X79's Rare ECC Support vs. Z77's Unavailable ECC Support

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Glowingwind

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Anyone have any idea why I can find many recently produced X79 and Z77 boards that will both list Xeon supported CPUs in the their officially support list(s), but while a handful of X79 motherboards seem to have corresponding ECC support listed (assuming an actual E5-XXXX Xeon CPU is present), none of the Z77 boards do?


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1651825

http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.us.asp?cat=Specifications&Model=X79 Extreme11

vs.

http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4169#

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Intel_Socket_1155/P8Z77_WS/#CPUS


I suspect this is a BIOS support issue and that eventually a handful of Z77 chipset motherboard manufacturers may have firmware revision available? If not, what's innately different between the two chipsets? They are the consumer equivalent of Intels C2xx and C6xx server/workstation line that officially supports this (but it lacking elseware), so what is unique about the X79 platform? Perhaps unofficial support, such as what some ASUS boards had, in the past, are already available now and just requires someone willing to try it?

Since there is still a major lack of selection for Ivy Bridge with Panther Point (C216) boards available, I'm struggling to find a way to use Xeon Ivy Bridge CPUs, but with both ECC and PCIexpress3 SLI support.


:confused:
 
The chipset doesn't support it. You aren't going to get ECC out of Z77 no matter what you do. X79 supports it because it is also used in some server and workstations board. It has been like this for ages. X58, X48, X38, and 975X all supported ECC memory while the lower end versions did not.

If you're just after a C216 board that supports multiple GPUs, Supermicro makes one: http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C216/X9SAE-V.cfm
 
Blue Fox said:
The chipset doesn't support it. You aren't going to get ECC out of Z77 no matter what you do. X79 supports it because it is also used in some server and workstations board. It has been like this for ages. X58, X48, X38, and 975X all supported ECC memory while the lower end versions did not.

If you're just after a C216 board that supports multiple GPUs, Supermicro makes one: http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C216/X9SAE-V.cfm
Click to expand...


Doh.


Yeah, I've eyed the X9SAE-V, but apparently it has issues using a 16x GPU card in an 8x (lanes) slot. It won't throttle down to 8x speed and causes compatibility, for some reason, according to Supermicro support:

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1698515&page=3
 
Yeah, the P8C is the only other C216 board I can find. It's reputation is mixed, however, having problems with supported ram and various controller cards, etc...
 
Glowingwind said:
Yeah, the P8C is the only other C216 board I can find. It's reputation is mixed, however, having problems with supported ram and various controller cards, etc...
Click to expand...

X79 is a workstation (hyperniche) chipset, while Z77 is merely an enthusiast chipset.

C206 is above X79 in the workstation-chipset hierarchy - hence its presence onboard the ASUS P8C (and predecessor P8B) - both of which are workstation/server motherboards.

It's why I'm actually recommending Z77 for home server usage (and starting to recommend it for workstation usage as well) due to the LACK of persnicketiness of most Z77 implementations.

There are tradeoffs when going with a XEON CPU - and *especially* one that is a socketmate to a more general-purpose CPU; that has been true since Apple went XEON-based Kentsfield (as opposed to Q6600) for the original Intel-driven Mac Pro.
 
There are no downsides of a Xeon processor aside from cost and lack of overclocking. There is also no such thing as a more "general purpose" processor. The Xeon line is not more specialized either. Also, the reason Apple did not go with a Q6600 is because their workstation is dual socket and therefore 771 instead of 775.
 
Blue Fox said:
There are no downsides of a Xeon processor aside from cost and lack of overclocking. There is also no such thing as a more "general purpose" processor. The Xeon line is not more specialized either. Also, the reason Apple did not go with a Q6600 is because their workstation is dual socket and therefore 771 instead of 775.
Click to expand...

I said *chipset* - not CPU.

Notice that I pointed out that the only real differences between the XEON and non-XEON variations are their sockets (and chipsets for those sockets)?

Here's an LGA1155 XEON CPU that seems perfectly capable of going into a Z77 motherboard (despite it being classified as a server CPU) - the Intel XEON E3-1230 v2:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117286

It actually has a "lower" TDP than desktop i5-3570K (69W vs. 77W) despite it supporting HTT (which i5-K lacks).

