Living On The Edge: Intel Launches Xeon D-2100 Series SoCs
by Ian Cutress on February 7, 2018 9:00 AM ESTXeon D-2100 Motherboards Appearing
ASRock Rack D2100D8UM
Jumping the gun just a little, we were sent a link to ASRock Rack who has already put some of its Xeon D-2100 products up on the website. Specifically, the D2100D8UM shows a motherboard with a fixed embedded socket, eight memory slots, two PCIe slots, a pair of SFF-8643 breakout ports, and an integrated IPMI with a dedicated network port. In order to take advantage of the integrated 10 GbE ports, customers will have to use a mezzanine card with the appropriate PHY.
We’re not entirely sure how long ASRock Rack has been preparing for this platform, although this looks like one of its more integrated platforms, probably designed for a specific customer in mind. The webpage states in the main headline that it supports up to 512 GB of DDR4, but in the specification table it says it only supports 128 GB of DDR4. Both segments however do clarify RDIMM and LRDIMM support, which is a positive.
The PCIe slots are physically an x16 slot and an x8 slot, however there are only 16 lanes between the two and they act in a switching capacity, for x16/x0 or x8/x8 operation. For a system that has access to 32 PCIe lanes, looking through the specification sheet it is not overtly obvious where the other 16 from the SoC have gone. It would seem that in the interest of cost (or the specific customer), they are simply not used.
Elsewhere on the board is almost a full set of SATA ports. Three SATA ports are standard SATA ports, 1 is a SATA DOM, and eight SATA ports come from the two SFF-8643 breakout connectors. This totals twelve ports, although the platform supports 14. Similarly, there is a single USB 3.0 port, a single USB 2.0 port, and one header each for USB 2.0 and USB 3.0. On the rear panel there is an Ethernet port for the integrated management chip, an Aspeed AST2500, along with a VGA header for management as well. Other networking and USB ports have to be added in by the customer. There are also five fan headers.
ASRock Rack does not list the exact processors that it will put into this motherboard, stating that it supports up to 110W, which would cover the full list. It is likely that interested parties will have to inquire as to exact pricing depending on the D-2100 series needed.
Many thanks to SH SOTN for the link.
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Threska - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
" From a pure price perspective, this jump from the top core count part down to the one just below it is sizable, although Intel does have a history with this, such as the E3-1200 Xeon line where the top processor, with a 100 MHz higher frequency than the second best, was 30%+ higher in cost."Must be nice having a monopoly.
Qwertilot - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
That's not a monopoly thing as, by definition, they provide very, very strong competition to themselves :) Some customers are presumably truly price insensitive for whatever reason.Elstar - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
If all you care about is upfront costs, then yes, Intel's high-end parts are expensive. But if you run a data center where "performance/watt" is critical, then the cost of the top parts are reasonable.Elstar - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
If all you care about is upfront costs, then yes, Intel's high-end parts are expensive. But if you run a data center where "performance/watt" is critical, then the cost of the top parts are reasonable.tamalero - Sunday, February 11, 2018 - link
I'm confused how 4 cores less but 600Mhz less per core on base frequency and all turbo is "better performance per watt" while being almost 1400 USD more per processor.HStewart - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
"Must be nice having a monopoly."Well anybody that states Intel has a monopoly should rethink that, even Apple could be consider a Monopoly because they don't allow others to manufacture products on iOS - but the one that comes to mind the most is Qualcomm with recent announcements of Windows 10 for ARM - which only works on Qualcomm.. Can we say Windows 10 for Qualcomm - sorry no thanks
But the real thing that make Qualcomm a real monopoly is it telecommunications.
prisonerX - Friday, February 9, 2018 - link
I guess you can argue what a monopoly is, but Intel is irrefutably abuses their dominant position in the marketplace. The former is not a sin, the later is illegal. Intel is repugnant.Yorgos - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
"Living on the Edge"Right on.
Will it work? will it get infested due to the various sec. holes? will it get bricked like their C2000 cousins?
You can never tell what's going to come tomorrow when you use intel.
Living on the Edge.
HStewart - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
I think you are trying to referred to Atom bases servers - they have been replace with C3xxx versions like 16 Corehttps://ark.intel.com/products/97927/Intel-Atom-Pr...
But if these new D series Xeons have lower power - I could see them replace C2000 cousins. or this Atom based server
DanNeely - Wednesday, February 7, 2018 - link
Looks like only 14 D2xxx CPUs (in all the tables/charts) not 15 as stated in the section header.