SuperMicro. How proprietary are they?

[simplesam]

I've never owned anything from supermicro.
I know that some of their pci cards are proprietary and are "reversed". I've been told on this forum, that their power supplies are proprietary.

What about everything else? Are they SuperProprietary?

I have been looking at the SC846E2-R900B and the SC216E2-R900UB chassis. Both come with integrated dual/redundant 36-port expanders. Both chassis cost ~$1300.

I assume that generic hard drives can be used.
But supermicro sells their own brand/label of raid cards. Does SM limit the backplane in chassis like these to their own raid cards, or can any generic lsi based raid card be used?
Can generic motherboards be used in their chassis'?
Do they do other goofy things, like flip pins around on power cables and the sas/sata backplane, so that you can only use their cables?

I'm also finding the X8DTH-6F motherboard very tempting. It seems like a good value, for what you get. But i don't want to fall into a rabbit hole of using highly proprietary products.

What's the verdict on supermicro stuff?

 

[Blue Fox]

In the server world, anything decent is proprietary. With those cases however, any drives will work. As will most RAID cards (I used an Areca with mine). You can use any motherboard in the case, however you'll need to get an adapter for the front panel so that you can plug it into the case (about $10). The only other thing is that the power cables might be too short depending on what board you use. They otherwise don't do anything screwy like what you mentioned.

Just to clarify, their UIO cards are actually a good thing. They allow you to fit more cards into a smaller space and are not something normally used on a case that large. Only when you want 3 expansion cards in a 1U case (2 full-height and 1 half-height) or 7 expansion cards in 2U case (4 full-height and 3 half-height). The 2U chassis you linked to is intended to be used with a proprietary board and UIO cards, however, you can swap out the back and use 7 half-height expansion cards instead. As for the power supplies, find me a non-proprietary redundant power supply. It doesn't exist really.

In the end, their products are excellent and when you want high quality, I wouldn't settle for anything less. Having spoken with their support numerous times, you really do get what you pay for.

 

[simplesam]

however you'll need to get an adapter for the front panel so that you can plug it into the case (about $10)

I have no clue what you're talking about. Do you have a link for me?

As for the power supplies, find me a non-proprietary redundant power supply. It doesn't exist really.

I usually use a wire to jumper two pins on the atx connector of standard atx power supplies, to make them behave like AT power supplies. Where if it's plugged in, it's on. No need for a motherboard or any other board/card to manage the chassis power. I just want to make sure that i could pull this off with a supermicro chassis and power supply too.

...
Zippy sells several generic, redundant power supplies.

 

[Blue Fox]

I have no clue what you're talking about. Do you have a link for me?

You'll use this if you don't use a Supermicro board.
http://www.supermicro.com/products/accessories/index.cfm
Look for: CBL-0084

I usually use a wire to jumper two pins on the atx connector of standard atx power supplies, to make them behave like AT power supplies. Where if it's plugged in, it's on. No need for a motherboard or any other board/card to manage the chassis power. I just want to make sure that i could pull this off with a supermicro chassis and power supply too.

...
Zippy sells several generic, redundant power supplies.

You could argue that those are proprietary because they're the only ones making them too. There is no standardization for redundant power supplies that I'm aware of, but that doesn't concern me because Supermicro's power supplies are excellent quality. As for running the power supplies without a case, you can do that, just not with the power supplies individually since they plug into a backplane. I believe they have some accessory specifically for this so that you can turn it on/off with the front panel if you just plan on using the chassis for storage and won't be using a motherboard inside.

 

[AceNZ]

Supermicro's large EE-ATX motherboards are a fairly proprietary form factor. But their cases hold standard ATX and E-ATX boards, and their ATX and E-ATX boards fit well in standard cases.

One of the reasons I like Supermicro is because they aren't afraid to push the envelope, even if that means making something proprietary, if they have to.

 

[longblock454]

One of the reasons I like Supermicro is because they aren't afraid to push the envelope, even if that means making something proprietary, if they have to.

And in general their stuff is good, may not be the cheapest but built well.

 

[unhappy_mage]

I have been looking at the SC846E2-R900B and the SC216E2-R900UB chassis. Both come with integrated dual/redundant 36-port expanders. Both chassis cost ~$1300.

My understanding is that you'll have to use dual-ported SAS drives to get any use out of the second expander. Or "sata interposer boards" like Sun designed for the J4000 series, but good luck finding those anywhere at all.

But supermicro sells their own brand/label of raid cards. Does SM limit the backplane in chassis like these to their own raid cards, or can any generic lsi based raid card be used?

I don't know about *any* cards, but I'm using an LSI 3442E-R with one with no problems, and I've seen reports of 3081s working as well.

Can generic motherboards be used in their chassis'?

Yes.

Do they do other goofy things, like flip pins around on power cables and the sas/sata backplane, so that you can only use their cables?

No.

I'm also finding the X8DTH-6F motherboard very tempting. It seems like a good value, for what you get. But i don't want to fall into a rabbit hole of using highly proprietary products.

