the BIOS meant no video or no post unless I re-enabled it or IPMI worked to change the BIOS to UEFI Boot. My MegaRAID card works fine in UEFI mode, but I was left without access to it pre-boot. Now it's integrated itself into the EFI menus.

I haven't tried booting anything that only supports MBR/BIOS booting, and the MegaRAID BIOS (and the Intel RSTe one) still doesn't show up on screen because it's a legacy OpROM and I'm not using the onboard video. Oh, and now the splash screen no longer looks like this:



It looks like this:



X9DRi8
Click to expand...
Yeah, the revision is typically on the corner of the board near the last PCI-E slot (right next to the X9DRi-F model name, and it's pretty small), so if you have it populated, it's probably covered up.

I came across this thread for the X9DRi-LN4F+ where people said some revisions won't work with v2 Xeons, even with a BIOS update:

https://forums.servethehome.com/ind...i-ln4f-rev-1-10-dual-socket-lga-2011-r.14906/

Not sure if it's limited to that particular model, or an issue across the X9 series. I'm thinking it might just be an issue with that particular model, because I can't find anybody reporting issues with the other boards.

Anyway, thanks again for the info. Appreciate you taking the time to check that out for me.
 
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bood

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Mar 20, 2019
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hippyhappo said:
Yeah, the revision is typically on the corner of the board near the last PCI-E slot (right next to the X9DRi-F model name, and it's pretty small), so if you have it populated, it's probably covered up.

I came across this thread for the X9DRi-LN4F+ where people said some revisions won't work with v2 Xeons, even with a BIOS update:

https://forums.servethehome.com/ind...i-ln4f-rev-1-10-dual-socket-lga-2011-r.14906/

Not sure if it's limited to that particular model, or an issue across the X9 series. I'm thinking it might just be an issue with that particular model, because I can't find anybody reporting issues with the other boards.

Anyway, thanks again for the info. Appreciate you taking the time to check that out for me.
Click to expand...
I can see X9DR CARD Rev BIG CARD lol. Tried to see if I could finagle it with loupes.

I'm shutting it down tonight to install the rear hot-swap bays and clean up some cabling.

And potentially create some labgore installing this:

on this:



I'll let you know what revision my board is tonight or tomorrow morning!
 
H

hippyhappo

Member
Oct 3, 2016
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bood said:
I can see X9DR CARD Rev BIG CARD lol. Tried to see if I could finagle it with loupes.

I'm shutting it down tonight to install the rear hot-swap bays and clean up some cabling.

And potentially create some labgore installing this:

on this:



I'll let you know what revision my board is tonight or tomorrow morning!
Click to expand...
That would be great, thanks!
 
M

mhilt

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Aug 8, 2019
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bood said:
If it interests you, I've been playing with modifying the BIOS - trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation actually working. No luck with that yet, but now I can see the AVAGO LSI menus that should normally appear in EFI mode (according to Avago). Not really sure why they do now, and why they didn't before.
Click to expand...
Hi, I saw you mentioned trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation working on your Supermicro X9 ... have you had any success? I just posted in another thread:

"I have a X9DR7-LN4F with Bios 3.3, and although bifurcation settings are visible, when I try to change x16 for instance, x16 is the only option I can select. Do any of yours actually allow you to select a different option?

When I first received the board, it had a 2.0 BIOS on it; and without thinking to back it up, I updated to 3.3 to get V2 CPU support. Oddly, I seem to recall though that when I looked through the 2.0 BIOS, I was able to select the bifurcation options, where I cannot now. Unfortunately I can't find an old BIOS to check that; does anyone have one?

It looks like @davidm (71)? on the win-raid forum was able to do a similar mod to enable bifurcation on a different mfg's board: RE: Add option in AMI UEFI bios menu (how to?) - 2

I've been trying to do similar, but the IFR Extractor tool has not worked for me -- anything I try to read with it spits back an error "Unknown protocol detected". I've tried it on several extracts from UEFI Tool; same result."
 
B

bood

New Member
Mar 20, 2019
10
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mhilt said:
Hi, I saw you mentioned trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation working on your Supermicro X9 ... have you had any success? I just posted in another thread:

"I have a X9DR7-LN4F with Bios 3.3, and although bifurcation settings are visible, when I try to change x16 for instance, x16 is the only option I can select. Do any of yours actually allow you to select a different option?

When I first received the board, it had a 2.0 BIOS on it; and without thinking to back it up, I updated to 3.3 to get V2 CPU support. Oddly, I seem to recall though that when I looked through the 2.0 BIOS, I was able to select the bifurcation options, where I cannot now. Unfortunately I can't find an old BIOS to check that; does anyone have one?

