The ASRock Rack SIENAD8-2L2T is probably one of the crucial easy designs we now have seen from the corporate. Constructed round an AMD EPYC 8004 “Siena” processor, the motherboard is designed to show the platform’s performance in a manner our readers might get actually enthusiastic about. As easy because the design is, it nonetheless has a bit ASRock Rack design aptitude that our readers might have already seen.
ASRock Rack SIENAD8-2L2T Overview
The motherboard itself is normal ATX 12″ x 9.6″ dimension. That makes it smaller than among the different Siena boards we now have reviewed beforehand.
On the coronary heart of the motherboard is an AMD socket SP6 (LGA 4844). What ASRock did with this motherboard is to make one thing that may very well be an improve to a 1 DIMM per channel AMD EPYC 7001-7003 sequence system and even an Ice Lake Xeon system.
AMD despatched us quite a few CPUs to make use of. We’re utilizing the AMD EPYC 8534P 64-core 200W processor on this system for the pictures. The AMD EPYC 8004 “Siena” sequence is fascinating because it has a ton of I/O and as much as 64 cores in single socket platforms, however it makes use of Zen 4C cores and has much less reminiscence.
One of many huge options of the AMD EPYC 8004 sequence is the DDR5 reminiscence format. The processor household helps 6-channel reminiscence, half of the EPYC 9004 sequence. As an alternative of this being a strictly 1DPC or 2DPC design, ASRock Rack has an extra two slots for eight DDR5 DIMM slots complete. That actually helps on the subject of of us needing emigrate from older era Xeon E5, Xeon Scalable, Xeon D-2100, or early era EPYC 3000 or EPYC 7000 programs.
From an airflow perspective, that is an ATX server platform. Consequently, is optimized for front-to-rear airflow.
MCIO connectors have develop into very talked-about within the PCIe Gen5 period. This technique has two on the prime fringe of the board.
One thing you’ll not see on the motherboard is a normal 24-pin ATX energy connector. As an alternative, there’s a little 4-pin ATX Energy connector. ASRock Rack contains an adapter for a 24-pin to this in an effort to present options like energy on for the system.
As an alternative, ASRock Rack is utilizing two 8-pin 12V energy inputs for the board’s energy. One thing we now have seen from the corporate is that the standard 24-pin energy connector is just too huge to make dense designs, so it is a format ASRock Rack has carried out for years. We promised some ASRock Rack aptitude.
There are six fan energy headers designed for conventional 4-pin or bigger counter-rotating fan designs. These are neatly positioned at the vanguard of the motherboard, the place most fan partitions will likely be.
On the underside of the motherboard, there’s a POST code show and quite a few headers.
One of many neat options is that this motherboard has twin PCIe Gen5 x4 M.2 slots. These slots might be both M.2 2280 (80mm) or 22110 (110mm) relying on the place the mount is put in.
ASRock has a pleasant thumb screw, however we want that the mounting level was a tool-less design. Another producers have began to have tool-less M.2 mounting all the way in which from securing the drive to the mount in addition to securing the mount to the appropriate spot on the motherboard. It’s a small contact however it could save a number of seconds per set up.
This platform has 4 PCIe Gen5 x16 slots, three of which help CXL 1.1. These slots are spaced for double-width playing cards, and there’s even an x8 slot. The block diagram part will clarify how all the PCIe is related.
Right here is one other take a look at the PCIe slots. One thing we should always level out is that full-length PCIe playing cards will cowl the onboard M.2 slots.
Beneath the heatsink, there are two essential chips. First, there’s an Intel X710-AT2 controller (prime) for 10GbE. The second is an ASPEED AST2600 BMC (backside). A single heatsink covers each.
One other enjoyable design ingredient is right here with the Intel i210-AT NIC for 1GbE.
The rear I/O has the out-of-band administration port, in addition to VGA and two USB 3 ports for native entry. There are two 1GbE ports and two 10Gbase-T ports for a pleasant mixture of 1GbE and 10GbE.
Subsequent, allow us to get to the block diagram.
