Summary:
I am in the market for a new server to facilitate storage and compute for a small group of researchers. I would like to combine bulk storage (HDD), flash storage (NVMe) and a single GPU in a 2U chassis. I have watched the informative and entertaining you tube video’s on level1tech on the 2u and 4u gigabyte chassis. (R282-Z93,G482-Z50) The G482-Z50 is an amazing chassis but if possible I would prefer a smaller 2U form factor.
Requirements:
2U form factor if possible
dual 10 Gbit ethernet (RJ45) Possibly via PCI-e
Single FDR infiniband via PCI-e
Single full height full length GPU (Possibly consumer card with blower)
Bulk storage → 2 four port HBA’s (4 shelf ZFS pool)
*Connection for sata/sas/nvme SSD’s
I have done a fair bit of research and looked at different options from Supermicro, Asus and Gigabyte. Currently I prefer the R282-Z94 (rev A00) chassis from Gigabyte. But this chassis is not officially GPU certified. In fact I am not aware of a chassis that officially supports nvme and GPU in a single chassis. I am aware that both consume PCI-e resources. I will have to build my NVMe pool with the remaining PCI-e lanes. (Use high capacity nvme devices in raid0 i can probably do without redundancy temporary work storage) There are chassis in the same family (R282-Z93,R282-Z96) that are GPU certified using (almost) the same mainboard and fan module (different fan duct obviously) PCI-e molex power via mainboard.
Would it work to add a data-center or blower style GPU for GPGPU to this chassis? Or would it better to look at a different server.
I mostly need CPU performance but maybe GPU in the future.
I think this might be a good fit for you. Its has 8 drive bays that can support SAS or SATA, and an additional 2 NVME slots not including 1 onboard for system drive. It has room for full length PCIE cards, and dual 10gb network ports.
Thank you for your response and time looking for an alternative! There is indeed ample room for full length GPU’s in this system but CPU performance is our top priority and the GPU is something we probably/might need in the future. I probably didn’t stress this enough in my story. Maybe it is just not a good idea to try and combine all in one chassis.
Sry for my late reply. Priority is CPU compute. I would prefer a dual epyc milan system to max out core count. I did some more research on different systems and I think the R282-Z96 is a good solution for me. The only downside is that it only has 4 nvme slots. But probably will otherwise tick all of my boxes. I will have to use very large nvme drives to meet/come close to storage requirements.
Either of these might be a good fit for your needs too. I will say I prefer SuperMicro to many other vendors just because parts are readily available so you can support them for a long time.