Status of Supermicro X11 series?

[Stéphane Delaunay]

Hi all,

I just wanted to ask about the current status of the Supermicro X11-series of boards.

I read on a German magazine that it should be supported by joint efforts of 9elements and Mullvad. Link (auto-translated):
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=de&tl=en&u=https%3...

Apparently there was a presentation planned at the OSFC 2019, but I can't find anything on it and the boards-list still shows them as status "Unknown", which seems odd.

Does somebody have any infos on the current development with these boards?

Kind regards!

[Christian Walter]

HI Stephane,

currently following x11 Supermicro boards are supported:

* x11ssh-tf
* x11ssm-f

The board status list is not always update and not very convenient to
update.

Let me know if you need to know more.

Chris

On 5/25/20 1:10 PM, Stéphane Delaunay via coreboot wrote:
> Hi all,
>  
> I just wanted to ask about the current status of the Supermicro
> X11-series of boards.
>  
> I read on a German magazine that it should be supported by joint
> efforts of 9elements and Mullvad. Link (auto-translated):
> https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=de&tl=en&u=https%3...
>
> Apparently there was a presentation planned at the OSFC 2019, but I
> can't find anything on it and the boards-list still shows them as
> status "Unknown", which seems odd.
>  
> Does somebody have any infos on the current development with these
> boards?
>  
> Kind regards!
>
> coreboot mailing list -- [e-mail]
> To unsubscribe send an email to [e-mail]

[Stéphane Delaunay]

Hi Chris,

On Monday, May 25, 2020 1:45 PM, Christian Walter  wrote:
> currently following x11 Supermicro boards are supported:
>
> x11ssh-tf
>
> x11ssm-f
>
> [..]
>
> Let me know if you need to know more.

Sorry for replying so late. Yes, I'd like to take you up on that offer.

I'm mainly interested in the F-model as a workstation board.

Since I couldn't find detailed info on it online: Just how well does it work with Coreboot? Are all the ports working, fan control, etc.?

Also how does it take a disabled ME, if you have any experiences with that?

Thanks!

[Paul Menzel]

Dear Stéphane,

Am 06.06.20 um 14:45 schrieb Stéphane Delaunay via coreboot:
> On Monday, May 25, 2020 1:45 PM, Christian Walter  wrote:
> > currently following x11 Supermicro boards are supported:
> >
> > x11ssh-tf
> >
> > x11ssm-f
> >
> > [..]
> >
> > Let me know if you need to know more.
>
> Sorry for replying so late. Yes, I'd like to take you up on that offer.

I do not have the board, so take my comments with a grain of salt.
> I'm mainly interested in the F-model as a workstation board.

I believe, the -F means, that it has a BMC (Baseboard Management 
Controller). If it’s a workstation board, I suggest, to get a model 
without the BMC, as it’s basically an additional system, that often gets 
more in the way than help. Especially with coreboot, where you have so 
many options to put an entire minimal (GNU/Linux) OS into the flash ROM 
chip, helping you to debug if something breaks.

In my experience, the BMC’s only useful feature is to reset the board in 
case it hangs, which is useful mainly in data centers and not so much 
for workstations.
> Since I couldn't find detailed info on it online: Just how well does
> it work with Coreboot? Are all the ports working, fan control, etc.?

(coreboot is officially spelled all lowercase.)

Michael recently uploaded the logs to the board status repository [1]. 
Yesterday, 9elements Cyber Security published a blog post regarding the 
board [2].
> Also how does it take a disabled ME, if you have any experiences
> with that?

Sorry, I can’t say. I learned it’s called SPS on server boards.

With people from 9elements Cyber Security and Michael working on the 
board family, I suggest to get the board from the family you want, and 
should something not work, you will likely get suggestions on how to fix it.

Kind regards,

Paul

[1]: 
https://review.coreboot.org/cgit/board-status.git/tree/supermicro/x11-lga115...
[2]: https://9esec.io/blog/next-generation-coreboot-server-platform/

[Prasun Gera]

For workstation use, you may want X11SSZ-F (and a few other variants),
which support the Intel iGPU. I do not know if the iGPU variants are
supported in coreboot though.

On Sat, Jun 6, 2020 at 2:07 PM Paul Menzel  wrote:
> Dear Stéphane,
>
> Am 06.06.20 um 14:45 schrieb Stéphane Delaunay via coreboot:
> > On Monday, May 25, 2020 1:45 PM, Christian Walter <
>
> [e-mail]> wrote:
> > > currently following x11 Supermicro boards are supported:
> > >
> > > x11ssh-tf
> > >
> > > x11ssm-f
> > >
> > > [..]
> > >
> > > Let me know if you need to know more.
> >
> > Sorry for replying so late. Yes, I'd like to take you up on that offer.
>
> I do not have the board, so take my comments with a grain of salt.
> > I'm mainly interested in the F-model as a workstation board.
>
> I believe, the -F means, that it has a BMC (Baseboard Management
> Controller). If it’s a workstation board, I suggest, to get a model
> without the BMC, as it’s basically an additional system, that often gets
> more in the way than help. Especially with coreboot, where you have so
> many options to put an entire minimal (GNU/Linux) OS into the flash ROM
> chip, helping you to debug if something breaks.
>
> In my experience, the BMC’s only useful feature is to reset the board in
> case it hangs, which is useful mainly in data centers and not so much
> for workstations.
> > Since I couldn't find detailed info on it online: Just how well does
> > it work with Coreboot? Are all the ports working, fan control, etc.?
>
> (coreboot is officially spelled all lowercase.)
>
> Michael recently uploaded the logs to the board status repository [1].
> Yesterday, 9elements Cyber Security published a blog post regarding the
> board [2].
> > Also how does it take a disabled ME, if you have any experiences
> > with that?
>
> Sorry, I can’t say. I learned it’s called SPS on server boards.
>
> With people from 9elements Cyber Security and Michael working on the
> board family, I suggest to get the board from the family you want, and
> should something not work, you will likely get suggestions on how to fix
> it.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Paul
>
> [1]:
>
> https://review.coreboot.org/cgit/board-status.git/tree/supermicro/x11-lga115...
> [2]: https://9esec.io/blog/next-generation-coreboot-server-platform/
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