I can already hear the whine from the cheap chipset fan on the Supermicro. A slightly larger and higher quality fan with an appropriate shroud could have nicely cooled the chipset and the adjacent m.2 devices.
Looks like a 40mm, replace it with a 40mm Noctua. If you know the hole spacing you could also find a suitable, larger/taller heatsink should you prefer that too. I've done that on several motherboards.
Hopefully they have the foresight to use a decent fan in the first place. For what these boards are inevitably going to sell for, I’d expect a NMB/Panaflo or Noctua (not sure they are an OEM - but they could be on such a niche product) class fan with a 10 year lifespan.
Well, if these TR-pro CPUs were freely available, too, this would be really excellent news.
But given that these chips will be segmented at packaging and fabs running at full capacity with queues only growing, I wonder just how meaningful this is: I guess you can't even use left-over/recycled EPICs and plug them into these (apart from the vendor lock issue).
I had a quick look online, there doesn't appear to be anything close to a shortage of Zen 2-based SKUs whether Ryzen or EPYC. And those new TR Pros are Zen 2-based. Are you confused by the Zen 3 shortages?
I'd be surprised if you'd ever see TR-pro sold online.
Since they launched this segment late and seemingly out of the blue, one explanation was that the product is about getting rid of surplus stockpiles of Rome SKUs, since you can't repurpose chiplets post packaging. TR-pro seems doable from EPYC chips post packaging via fuses and microcode updates and they seem a logical escape valve for surplus.
For AMD the TR-pro segment would be less attractive than EPYC, because they'd make more money selling that silicon as servers. And the TR-pro chiplets don't seem to be second rate bins, since their only limitation is RAM capacity (something AMD swore they'd never 'segment' originally).
I don't think AMD is still making Zen 2 CCDs when they can make Zen 3 CCDs instead, since they are on the same process and fab resources are a major limitation. So anything Zen 2 now is likely from stock and thus limited.
Milan seems to be backward compatible from Rome from a socket perspective so whoever has a fitting use case for EPYC class compute in a workstation form factor would probably prefer to buy Zen 3 based TR-pro chips, because they are quite simply better in any way for very little additional silicon die area and production cost.
And I just don't see how that segment might see a lot of packaged SKUs when there is a tight constraint on the fabbing of the chiplets. Again, I only see it receiving significant volumes, once the more attractive channels are saturated.
These aren't really out of the blue. They were announced months ago, but Lenovo was given temporary exclusivity with their Thinkstation. There were whispers of the WRX80 when the Zen 2 Threadrippers were coming out.
It's interesting to see U.2 making more inroads to workstation, and the ASUS board looks even better then those monochrome NZXT boards, great symmetry up top.
Sure it makes sense. Take a look at the Asrock Rack ROMED8-2T. Roughly the same I/O and board size but no chipset with everything running off the SoC. I would have assumed the same if the TR Pro is EPYC-based.
Yes cause it does? About the only thing the chipset actually adds is more PCIe lanes remapped to USB, something that a couple of PCIe-based USB controller would do just fine off 1 or 2 lanes of PCIe that the chipset currently uses.
On Zen2/3, essentially all the IO lives on the IOD, 32 and 128 PCIe/USB/SATA for AM4 and SP3 IODs respectively, even though AMD are right dicks in locking it away with an undersized AM4 socket and.. well.. everything about TRX40.
I was thinking the same. They probably “could” but with that many PCIe4 lanes...I’d they are all filled up the TDP of that chipset is going to be pegged which is like what 15w or something on the X570 so this is probably even higher.
There are actually at least 3 other pictures that can be found for the Asus board: https://quasarzone.com/bbs/qn_hardware/views/80524... Judging by the lack of VGA port, it seems to be the only one out of the 3 to not have an onboard BMC. Unless there's a separate bracket for it, but that would mean sacrificing one of those potentially precious PCI-E x16 slots.
There is a Nuvoton chip visible on the board. It *could* be the BMC. Additionally, they could share the onboard NICs to provide an IP just for the BMC. Lastly, while there is no VGA port, it may be just a small bracket to provide that. The one connector underneath the PCIe slot could be for that. My current desktop board (Asus Z10PE D16-WS) runs in a similar fashion. I agree on the x16 slot, but it's likely that nobody will really use all of them, or not be able to relocate the bracket to a slot that's unusable for whatever reason.
