The Epyc 9004 “Genoa” server chips deliver immense performance with up to 96 cores, twelve memory channels and 128 PCI Express lanes, but they also cost between 1000 and 12,000 euros per CPU. For the lower price segment, Taiwanese board manufacturers such as Asrock Rack, Gigabyte, MSI and Tyan now offer AM5 server boards, for which AMD has released the consumer versions of the Ryzen 7000 desktop processors.
The legacy interfaces VGA and RS/232 are found on the Gigabyte MC13-LE0, which is typical for servers.
Compact servers with Ryzen
Interested parties can use these boards to build small, cheaper servers with 6 to 16 CPU cores. The Ryzen 7000X3D with additional, stacked level 3 cache are also officially supported, which brings performance advantages for memory-intensive applications. In contrast to the usual consumer boards, the server motherboards have up to five network ports, including 10 Gbit/s Ethernet, PCIe x8 slots and a baseboard management controller (BMC) for remote maintenance and access.
The MSI D3051 offers 2 × 10 GbE and 3 × 1GbE.
Furthermore, the AM5 server boards take on up to 192 GB ECC-DDR5 RAM if you install new 48 GB large bars, and offer PCI Express 5.0 x16 on the PEG slot. As a special feature, the MSI D3051 draws its energy either internally via ATX power connections or an external 12-volt socket.
(chh)