Did ASRock Just Put X99 On A Mini-ITX Board? Oh Yes It Did!

[Mark Ace]

This is impressive. Every millimeter of board space is being utilized and it is a significant feat of engineering in my opinion. The M2 appears to be on the front of the board, i see the 3 holes lined up and the spacer peg on the blown up view. I have an Asrock board so i know what it looks like. I know those buying Haswell E are looking to do multiple video cards and/or at least run the quad channel ram they paid to have the function of but i guess some will find a use for this. Still very cool indeed.

 

[vuvspbat]

Awesome. Can you say "[large] software development"? Finally a Mini-ITX, 8-core power-workstation that I can fly with as a convenient carry-on. We need to get Id-cooling IS-VC45 (135W) working with the "narrow" LGA2011-3 or go water. I'm buying it.

 

[Arabian Knight]

This is the itx Killer , reasons :

1- The 40 lanes in the CPU will allow things like M2 4X ultra solts to take four lanes from the CPU , and still the Graphics Card will stay 16 lanes !!! this is a huge thing against the Z97 which will force the GPU to work on 8X lanes. I know not all Cards need 16X lanes , BUT , Dual GPU Cards like Titan Z and then new coming Titan Z and GTX 990 with Dual GPU will need a full 16 lanes PCI express.

2- upto 18 cores in mini ITX , yes this slot takes Xeons , and imagine having 18 cores in a 17x17x17 case !!! AMAZING ...

3- I REALLY hope there are 2 Dimms behind the mother board for Four Channels !!! there are Dimm Slotts that are horizontal like the SODIM in notebooks !
also , they could just Add onboard 8G or 16 G of ram behind the mobo ...

EVEN if the Board still works only on dual channles and not four channels .. it will be no big deal ... remember it is DDR4 VS DDR3 , so it is STILL faster than the Z97 itx !!!

 

[InvalidError]

EVEN if the Board still works only on dual channles and not four channels .. it will be no big deal ... remember it is DDR4 VS DDR3 , so it is STILL faster than the Z97 itx !!!

Right now, most DDR4 is slower and considerably more expensive than DDR3. For example, you can get 16GB 2133-11 DDR3 for $130 while 2133-15 DDR4 sets you back $200 or more. In this case, DDR4 is 50% more expensive for 40% slower access time.

There is little to no benefit to using DDR4 aside from lower power and being required by LGA2011-3 CPUs at the moment.

 

[Rfosgate]

EKWB actually has a mounting plate for narrow socket:

http://www.ekwb.com/shop/blocks/professional-solutions/cpu-blocks/mounting-plate-supremacy-lga-2011-narrow-ilm.html

With this you can mount any normal EK Supremacy CPU blocks to this socket if I read correctly

 

[Arabian Knight]

Apple Mac pro owners will be soooo jealous soon ... same sized with Free GPU choices !!! and Haswel-E on top

 

[Majkel133]

all nicely landscaped, but why they gave ILM Narrow type socket where the mounting holes are arranged in plates as server -_-

it is therefore also the use of server cooling...

 

[Arabian Knight]

all nicely landscaped, but why they gave ILM Narrow type socket where the mounting holes are arranged in plates as server -_-

it is therefore also the use of server cooling...

If you look carefully , the X99 chipset cant be mounted anywhere had the socket been standard. it is almost touching it.

I think with little modding you can use any cooler on this socket , just two pieces of metals needed ...

one thing however , If Asrock can read my comment , you can put the chipset on a riser card . to save space . and use standard socket. i dont know why they chosen not to go riser card route .

 

[Majkel133]

u are not able to mount another cooling, another hole spacing that's the point. See? http://www.servethehome.com/narrow-ilm-square-ilm-lga2011-heatsink-differences/ or http://www.noctua.at/images/faqs/noctua_xeon_lga2011_ilm_compatibility.jpg
u see the difference? no chance to mod.

 

[InvalidError]

one thing however , If Asrock can read my comment , you can put the chipset on a riser card . to save space . and use standard socket. i dont know why they chosen not to go riser card route .

A riser would mean extra cost, having to deal with potential signal integrity between the motherboard and riser, needing over a hundred pins for all the IOs to/from it to connect the chipset to rear IOs, on-board peripherals, miscellaneous board connectors, etc.

