Intel hopes their new line of motherboards supporting their Xeon processor E5-2400 chip sets are not too big, not too little, but just right for smaller companies moving up and mid-size companies on a budget. Four boards, all with dual-socket capability, have been announced.
“Last year we announced we were going to provide three times the number of motherboards for the channel,” says David Brown, Director of Marketing for Enterprise Platforms and Services Division at Intel. “We released the E5 2600 line earlier this year, and we’re filling in the motherboard line card for our resellers.”
Intel Server Board S2400SC is aimed at first time server buyers who need more than a single socket system. It includes 32 total PCIe lanes, including 28 PCIe Gen3 lanes for expanded I/O in an entry level server. It has dual integrated NICs, eight memory sockets supporting up to 128GB memory, up to eight SAS/SATA ports, plus two SATA 6Gb ports and four SATA 3Gb ports.
Server Board S2400GP steps up the I/O ladder with 48 PCIe Gen3 lanes and 12 DIMM slots for up to 384 GB memory at 1600 MHz, up to eight SAS/SATA ports, plus six SATA 6 Gb ports, four SATA 3 Gb ports, and integrated quad or dual 1GbE NICs.
Server Board S2400BB puts the specs of the S2400GP in a rack-mount format, and adds multiple boot options. This model fits well with budget-minded enterprises and cloud computing systems, and includes dual or quad 1GbE NICs, support for up to 384GB 1600 MHz memory in 12 sockets, and up to eight SAS/SATA ports and two SATA 6 Gb ports.
Server Board S2400LP is a half-width form factor for the Blade or half-width server format, putting 4 node systems in a 2U chassis. It includes one integrated 1GbE NIC, 12 memory slots for up to 384 GB 1600 MHz memory, and optional Integrated ConnectX-3 QDR/FDR InfiniBand for high performance computing cluster use.
All the boards include features from the Xeon processor E5 family, including Intel Turbo Boost technology 2.0, Intel Trusted Execution Technology, and Intel Integrated I/O. The Intel Server Continuity Suite comes with each board, including server management, continuous backup, point-and-click systems management, and virtualization capabilities.
In addition, all the boards in this release qualify for Intel’s On-Site Repair Service for Servers, including Next-Day onsite repair, in all 50 states and select cities in Canada. Resellers can also add two more years of warranty protection, for a total of five years, with the Intel Server Component Extended Warranty.
A few more boards will be launched soon. “All the E5 series SKUs will have been launched by the middle of this year,” says Brown. All the boards in the E5-2400 line are available now, except for the BB model which will hit the streets in four to six weeks.
Outside of a very few direct customers, these systems “go one hundred percent through distribution and resellers,” says Brown. They are also used in embedded systems and the appliance market. “The resellers make some interesting products out of our platforms, for military uses, security, medical imaging, and more.”
In quantities of 1000, the Intel Xeon processor ES-2400 product family ranges in price from $188 to $1,440. For details, contact Intel or check http://www.intc.com/priceList.cfm.