It looks like @davidm (71)? on the win-raid forum was able to do a similar mod to enable bifurcation on a different mfg's board: RE: Add option in AMI UEFI bios menu (how to?) - 2

I've been trying to do similar, but the IFR Extractor tool has not worked for me -- anything I try to read with it spits back an error "Unknown protocol detected". I've tried it on several extracts from UEFI Tool; same result."
Click to expand...
Unfortunately not. I do actually have options visible for my 16x slots and even some of the 8x slots, but none appear to be functional.
 
M

mhilt

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Aug 8, 2019
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bood said:
Unfortunately not. I do actually have options visible for my 16x slots and even some of the 8x slots, but none appear to be functional.
Click to expand...
That sucks. What BIOS version are you using? Do you have / have you tried any older versions (2.x or 3.0)?
 
J

josh

Active Member
Oct 21, 2013
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mhilt said:
Hi, I saw you mentioned trying to get PCI-e Bifurcation working on your Supermicro X9 ... have you had any success? I just posted in another thread:

"I have a X9DR7-LN4F with Bios 3.3, and although bifurcation settings are visible, when I try to change x16 for instance, x16 is the only option I can select. Do any of yours actually allow you to select a different option?

When I first received the board, it had a 2.0 BIOS on it; and without thinking to back it up, I updated to 3.3 to get V2 CPU support. Oddly, I seem to recall though that when I looked through the 2.0 BIOS, I was able to select the bifurcation options, where I cannot now. Unfortunately I can't find an old BIOS to check that; does anyone have one?

It looks like @davidm (71)? on the win-raid forum was able to do a similar mod to enable bifurcation on a different mfg's board: RE: Add option in AMI UEFI bios menu (how to?) - 2

I've been trying to do similar, but the IFR Extractor tool has not worked for me -- anything I try to read with it spits back an error "Unknown protocol detected". I've tried it on several extracts from UEFI Tool; same result."
Click to expand...
Digging this thread for a bit, I too am trying to get bifurcation to work on X9. Did you have any luck? X9DRI-F here.
 
M

Mizerka

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Aug 29, 2020
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spend a few days on this and can confirm that x9dri-f and x9dr3-f although have bifurication enabled in bios, it doesn't operate at all. spoke with SM on this but board is way EOL so they won't do anything about it.

SM released Beta driver dated FEB'20, confirmed working with hyper m2 x4 with 4x4x4x4 bifurcation in slot2;

mega.nz

File folder on MEGA

mega.nz mega.nz
 
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Mizerka

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Aug 29, 2020
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macstibs said:
@BlueFox

Yep - without rebooting I'm pretty sure I'm already running 3.4
Click to expand...
just don't download it then, it's only fixing an issue affecting like 12 people atm. 3.4 wasn't available publicly, so unless you're certain, then you're running 3.3 that was released publicly, this is 3.3dev build or 3.4, I didn't bother checking if it was 3.4 base or 3.3 but it implements cpu microcode for spectre and fixes bifurcation issues seen on these specific board models.

I'll add official 3.4 to my mega. it's dated june2020, but not tried it myself yet, from tech, it sounded like more microcode security fixes. bifurcation was never raised as an actual bios issue so no mention of it in patch notes either.

hell, the website was down for good 2 weeks without any notice, and just came back this week, so if you want anything official get in touch with support.

actually got nothing better to do, upgrading to this 3.4 now, proof of email and version checks uploaded.
 
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Mizerka

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Aug 29, 2020
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Mizerka said:
just don't download it then, it's only fixing an issue affecting like 12 people atm. 3.4 wasn't available publicly, so unless you're certain, then you're running 3.3 that was released publicly, this is 3.3dev build or 3.4, I didn't bother checking if it was 3.4 base or 3.3 but it implements cpu microcode for spectre and fixes bifurcation issues seen on these specific board models.

I'll add official 3.4 to my mega. it's dated june2020, but not tried it myself yet, from tech, it sounded like more microcode security fixes. bifurcation was never raised as an actual bios issue so no mention of it in patch notes either.

hell, the website was down for good 2 weeks without any notice, and just came back this week, so if you want anything official get in touch with support.

actually got nothing better to do, upgrading to this 3.4 now, proof of email and version checks uploaded.
Click to expand...
confirmed 3.4 in my mega bifurcation works fine as well, so if you're not happy with feb build, just use the 3.4 official one.
 
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macstibs

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Feb 1, 2020
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I have a supermicro 2x NVME card with only one ssd in there so was planning on turning on bifurcation soon. Glad to hear it's enabled on 3.4

Thanks.
 
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