The problem is that requirement for registered ECC memory (tied to the MCH - which is on the CPU die) hence XEON requiring particular chipsets - C2xx supports ECC, while Z77 does not.
 
Guys, most z77 1155 boards will probably take Xeons just fine like me my e3-1230 and my m4gene-z. Officially it doesn't work. Turns out it works just fine at least with standard desktop DIMMs.

It is just mainboard manufacturers apart from Asrock don't officially list support Xeon on their z77 products.
 
PGHammer said:
I said *chipset* - not CPU.
Click to expand...
You most certainly said CPU and my response was aimed specifically at this:
PGHammer said:
There are tradeoffs when going with a XEON CPU - and *especially* one that is a socketmate to a more general-purpose CPU; that has been true since Apple went XEON-based Kentsfield (as opposed to Q6600) for the original Intel-driven Mac Pro.
Click to expand...

PGHammer said:
Notice that I pointed out that the only real differences between the XEON and non-XEON variations are their sockets (and chipsets for those sockets)?
Click to expand...
In the world of single processor systems, the sockets don't change. Chipsets are independent and currently the desktop line of chipsets supports Xeon processors and the server/workstation line support desktop (Celeron, Pentium, Core iX) processors.
PGHammer said:
Here's an LGA1155 XEON CPU that seems perfectly capable of going into a Z77 motherboard (despite it being classified as a server CPU) - the Intel XEON E3-1230 v2:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117286

It actually has a "lower" TDP than desktop i5-3570K (69W vs. 77W) despite it supporting HTT (which i5-K lacks).
Click to expand...
As mentioned, they do work just fine in desktop boards for the most part. The TDP is lower because it has no integrated GPU (it's also the equivalent of a Core i7).
PGHammer said:
The problem is that requirement for registered ECC memory (tied to the MCH - which is on the CPU die) hence XEON requiring particular chipsets - C2xx supports ECC, while Z77 does not.
Click to expand...
Xeon CPUs do not always require ECC memory and the current line works fine without it. Did you know you can run the many of the processors from the desktop line in a C2xx chipset board with ECC memory?
 
Skripka said:
Guys, most z77 1155 boards will probably take Xeons just fine like me my e3-1230 and my m4gene-z. Officially it doesn't work. Turns out it works just fine at least with standard desktop DIMMs.

It is just mainboard manufacturers apart from Asrock don't officially list support Xeon on their z77 products.
Click to expand...


Yes, it will "take" Xeons, but will the bios also recognize and "enable" the ECC support available by ECC memory, when coupled?



Blue Fox said:
Did you know you can run the many of the processors from the desktop line in a C2xx chipset board with ECC memory?
Click to expand...


I had thought and still assume that the memory controllers on anything produced by Intel lately had ECC support intentionally disabled, unless it's a Xeon processor:

http://ark.intel.com/products/55452

vs.

http://ark.intel.com/products/65523
 
Glowingwind said:
Yes, it will "take" Xeons, but will the bios also recognize and "enable" the ECC support available by ECC memory, when coupled?
Click to expand...
No.
Glowingwind said:
I had thought and still assume that the memory controllers on anything produced by Intel lately had ECC support intentionally disabled, unless it's a Xeon processor:

http://ark.intel.com/products/55452

vs.

http://ark.intel.com/products/65523
Click to expand...
The ECC functionality winds up being disabled, but it does work. For example this board requires ECC RAM, but still supports Core i3s (and the Pentium and Celeron line even though they aren't mentioned): http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/Xeon/C202_C204/X9SCM-F.cfm
 
XTF said:
The memory controller is on the CPU. How exactly is the chipset involved in ECC?
Click to expand...
While that may be so, the PCH still plays a part in everything. Unfortunately I'm not certain of all the technical details having not looked at all of Intel's whitepapers, but you can look at the current chipsets as an example:

C20x requires ECC unregistered memory.
C216 supports both ECC and non-ECC unbuffered memory.

Both are the same socket and support the same line of processors (for the most part).
 
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