Anyone play around with Asrock Rack D1541D4U-2O8R or D1541D4I-2L2T?

Hardware
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Browsing Newegg for some deals and come across this: https://www.newegg.com/asrock-rack-d1541d4u-2o8r-supports-intel-xeon-d1541-processor/p/N82E16813599021?Item=N82E16813599021

$1280, but there is a 50% off code atm for this board, bringing cost down to $640, which seems like a BITCHEN deal for what you get:

4c/8t Intel D-1541 with active cooler
4 DIMM slots, 128GB ECC RDIMM, or 64GB ECC/Non-ECC UDIMM
2 M.2 slots (PCIe 3.0 x1 though, so probably just SATA based)
2 PCIe 3.0 x8 slots (x16, x8 formfactor)
LSI 3008 SAS controller (8 SAS channels)
6 x SATA ports
2 x 10G SFP+ ports, CS4227 controller
IPMI

Gotta know though, anyone have experience with this board? Is it this cheap because its garbage, or is it legitimately good. Really tempted to get it, but want at least some kind of confirmation it’s not garbage

There’s also the slightly cheaper ITX variant: https://www.newegg.com/asrock-rack-d1541d4i-2l2t-supports-intel-xeon-d1541-processor/p/N82E16813599019

Less PCIe slots, no SFP+, and loses the 3008 controller, but is also a bit cheaper, and is ITX vs mATX, so could fit in say portable homelab kind of build

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Slight correction, it’s 8c/16t.

I have the D1541D4I-2L2T and it’s decent but lack of PCIe and SATA slots is limiting. CPU performance is kind of Xeon E3v3 to E5v3 level. Temps are decent in a desktop case with 3 fans for me, usually maxes out around 55C on the highest loads I put on it, which would be occasional video transcoding.

I would suggest the mATX board out of the two though for more general usability, at this point I’m considering moving mine into a router/firewall/IPS at some point in the future.

2 Likes
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Ah yeah, spaced on the cores/threads. Good to know it’s been working for you. I was contemplating doing something like a relatively very small VM testbed/Flash based NAS or something. If only I had more disposable income, or I’d have pulled the trigger already lol.

In reality, I have workarounds, so may not necessarily get around to building with one anytime soon