Not quite as simple as it sounds.

 

[siman0]

X99 ITX, R9 295X2, 512gig M.2, Intel 6 core, 4x 1tb ssd raid 0, x2 16gig ddr4 = most bad ass lan-party computer made

 

[Arabian Knight]

one thing however , If Asrock can read my comment , you can put the chipset on a riser card . to save space . and use standard socket. i dont know why they chosen not to go riser card route .

A riser would mean extra cost, having to deal with potential signal integrity between the motherboard and riser, needing over a hundred pins for all the IOs to/from it to connect the chipset to rear IOs, on-board peripherals, miscellaneous board connectors, etc.

Not quite as simple as it sounds.

1- Have you seen old Apple Mac pros ? the whole CPU and Ram was put on Riser card. while the chipset is on the motherboard . so it is possible.

2- Super Micro , 8 CPU mother boards , also CPU are on riser cards , which has Crazy counts of pins ...

3- More over , you can keep the Sata ports , Audio connectors , and front USB3 connectors on the riser card to reduce the pin counts and make only the external LAN/USB and DMI to CPU pins ... this would also free the space used for the 6 sata connectors and the usb3 front connector !!! more space !!!

4- even for more extreme , they can design the riser card to extend back to the rear IO place and put all the I/O ports on that riser card. in this way only DMI connectors are needed a simple 8 lanes pcie like connector..
This Riser card idea will allow also the addition of a good sound chip .

it is possible . and even if Expensive , well who cares this is an X99 Motherboard , a High end . 50$ more no big deal.

5- Another way : They also could place the chipset in the I/O rear Area ... see how they placed the WIFI module there ?

they could placed the chipset there instead of the wifi module ... wifi can be added using USB ... not a big deal. or even put the wifi module behind the motherboard.

Actually if they put the chipset in the I/O Area back of the Mobo , they will have the space for both Square 2011 socket AND 4 Dimms !!! The sacrificed place in the I/O area can be dealt with sing micro USB maybe ? instead of full USB ? or a mix of both !

6- Hey Asrock , how about adding 16G of ram onboard on the back of this mobo ? in dual channel ? and if people want four channels they add another 16 in the dimms slots ? also a cool idea .. no one will go less than 16G these days and they will buy it with onboard 16 GB RAM behind the mobo ... or just add horizontal dimms ...

7- and finally , for more space use SAS connectors , each SAS connector spans to 4 SATA3 ... you dont need to waste space for 6 Sata Ports . all what you need is 2 SAS ports for total 8 DRIVES !!! and include the SAS to Sata 3 cables with the mobo.

Asrock are you reading ? do it or Asus will do it :LOL

Any one reading ?

 

[rantoc]

Drop an titan x in that one and it will be a small powerhouse for gaming as well

 

[InvalidError]

1- Have you seen old Apple Mac pros ? the whole CPU and Ram was put on Riser card. while the chipset is on the motherboard . so it is possible.

2- Super Micro , 8 CPU mother boards , also CPU are on riser cards , which has Crazy counts of pins ...

Putting CPUs on risers with the RAM and a few other support components is relatively easy. While the connector may have a "crazy number of pins," the bulk of them are just power and ground going straight down to their respective PCB copper planes. Another advantage to putting the CPU on risers is that the interface only has QPI/DMI and PCIe to deal with instead of a plethora of different interfaces all headed to different places. Board-to-board interfaces with uniform characteristics and routing requirements are much easier to deal with.

 

[BadBoyGreek]

X99 ITX, R9 295X2, 512gig M.2, Intel 6 core, 4x 1tb ssd raid 0, x2 16gig ddr4 = most bad ass lan-party computer made

If someone's got the budget to afford those kinds of components, then an X99 ITX board is not for that target market. 4 x 1 TB SSDs in RAID 0 alone is most people's budget for a super high end system

 

[Darkk]

I have few of their ASRock motherboards and love them all. This one is just crazy. It may not have quad channel memory but given what this form factor is targeted for I don't think it's an issue. It'll make a great small server, HTPC or decent gaming machine for the living room. Love the small form factor.

 

[burstfyre20]

Someone should make an 990FX itx board :v