I really wish they had announced Zen3 versions of TR and TRPro. I'll be getting a TRPro video workstation this year, but I'd really prefer it to be Zen3-based for some level of future-proofing. Hopefully it'll be a drop-in/BIOS upgrade on these motherboards to upgrade to a Zen3 when the time comes.
If history is our guide, Zen 3 Epyc will come before Threadripper. At this point, this all seems academic, as TSMC is maxed out and has no spare capacity. So even if Zen 3 Threadripper was announced, doesn't look like they'd be able to make very many, since it is a low-volume product to begin with.
I am really happy to hear this, as the fact that a Threadripper allows me to have an accelerator card in addition to a video card is attractive, but being able to have eight-channel memory by getting a Threadripper Pro is also a plus. I hope that Zen 3 Threadripper Pro chips will come soon, and they too will be generally available.
According to this Tom's Hardware article, "The LGA4094 socket is physically identical to the Threadripper consumer and EPYC data center platforms", but the pinout is different to support the additional memory channels and PCIe lanes. It doesn't mention if the Pro chip would work in earlier sockets with reduced functionality, but who in their right mind would spend the extra money for the PRO Threadripper and then put it in a TRX40 motherboard where it only has the capabilities of the cheaper non-PRO Threadrippers?
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Pessimism - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
I can already hear the whine from the cheap chipset fan on the Supermicro. A slightly larger and higher quality fan with an appropriate shroud could have nicely cooled the chipset and the adjacent m.2 devices.Ej24 - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
Looks like a 40mm, replace it with a 40mm Noctua. If you know the hole spacing you could also find a suitable, larger/taller heatsink should you prefer that too. I've done that on several motherboards.Ej24 - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
You're right though, on second glance it is particularly wimpy. Definitely slap a noctua on it at minimumSamus - Thursday, January 14, 2021 - link
Hopefully they have the foresight to use a decent fan in the first place. For what these boards are inevitably going to sell for, I’d expect a NMB/Panaflo or Noctua (not sure they are an OEM - but they could be on such a niche product) class fan with a 10 year lifespan.Olaf2k4 - Wednesday, January 13, 2021 - link
You can always replace it with a fan from EBM PAPST... The board will disintegrate from rust before those magnetic bearing will break :)abufrejoval - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
Well, if these TR-pro CPUs were freely available, too, this would be really excellent news.But given that these chips will be segmented at packaging and fabs running at full capacity with queues only growing, I wonder just how meaningful this is: I guess you can't even use left-over/recycled EPICs and plug them into these (apart from the vendor lock issue).
ZoZo - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
I had a quick look online, there doesn't appear to be anything close to a shortage of Zen 2-based SKUs whether Ryzen or EPYC. And those new TR Pros are Zen 2-based. Are you confused by the Zen 3 shortages?abufrejoval - Wednesday, January 13, 2021 - link
I'd be surprised if you'd ever see TR-pro sold online.Since they launched this segment late and seemingly out of the blue, one explanation was that the product is about getting rid of surplus stockpiles of Rome SKUs, since you can't repurpose chiplets post packaging. TR-pro seems doable from EPYC chips post packaging via fuses and microcode updates and they seem a logical escape valve for surplus.
For AMD the TR-pro segment would be less attractive than EPYC, because they'd make more money selling that silicon as servers. And the TR-pro chiplets don't seem to be second rate bins, since their only limitation is RAM capacity (something AMD swore they'd never 'segment' originally).
I don't think AMD is still making Zen 2 CCDs when they can make Zen 3 CCDs instead, since they are on the same process and fab resources are a major limitation. So anything Zen 2 now is likely from stock and thus limited.
Milan seems to be backward compatible from Rome from a socket perspective so whoever has a fitting use case for EPYC class compute in a workstation form factor would probably prefer to buy Zen 3 based TR-pro chips, because they are quite simply better in any way for very little additional silicon die area and production cost.
And I just don't see how that segment might see a lot of packaged SKUs when there is a tight constraint on the fabbing of the chiplets. Again, I only see it receiving significant volumes, once the more attractive channels are saturated.
blkspade - Thursday, January 14, 2021 - link
These aren't really out of the blue. They were announced months ago, but Lenovo was given temporary exclusivity with their Thinkstation. There were whispers of the WRX80 when the Zen 2 Threadrippers were coming out.guyr - Tuesday, March 2, 2021 - link
NewEgg has them listed as available today:https://www.newegg.com/threadripperpro/EventSaleSt...
