Tyan Tempest i5000XT S2696
Last month Intel Corporation had announced their Kentsfield and Clovertown processors. The Intel Core 2 Extreme Quad QX6700 was the first processor (and only one at this time) based upon the quad-core Kentsfield. Meanwhile Intel had introduced the Clovertown Xeon 5300 series at Super Computing 2006. With the two Clovertown quad-core processors in hand, we had delivered our launch-day preview back on November 14. The motherboard we had used for those tests, as well as to test the Xeon 5000 and 5100 series, was the Tyan Tempest i5000XT S2696. Now having spent nearly a month with this flagship motherboard we have a few thoughts to share about this Xeon creation.
Features:
Processor
· Dual LGA771 sockets
· Supports up to two Intel Xeon processors 5000/ 5100 series ("Dempsey/Woodcrest");
dual-core
· 1333/1066/667 MHz FSB; VRD 11.0
Chipset
· Intel 5000X chipset
· Intel 6321ESB I/O Controller Hub
· Winbond 82627EHG Super I/O chip
Memory
· (8) 240-pin DDR2 FBDIMM sockets
· Four memory channels; supports ECC DIMMs
· Maximum of 32/16GB of DDR2-533/667
Expansion Slots
· (2) PCI-E x16 slots (one x4 sig. from EBS2; one x16 signals for graphics
cards)
· (1) PCI-E x8 slot (x4 sig. from EBS2)
· (2) PCI-X 133/100MHz slots from EBS2
· (1) PCI 32-bit 33MHz slot
System Management
· ADI ADT7470 Hardware Monitor
· CPU thermal & voltage monitor support
· Five (5) fan headers (4-pin configuration)
Integrated Audio Controller
· HDA link; SPDIF in/out port in rear
· RealTek ALC888 controller (High-Def. Audio)
· Stacked Mic-in/Line-in/Line-out rear ports
· Front panel audio header
· CD-in, Aux-in headers (4-pin configuration)
Integrated SATA Controller
· (6) SATA-II ports running at 3.0Gb/s
· RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 supported
(RAID 10 only supported under windows)
Integrated SAS Controller
· LSI 1068E SAS controller
· (8) SAS ports; RAID 0, 1, and 1E supported
· Supports Integrated Mirroring, Integrated Enhanced Mirroring, and Integrated
Stripping
Integrated FireWire (1394a) Controller
· TI TSB43AB22 1394a controller
· 1394a channel for rear (connector)
· 1394a channel for front (header)
Integrated LAN Controllers
· Intel Gigabit from ESB2 (w/ dual pors "Gilgal")
Trusted Platform Management (TPM)
· Infineon SLB9635TT 1.2 (w/ 5000X-G chipset)
BIOS
· Phoenix BIOS on 8Mbit Flash ROM
· Support ACPI 2.0
· PXE via Ethernet, USB device boot
· PnP, DMI 2.0, WfM 2.0 Power Management
· User-configurable H/W monitoring
· Auto-configuration of hard disk types
· Multiple boot options
· 48-bit LBA support
Form Factor
· SSI / Extened ATX footprint (12" x 13")
Power
· EPS12V / SSI (24 + 8 + 4 pin) power connectors
Regulatory
· FCC Class B (Declaration of Conformity)
· European Community CE (DoC)
Contents:
The Tyan Tempest i5000XT had arrived at our doorstep in early November as we were beginning to prepare for the Clovertown introduction. In the past we had looked at the i5000VF, i5000VS, and i5000XL from the Tyan Tempest series. As we had mentioned in those previous articles, the Tempest series is designed to be a seriously powerful server platform with maximum scalability and flexibility. The product packaging and contents for all of these motherboards are nearly the same. When opening the i5000XT S2696 there was the usual assortment of cables, power adapters, and more.