Tyan Thunder n6650EX

Tyan, a long-time supporter of Phoronix and a manufacturer of many leading workstation/server-oriented motherboards, recently sent out their Thunder n6650EX motherboard. This motherboard is a slight redesign of their earlier Thunder n6550EX product, but with out of the box support for AMD's 45nm Opteron CPUs. The Thunder n6650EX is capable of handling four quad-core processors, up to 128GB of ECC Registered DDR2 system memory, dual PCI Express x16, and six Serial ATA 2.0 ports. In this article we are offering a preview of the Tyan Thunder n6650EX (S4992).

Features:

Processor
- Four 1207-pin ZIF sockets
- Support up to (4) AMD 45nm Quad-Core Opteron 8300 series processors
- Support 4.4GT/s HyperTransportTM inter-processor link
- Support AMD Dual Dynamic Power Management (DDPM) feature

Chipset
- nVIDIA nForce Professional 3600 + 3050 (NFP 3600+NFP3050)
- (1) PERICOM P17C9X130 PCI-X bridge
- (2) PERICOM PI2PCIE412-D PCI-E Mux.
- Winbond W83793G Super I/O
- (2) Analog Devices ADT7476 Hardware Monitoring ICs

Memory
- 128-bit Dual channel memory bus
- (32x) 240-pin DDR2 DIMM slots
- Support memory speeds of 400/533/677/800MHz
- Supports up to 128GB of Reg/ECC DDR2 memory
- Supports Single, Dual and Quad Rank memory

Expansion Slots
- (2) PCI-E x16 slots
- (3) PCI-E x8 slots
- (1) PCI-X 64/133MHz slots from PERICOM P17C9X130 (PCI-X Bridge)
- Total (6) expansion slots

Integrated I/O
- (2) 9-pin USB headers
- (6) SATA-II connectors
- (2) Mini-SAS connectors (total 8 SAS internal ports)
- (12) 4-pin FAN headers
- (1) 2x9-pin front panel header
- (1) 2x6-pin TYFP2 header for Tyan Barebone
- (1) 2x9-pin FAN header for Tyan Barebone
- (1) 2x3-pin LCM header
- (1) 5-pin PSMI header
- (1) 3-pin IPMB header

System Management
- CPU thermal & voltage monitor support
- (8) fan headers: (4) for CPU fans and (4) for system fans
- Watchdog timer (WDT) support
- Port 80 code display LED

Integrated 2D/3D PCI Graphics
- XGI VolariTM Z9s graphic controller
- PCI interface
- 32MB DDR video frame buffer memory

Integrated SAS Controller
- LSI SAS1068E 8-port SAS controller
- PCI-E x8 interface
- RAID 0, 1 and 1E support
- (2) mini-SAS internal connectors

Integrated SATA Controllers
- SATA-II controller integrated in NFP 3600
- (6) SATA-II ports w/ RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support

Integrated Network Processor
- (1) Intel 82571EB dual-port GbE LAN controller
- (1) Davicom DM9161AE 10/100 PHY
- WOL and PXE support
- Total (3) RJ-45 LAN ports (one for dedicated IPMI connection)

Integrated LAN Controller
- (2) GbE LAN ports via Marvell PHY 88E1121
- Supports WOL and PXE
- (2) RJ-45 ports with LED

BIOS
- AMI 8Mbit LPC Flash ROM
- Serial console redirect
- USB boot supported
- Supports APM1.2 and ACPI
- PnP, DMI, WfM power management
- S0/S1/S4/S5 states supported

Power Connector
- (1) 24-pin(2x12-pin), 3V+5V+12V power connector
- (2) 8-pin, 12V power connector
- (1) 4-pin, 12V power connector

Form Factor
- MEB (13" x 16.2")

Regulatory
- FCC Class B (DoC)
- European Community CE (DoC)

Server Management
- Onboard Raritan KIRA 100 supporting KVMover-IP function
- IPMI v2.0 compliant

Back Panel I/O Connector
- Stacked PS/2 connector for mouse and keyboard
- (2) stacked USB v2.0 ports
- (1) stacked DB-9 serial port and D-sub VGA port
- (3) side-by-side RJ-45 ports (one for dedicated IPMI connection)

Receiving the Thunder n6650EX we had just the motherboard itself in a very well protected cardboard box. However, the retail motherboard package for the Tyan S4992 should include a few SATA power and data cables, SAS cables, S4992 user's manual, a quick reference guide, driver CD, and the I/O shield. With this motherboard having four CPU sockets and being sized for an MEB enclosure, the Tyan Thunder n6650EX is quite large at 33 x 41 cm.