Pricing is too rich for me, I think I'll make due with 4 memory channels. :)
Unashamed_unoriginal_username_x86 - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
It's interesting to see U.2 making more inroads to workstation, and the ASUS board looks even better then those monochrome NZXT boards, great symmetry up top.Silver5urfer - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
It's insanely expensive and they can't even get a damn passive cooled PCH on these ? Insane.ZeDestructor - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
I'm more salty there's a chipset at alllmcd - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
You really think that amount of IO fits onto a sanely-sized package with no PCH? Honestly go away, this isn't for you.Athlex - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
Sure it makes sense. Take a look at the Asrock Rack ROMED8-2T. Roughly the same I/O and board size but no chipset with everything running off the SoC. I would have assumed the same if the TR Pro is EPYC-based.ZeDestructor - Wednesday, January 13, 2021 - link
Yes cause it does? About the only thing the chipset actually adds is more PCIe lanes remapped to USB, something that a couple of PCIe-based USB controller would do just fine off 1 or 2 lanes of PCIe that the chipset currently uses.On Zen2/3, essentially all the IO lives on the IOD, 32 and 128 PCIe/USB/SATA for AM4 and SP3 IODs respectively, even though AMD are right dicks in locking it away with an undersized AM4 socket and.. well.. everything about TRX40.
PixyMisa - Wednesday, January 13, 2021 - link
Threadripper Pro has 128 lanes of PCIe 4.0.Samus - Thursday, January 14, 2021 - link
I was thinking the same. They probably “could” but with that many PCIe4 lanes...I’d they are all filled up the TDP of that chipset is going to be pegged which is like what 15w or something on the X570 so this is probably even higher.ZoZo - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
There are actually at least 3 other pictures that can be found for the Asus board:https://quasarzone.com/bbs/qn_hardware/views/80524...
Judging by the lack of VGA port, it seems to be the only one out of the 3 to not have an onboard BMC. Unless there's a separate bracket for it, but that would mean sacrificing one of those potentially precious PCI-E x16 slots.
HappyCracker - Wednesday, January 13, 2021 - link
There is a Nuvoton chip visible on the board. It *could* be the BMC. Additionally, they could share the onboard NICs to provide an IP just for the BMC. Lastly, while there is no VGA port, it may be just a small bracket to provide that. The one connector underneath the PCIe slot could be for that. My current desktop board (Asus Z10PE D16-WS) runs in a similar fashion. I agree on the x16 slot, but it's likely that nobody will really use all of them, or not be able to relocate the bracket to a slot that's unusable for whatever reason.luiset83 - Thursday, January 14, 2021 - link
ASUS' press release mentions a BMC:https://www.asus.com/news/mw0tfe64yrgpviom
tyger11 - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
I really wish they had announced Zen3 versions of TR and TRPro. I'll be getting a TRPro video workstation this year, but I'd really prefer it to be Zen3-based for some level of future-proofing. Hopefully it'll be a drop-in/BIOS upgrade on these motherboards to upgrade to a Zen3 when the time comes.guyr - Tuesday, March 2, 2021 - link
If history is our guide, Zen 3 Epyc will come before Threadripper. At this point, this all seems academic, as TSMC is maxed out and has no spare capacity. So even if Zen 3 Threadripper was announced, doesn't look like they'd be able to make very many, since it is a low-volume product to begin with.quadibloc - Tuesday, January 12, 2021 - link
I am really happy to hear this, as the fact that a Threadripper allows me to have an accelerator card in addition to a video card is attractive, but being able to have eight-channel memory by getting a Threadripper Pro is also a plus. I hope that Zen 3 Threadripper Pro chips will come soon, and they too will be generally available.officialliya - Wednesday, January 20, 2021 - link
such a great information.<a href="https://motherboardsguru.com/"></a>
zoer - Thursday, March 4, 2021 - link
Does the Threadripper Pro require a WRX80 Mainboard? Or is it backwards compatible to the TRX40 boards available on the market?guyr - Thursday, March 4, 2021 - link
According to this Tom's Hardware article, "The LGA4094 socket is physically identical to the Threadripper consumer and EPYC data center platforms", but the pinout is different to support the additional memory channels and PCIe lanes. It doesn't mention if the Pro chip would work in earlier sockets with reduced functionality, but who in their right mind would spend the extra money for the PRO Threadripper and then put it in a TRX40 motherboard where it only has the capabilities of the cheaper non-PRO Threadrippers?https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-threadrip...