Been thinking about upgrading my server's MB/processor.  I'm completely spoiled by the IPMI/KVM/IP on my current (SuperMicro) motherboard + 2346HE processor.  Any recommendations for other manufacturers with similar remote-management capabilities?  I really like SuperMicro, but their stuff tends to be on the expensive side, so I'm hoping a less expensive alternative exists.  Thanks.

You basically have Supermicro or Asrockrack, between those I vote for Supermicro.

I have an ASRock MB with IPMI in one of my servers and I have had no issues with it. Tyan also makes boards with IPMI but they tend to be more expensive as many are dual socket.


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I've nothing against Asrock, well maybe the buggy Marvell controller they use on a lot of their server boards, but had several Asrock desktop boards and never had any issues, mainly recommend Supermicro for server boards because is what I have and know, also from what I've read the support seems a little better.

Thanks guys.  I'd came to the same conclusion, but was hoping I was wrong...or that I'd missed something.

Last year for BF Newegg had some Gigabyte boards with IPMI on a super fire sale. They were mITX with integrated Xeon D CPUs, but that was exactly what I was looking for.

 

Marked down from ~$400 to ~$200. Was too good of a deal to pass up. The board and management features seem a little less polished than my old Supermicro IPMI board, but the functionality is all still there.

I had an ASRock Server MB (E3C224-4L for Haswell Xeon) with IPMI and VGA. Worked great. Traded it in on a ASRock Workstation MB (C226M WS) with an extra x4 slot which i really needed, but lacking the IPMI and onboard Video. Good trade for me. Had slight issue with the C226M and USB passthrough, and resolved it by disabling USB 3.0. Not a big deal for me, and probably should reach out to tech support to report the issue and maybe get a BIOS fix. Its an old board and not sure they would.

 

I really don't miss the IPMI. The ability to do a remote reboot was certainly a nice convenience, but only used it once or twice, as rebooting my server remotely is not a common need. Most of the time when I am powering up the server, it is after doing some work on the machine. And I want to be standing there switching it on in case of any clicking or fireworks! TBH, I prefer very basic VGA video on the MB to IPMI. But both are nice.

 

I think its harder to find boards with the right number of slots and lanes and memory expansion. In today's world, I'd want 8 memory slots, ability to handle 2 PCIe 3.0 x8+ (double wide for video cards), 1 x8 PCIe 3.0 (single wide for HBA), 1 x4 PCIe 2.0+ (RAID card I need), and 1+ x1+ card (USB card / other if needed) - none blocked by the video cards. I'd also want 3 USB 2.0 controllers (one for unRAID and 2 to passthrough for keyboard/mouse). If it had all that, I'd be fine with no video or IPMI. 

 

My prior MB was a SuperMicro - got super deal on it but limited on memory. I don't generally like the way the way SM boards are outfitted - lanes and memory expansion often limited or not meeting my requirements. For whatever reason, the ASRocks usually are a better fit.

 

I would not hesitate to buy either if it met my needs.

Most Asus server/workstation boards take a cheap plug-in module for IPMI.  I have one on a P9D, and it works great.  AsRock's IPMI seems to use an ancient version of the same software, but they don't seem to be bothered updating it.

 

The king of IPMI has to be HP's iLO, though.  Worth the investment in their servers.

I bought a used Supermicro X10 SLL-F m-atx board a few months ago on eBay for about $100. It's for backup/testing purposes so I only bought a used Pentium G for it and 8GB ECC. But you could put a nice Xeon V3 in it.

Also IPMI is useful for many more things than just remote boot. But if your server does hang for any reason you can always reset it and view the last console remotely. With an X10/X11 or Asrock you can use a sweet plugin to control individual fans based on hard drive, motherboard or CPU temps. You can view real time actual sensor readings without the sorcery of lm-sensors and sensor.conf's. You can get push notifications of critical server events. E.g. Memory errors, high/low temps, volts, rpms. I would never get another board for a server without IPMI.

Asus and Intel motherboards can work with an IPMI add-in module. Supermicros IPMI seems less prone to iKVM stopping to work after a Java update than Asrock boards. This is mostly due to security issues. HPs ILO works very nice and has never failed on my Microserver Gen 8. Iam very happy with Supermicro motherboards and their support department. They respond fast.