topic Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue in ProLiant Servers - Netservers

Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

Highwind — Fri, 19 Jun 2020 17:03:22 GMT

It seems that it only support x8+x8 bifurcation. Is it possible to support x4+x4+x4+x4 bifurcation? I have a 4 x NVME slots card and it does not work on Microserver Gen10+.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

Chandra_S — Mon, 29 Jun 2020 15:44:23 GMT

Hello,

Good day,

Pleasse elevate this case with logs to HPE , we need to check this in local HPE Lab.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

Bierut — Wed, 08 Jul 2020 13:14:29 GMT

It does only split X8X8. Could you please make X4X4X4X4 available?

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

winge — Sun, 19 Jul 2020 20:05:22 GMT

I've been in contact with HPE support about this with no luck. I hope for the next firmware update to include this.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

Mikael Östergren — Mon, 16 Nov 2020 12:37:15 GMT

Hi, any news on this?

Is it even possible to implement this change through a BIOS-update?

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

frairsan — Sun, 09 May 2021 07:44:38 GMT

Hi,

This is really an issue for me and many other HP Microserver Gen 10 plus owners. I did also send a request but I was told that it's currently not supported, but it might be in future. It's been a few months and BIOS releases and I haven't seen any improvement

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

Mikael Östergren — Fri, 09 Apr 2021 12:58:38 GMT

Hi,

Hoping on some feedback from official hpe here. Any news on a BIOS that will allow 4x4x4x4x PCIe bifurcation?

Brgs,

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

mchlrv — Mon, 26 Apr 2021 11:50:24 GMT

I would need the 4x4x4x4x PCIe bifurcation as well.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

killtux — Sat, 08 May 2021 12:33:28 GMT

i really would love to see this in future update.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

LaurentBXL — Tue, 18 May 2021 17:48:02 GMT

After that much time, I realy am disaapointed it was not already done as it's a simple matter of updating the firmware really.

Other Proliant servers do enjoy such thing.

I currently am running an x8 x8 bifurcation I with to have x8 x4 x4 or even 4 times x4.

Please, make it more more flexible in iLo. thank you!

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

cmptrdude — Tue, 25 May 2021 02:19:04 GMT

Can we at least get some kind of official answer on this issue? If it's impossible to fix this with a firmware update let us know so we can get on with our lives and likely buy a different product.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

KevinSpringPM — Wed, 26 May 2021 06:59:59 GMT

Hi all. This isn't a matter of a FW update or HPE not providing the support for this feature. The Intel processors used in this server do not support x4x4x4x4 bifurcation, so neither HPE nor any other server using the Intel Xeon Entry 2100/2200 family of processors will support this now or in the future.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

frairsan — Wed, 26 May 2021 07:24:16 GMT

Hi,

what about the G5420 then? does it support bifurcation? I could not find yet the datasheet for the processor.

I did see that the E-2224 supports x8x8 and x8x4x4 bifurcation. I don't have any card accepting the last format to check but I wonder if it would work...

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

KevinSpringPM — Wed, 26 May 2021 08:34:17 GMT

Technically the Pentium is still in the same family and shares the same bifurcation support from an Intel perspective, no difference there.

My understanding is that the lack of x8x4x4 support is an HPE UEFI choice based on the lack of clear/supported use cases for that option. x8x4x4 would probably need some kind of riser to be useful, which wouldn't fit in the MicroServer. I can't think of a valid use case for x8x4x4 configuration in a single slot design, and that's probably why it's not implemented in the UEFI, not enough popular customer use cases and no HPE riser or options to validate that configuration against or support.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

KevinSpringPM — Wed, 26 May 2021 08:16:27 GMT

Apologies for the delay in getting this answer provided to the community, I don't normally check the "Netserver" forum section ( @Parvez_Admin when was the last time someone needed help with their Netserver from 1997) but I do keep an eye on the ML/DL section. Also excuse the bold font, it's just the default when posting from a mobile device.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

aptinit — Fri, 27 Aug 2021 07:38:53 GMT

Hi, could you please clarify my confusion about the bifurcation support on Microserver Gen10 Plus?

Can this machine support two pcie x4 nvme ssd running off a bifurcation riser card? From what I know, if this machine supports x8+x8 bifurcation, it should recognize two x4 devices without problem. However, some folks bought this model told me that only one x4 device was recognized.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

KevinSpringPM — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 03:40:52 GMT

It *should* but keep in mind that what you and others are trying to do is fully unsupported from an HPE perspective, so whether the pcie card or drives plays nicely with the server, bios, ilo, etc will not be something HPE has tested or built support for. So you can end up in situations where something should work in theory, but because unsupported components are being used, there's some sort of undiagnosed issue that prevents it from working.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

cmptrdude — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 04:49:51 GMT

I have personally tried several common 4x4 cards and none worked. I am under the impression that no card exists that will operate on an 8x8 bifurcation. If anyone find one that works and proves me wrong please share, I would live to get mine working.

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

MJFH — Tue, 14 Sep 2021 09:38:43 GMT

Hi all!

What KevinPringPM said above checks out, see Intel ARK specs pages

The officially not offered/supported by HPE upgrade, mentioned in a ServeTheHome Video on YouTube doesn't support it either

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/190886/intel-core-i3-9100f-processor-6m-cache-up-to-4-20-ghz.html

It's the same with all of them; we only get 1x16, 2x8, and 1x8+2x4. Any multi-M.2 adaptor card must either be aware of the x8+2x4 issue, or have a dedicated PCIe switch/bridge.

As i'm currently researching a solution to my own NVMe cache needs, I've found an active option from StarTech (ASMedia ASM2824 chipset). The 10gig+M.2 cards from Synology and QNAP might be an option. I'm not sure whether the QNAP one is bifurcated or switch-bridged, the Synology one seems to be.

A rather specific alternative solution would be a passive (bifurcation-based) adaptor card which utilizes the 3rd and 4th x4 block of lanes. I have yet to find this Unicorn. Anyone?

"A valid use case" would be something like this.

(edit: fixed typo)

Re: Microserver Gen10 Plus PCIe bifurcation support issue

aptinit — Sat, 18 Sep 2021 15:40:35 GMT

Regarding your cropped add-in card, I don't think PCI-E bifurcation works this way. While it is possible for me to design a bifurcation card satisfying your requirements (for gen3 speeds a matching impedance should be enough, and basically the only ic we need is a cheap clock buffer). I don't have the time to design and test it myself. However, if you want to make one yourself, you can read some design guidelines from ti as a starting point. (For example https://www.ti.com/lit/an/spraar7h/spraar7h.pdf ) As a side note though, PCI-E is not an open spec, so you have to dig deeper.