Is It Possible To Use A Server Motherboard For a Desktop Computer?

[ttechfs]

Hi, I was curious as to instead of using a desktop motherboard, could you potentially use a server motherboard and use that as your desktop computer? Not even using it AS a server, just so you have the ability for multiple processors and tons of memory in your desktop? Can you use this as you would a regular desktop motherboard or is something different that would prevent one from doing this?

For example, could I use this motherboard - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813151219

It has 4 sockets for processors. Put 4 Magny Cour 12 core processors in it from AMD. So that's 48 processors. Put 256GB of RAM/Memory in it and just throw Windows 7 Ultimate on it and use it as a desktop computer?

Any feedback or answers would be GREATLY appreciated as I've been wondering about this for some time and can't seem to find a straight answer anywhere.


Thank you for your time! : )

 

[justinm001]

Yeah there's nothing stopping you but im unsure of windows 7's limits, I believe they have a memory and processor limit.

You could however just run 2008R2 server (free if you're a student at dreamspark.com) and change a few settings and it'll act just like windows 7 but be a lot more stable. There's a lot of websites about this. I currently am running 2008R2 on one of my main machines and it's great.

 

[fullofzen]

Hi, I was curious as to instead of using a desktop motherboard, could you potentially use a server motherboard and use that as your desktop computer? Not even using it AS a server, just so you have the ability for multiple processors and tons of memory in your desktop? Can you use this as you would a regular desktop motherboard or is something different that would prevent one from doing this?

For example, could I use this motherboard - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813151219

It has 4 sockets for processors. Put 4 Magny Cour 12 core processors in it from AMD. So that's 48 processors. Put 256GB of RAM/Memory in it and just throw Windows 7 Ultimate on it and use it as a desktop computer?

Any feedback or answers would be GREATLY appreciated as I've been wondering about this for some time and can't seem to find a straight answer anywhere.


Thank you for your time! : )

I'll leave the analysis and recommendations to others, but I'm genuinely curious what you'd do with this. Experimental benchmarking? Folding or some other distributed computing projects?

Would definitely be something cool to tinker with if you're a wealthy hobbyist...

 

[chunkymonster]

It is entirely possible but performance may be limited by the fact that it is a server chipset as opposed to an enthusiast/gaming chipset, the need for ECC memory, and limits on the RAM speed. Specifically with that TYAN motherboard, there is no ability for Crossfire and/or SLI if you ever wanted that feature for gaming.

Truth is, that many cores and amount or RAM is way overkill for running a desktop OS and you will gain very little by using that motherboard over an enthusiast/gamer motherboard. A typical X58 Skt1366 motherboard can run up to 12 processors (6 physical, 6 logical like on the Skt1366 i7-970) and 24GB RAM running in Triple Channel, which is more than enough for just about anything you would do within a consumer desktop OS environment.