The only proprietary things I can think of are UIO cards, which generally add up to a good deal, and the IPMI cards (I don't think that's a standard form factor...). In both cases, it's livable-with.

 

[keenan]

Can generic motherboards be used in their chassis'?

Some chassis have the I/O panel welded on. Be careful of these if you want to use an 'unsupported' board. Most don't though, as far as I can tell.

 

[Blue Fox]

Some chassis have the I/O panel welded on. Be careful of these if you want to use an 'unsupported' board. Most don't though, as far as I can tell.

That's going to be 1U chassis and that's only because things like audio jacks are normally too tall. Most 1U board will work with their 1U cases.

 

[aitoribarra]

I've had a problem with UIO and a SC216-R900 series chassis. The system couldn't power more than two cards at once. This could have been a power supply issue, but the BIOS was also convinced that there were only two PCIe slots in the system (if UIO is a kind of PCIe switch, it should have seen six or seven).

This was a big problem; I had to go for the SC216-R900 because I wanted 2.5" drives, I had to go for a UIO model because I wanted to have two full height RAID cards and a dual 10GbE NIC. The system would only work with 2 out of the 3 cards installed - if both RAID cards were in, the NIC wouldn't work. So instead of two 12 port Areca's with 4GB cache each, I had to make do with one 24 port Areca.

The system builder also had problems with the redundant power supplies and ended up having to fit just one and giving me a spare.

This was from one of Supermicro's largest resellers.

In general I love their kit though - I have several of their 1U Twin servers, and my new storage servers are going to be Supermicro too (although this time I'm using 4U chassis so I don't have to muck about with UIO).

SAS: they use LSI chips so not that proprietary. In another server I'm using a 8x 2.5" backplane ("mobile rack" in SM speak) - with built in SAS expander, so a 4x connection is enough for all 8 drives - inside a Dell server using a PERC raid controller (which is LSI too).

NICs use Intel chips (and drivers).

One minor annoyance is that the 2.5" drive carriers used in the 1U and 2U servers are not interchangeable with the ones used in their mobile racks, even though they are very similar.

 

[simplesam]

OK, I think my question is answered.

They're generally not proprietary.
Some of their electrical connections are sort of proprietary, but they don't kill you on the price of the cables.
Some of their bleeding edge stuff is sort of proprietary, but only because nobody else is doing it yet.
They could discontinue/change/fix the bleeding edge stuff, leaving you at a dead end. But that's the case everywhere.
But generally, they're OK.

---

I just came into a handful of lsi sasx36 based expanders (two handfuls really), so i probably won't even be using the supermicro disk chassis. I'll probably use these expanders + the norco mini-sas for 3.5" drives, and the chenbro 24x chassis for 2.5" drives.

I have a few questions about their motherboards, but I'll start a new thread for that.

Thanks everyone.

 

[lizardking009]

SAS: they use LSI chips so not that proprietary. In another server I'm using a 8x 2.5" backplane ("mobile rack" in SM speak) - with built in SAS expander, so a 4x connection is enough for all 8 drives - inside a Dell server using a PERC raid controller (which is LSI too).

Glad to hear that this works. As soon as I can get 1tb RAID series 2.5" drives, I'm going to stick those 8x2.5" racks in 2 of my Dells and use the existing PERC6/i to run them.

What drives are you using?

 

[Pocatello]

But generally, they're OK.

I would have to disagree. They rock! They make good products that really work well the first time. They have great quality control.

I have never had to use their customer service, but I hear that they excel in this area as well.

Super Micro is first class all the way. They might be more expensive, but it has been worth it to me.

 

[unhappy_mage]

This was a big problem; I had to go for the SC216-R900 because I wanted 2.5" drives, I had to go for a UIO model because I wanted to have two full height RAID cards and a dual 10GbE NIC. The system would only work with 2 out of the 3 cards installed - if both RAID cards were in, the NIC wouldn't work. So instead of two 12 port Areca's with 4GB cache each, I had to make do with one 24 port Areca.

This is very likely a problem with the Option Rom space running out. If you've still got the system somewhere you can play with it, try setting one of the cards to be completely disabled in its BIOS; the drivers usually know how to do all the initialization that's necessary.

 

[aitoribarra]

The server is actually in production so I can't really take it down until the replacement is ready. Anyway, I think I tried that before. Also powered the system up with no expansion cards, just the risers installed, and the bios still would only think there were two slots in the system. Maybe it was the riser, but when the system builder took the server back, they tried swapping the riser and that didn't cure the problem either.

But I will have another go when I've got spare hardware to move the drives to.

Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[Brak710]

Only complaints that I had heard of is the with the cases. The wiring for the power/LEDs/reset buttons are on a proprietary connector to the motherboard. You need to buy an adapter, which they do sell, but not many retailers carry it.

 

[kharan5876]

I used an SC846E1 with an LSI SAS HBA and had no problems.

Don't get the E2 unless you're getting dual port SAS drives.