June 7, 201313 yr I'm not sure if this has been reported already, but this new motherboard seems interesting: http://www.supermicro.co.uk/products/motherboard/Xeon/C220/X10SL7-F.cfm Based on Intel C222 chipset 4x SATA2, 2x SATA3 + 8x SATA3 from LSI IPMI I will most probably buy this, i am hoping it will become the next staple unRAID mobo?
June 7, 201313 yr Author Whoops! Hopefully it is a worthy motherboard to deserve a dedicated thread. I mean if the price is right and it ticks all the ESXi support boxes, we have a winner!
June 7, 201313 yr Author Oh and the V3 Xeons don't all have onboard GFX! http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/06/04/intel_haswell_xeon_e3_1200_v3_server_chip/
June 7, 201313 yr Whoops! Hopefully it is a worthy motherboard to deserve a dedicated thread. I mean if the price is right and it ticks all the ESXi support boxes, we have a winner! It is worth it. It is appealing. I would try it if I hadn't already built my systems.
June 7, 201313 yr Oh and the V3 Xeons don't all have onboard GFX! http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/06/04/intel_haswell_xeon_e3_1200_v3_server_chip/ Neither did the v2. Or the v1 for that matter. On the subject on the board, I'm not a big fan of this X10 series. I prefer the four 8x (though two run at 4x) slots on the X9SCM series. The X10 equivalent, the X10SLM, has a 16x slot running at 8x, a 8x at 8x and an 8x at 4x. Why did it lose a slot? That model doesn't have the LSI controller so why is it losing an additional 4x lane the X9SCM had. As for the X10SL7 you posted, this being a server motherboard, why does the LSI controller use standard SATA ports instead of SAS connectors? I'd have to buy reverse breakout cables to use this with the SAS backplanes in my server case. I guess we can wait and see what Tyan comes up with but the Haswell compatible line of server motherboards for Supermicro has been a big disappointment as far as I'm concerned. Not that I was planning on upgrading since I've got an X9SCM-F and E3-1230 v2, but I was thinking about upgrading next year when Broadwell chips are released, but Supermicro will likely keep the same line of boards like they did for Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge. Guess I'll have to wait for Skylake in 2015.
June 7, 201313 yr ...why does the LSI controller use standard SATA ports instead of SAS connectors? I'd have to buy reverse breakout cables to use this with the SAS backplanes in my server case...For me this would be fine since I have tower cases with 5x3 cages with sata connectors.
June 7, 201313 yr Author About the GFX I thought they would stop making the E3 without GFX hence the comment. I agree with you the loss of the 4x connectors is baffling, however, if you have a case that will fill up all the PCI slots with expansion cards it means you have a lot of drives which then means you'll just buy a full ATX board rather than this one. This will work nicely in a case that fits 8-10 drives!
September 9, 201312 yr Author I'm about to buy this, will report back. I'll be trying XenServer on it!
September 9, 201312 yr I'm about to buy this, will report back. I'll be trying XenServer on it! It'd also be interesting if you'd try booting ESXi just to confirm whether or not it works As near as I can tell from a quick review of Intel's site, all the E3 v3's "check all the boxes" for full virtualization support [VT-x, VT-d, EPT, etc.] so I suspect ESXi is no problem. What would REALLY be nice to know is whether the LSI controller can be passed through to an ESXi VM What CPU are you planning to get? [i'd use the E3-1245v3 ]
September 9, 201312 yr Author @garycase i wouldn't get a 12x5 CPU because the motherboard already has GPU on it. Unfortunately as my SM AOC-SASLP-MV8 died last night, i needed things in a hurry so i just went for the 1230v3. Will try out both XenServer and ESXi and let you guys know. I like the onboard USB slot!
October 15, 201312 yr Hey spylex, How is the board running? Any problems so far? I am planing on a unraid Server with 12HDD (not ESXi) so it seems perfect for me.
October 15, 201312 yr Good to know it's working well. Is that with bare metal UnRAID, or are you running it virtualized with ESXi ??
October 16, 201312 yr Author I'm using ram from CRUCIAL as they surprisingly offered the best price: http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?IMODULE=CT2KIT102472BA160B I've booted in bare metal in unRAID, detected all drives straight out of the box. Moved to ESXi 5.5, passed the LSI controller through (not the onboard one though, saving those for ESXi related storage) and i added on a another supermicro AOC card, all good so far. The internal USB slot is useful for just keeping ESXi boot stick on there too.
October 16, 201312 yr Moved to ESXi 5.5, passed the LSI controller through (not the onboard one though, saving those for ESXi related storage) and i added on a another supermicro AOC card, all good so far. Not sure what you mean here -- did you add another LSI card and pass it through to your VM? ... or did you pass the onboard LSI controller through, and when you say "not the onboard one" are you referring to the chipset controller ports?
October 16, 201312 yr Author I see my choice of words was a little poor there Yes, i passthru the onboard LSI but not the onboard C222 chipset ports. I also attached a AOC-SASLP-MV8 and passed through just fine (with HBA mode hack). I had to add the drivers for the networking cards to the ESXi installation image.
October 16, 201312 yr EXCELLENT. So this board seems nearly perfect for an ESXi system that can run UnRAID with 8 drives with no add-on controller; or up to 16 with a single extra controller !!
October 16, 201312 yr ... by the way, did you have to do any special flashing for the onboard LSI controller? ... or does it work (and pass-through) "as is" ??
October 18, 201312 yr Author Yeah it's a sweet board. I did flash it to IT mode but i'm not sure it even needed it. I just read on some forums that it might help. After my ESXi purple screened once, i realised it was the AOC controller not being in IT mode that hurt!
October 18, 201312 yr I ordered the Board What's with the IT mode, read it here in the other Thread. But why is that necessary?
October 18, 201312 yr I ordered the Board What's with the IT mode, read it here in the other Thread. But why is that necessary? unRAID cannot operate with many RAID controllers. But by flashing it to IT mode you turn it into a dumb controller. All raid capabilities are removed. If you want them back then you have to flash it to IR mode.
October 18, 201312 yr I did flash it to IT mode ... It'd be nice if you'd post a link to the exact firmware you flashed it with => there are several choices; so it'd be nice to use one we know works with that board
October 19, 201312 yr Author I used the advice on these two threads: http://forums.servethehome.com/processors-motherboards/2115-supermicro-x10sl7-f-vs-x10slh-f.html http://forums.servethehome.com/raid-controllers-host-bus-adapters/1734-flashing-lsi2308-x9srh-7f-mode.html In the rush of getting it done, i didn't actually document my steps
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.