# EVGA Unleashes Classified SR-2 Motherboard and Power Supply



## btarunr (Mar 17, 2010)

EVGA just released two of its most indigenous designs that marks a complete evolution from being a reference-design products vendor to an enthusiast-grade hardware giant: the much talked about EVGA Classified SR-2 dual-LGA1366 enthusiast-workstation motherboard, and power supply unit (PSU) tailor-made to suit systems based on the SR-2 motherboard. To begin with, the Classified SR-2 motherboard is a dual-LGA1366 motherboard supporting two dual-socket capable Intel Xeon E5500 series, and X5600 series quad-core and six-core processors. It is based on Intel's enterprise-grade 5520 chipset with ICH10R southbridge. 

The Intel 5520 supports two QuickPath Interconnect paths to each of the sockets, which in turn can communicate with each other. Since each socket (processor) has its own triple-channel DDR3 memory controller, it has its own six DDR3 memory slots. The 5520 gives out two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 lanes which connect to two NVIDIA nForce 200 chips that give out two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 links each. With external x8 switching thrown into the mix, the motherboard manages a staggering seven PCI-Express x16 slots. 



 

 

 



Each processor socket uses higher amounts of gold on the pins for better conductivity. Each socket is powered by an 8-phase digital PWM circuit, with 2-phase uncore. Each set of memory slots is powered by a 3-phase circuit. Apart from the usual 24-pin ATX connector, power is drawn in from two 8-pin CPU power connectors and three PCI-Express 6-pin connectors. The VRM areas are cooled by individual heatsinks, while the chipset area (covering the NB, SB, and NF200 chips) is cooled by a monolithic air-stream cooler where air is circulated through aluminum channels by a fan. 

The ICH10R gives out six SATA 3 Gb/s ports (coded black), while an additional Marvell SATA 6 Gb/s controller gives out two 6 Gb/s ports (coded red). Connectivity options include dual gigabit Ethernet, eSATA, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, and 8+2 channel audio. The board supports 4-way SLI with supported graphics cards, 3-way SLI, Quad-SLI, and 4-way CrossFireX. Apart from a plethora of overclocker-friendly features at the hardware and BIOS levels, the board supports the proprietary EV-Bot module that helps on-the-fly overclocking. The board itself is physically larger than EATX and EVGA's own XLATX form-factors. EVGA calls it "HPATX".





Next up, is the EVGA Classified SR-2 PSU. As mentioned before, this PSU is tailor-made for systems using the Classified SR-2 motherboard. It has a power output of 1200W (continuous) and >1500W (peak). It uses six +12V rails rated at 38A each. Also featured are adjustable +12V rails that could let you divert more power into particular outputs for higher overclocking stability. Its fan-speed is also adjustable.



 

The EVGA Classified SR-2 motherboard is available following Intel's launch of six-core Xeon X5600 series processors, it is priced at US $599 (which is a steal looking at prices of "high-end" dual-LGA1366 workstation motherboards). The SR-2 power supply on the other hand, will be available shortly.

*View at TechPowerUp Main Site*


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

I would not mind owning that motherboard at all.


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## Deleted member 3 (Mar 17, 2010)

A steal? I disagree, I'd rather see them put one on the market for half the price with a more standard expansion slot configuration (1-2 PCI-E x16 would be sufficient), as if the current configuration has any added value in most cases.

And wtf, who made this?





They could at least have made that a bit cleaner.


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

Seems they are actually photos of motherboards that have been covered in, for instance on the blue one you can see SATA ports XD

Anyway Dan this board is not marketed for you, its marketed for High endservers/super computer builders and OTT enthusiasts.


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## InnocentCriminal (Mar 17, 2010)

Panther, look at Dan's mobo.


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

InnocentCriminal said:


> Panther, look at Dan's mobo.




So?

He's still missed the point of THIS motherboard we're discussing 

Whack a shit ton of GPUS in there and you have super computer levels of performance.

You could also use PCI-E raid cards etc in and have amazing raid arrays.


Boards like this have a specific use, it does not make them overpriced or poorly designed.


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## satelitko (Mar 17, 2010)

The sheer amount of E-peen this piece of hardware offers, especially when populated by top-end parts is simply staggering.


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## InnocentCriminal (Mar 17, 2010)

pantherx12 said:


> So?



So? So, he's more of the target audience than most workstation/enthusiasts.

If I had the money I'd love a couple of these folding 24/7 - if only I could win the lottery I'd have a whole f'ing farm.


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## btarunr (Mar 17, 2010)

You could go through this catalogue of dual-LGA1366 motherboards, look at each of their features and prices, and then see if for its features this board isn't a steal at $599: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ption=&Ntk=&CFG=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

InnocentCriminal said:


> So? So, he's more of the target audience than most workstation/enthusiasts.
> 
> If I had the money I'd love a couple of these folding 24/7 - if only I could win the lottery I'd have a whole f'ing farm.



And yet he's still missed that the "Non standard" layout has advantages for specific uses.

For example if your a research facility buy one of these fill it up with gpus/raid cards +ssds and you have a super computer.

For cheap.


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## steelkane (Mar 17, 2010)

Oh,, How long this would last me.. Very long time, Just need a small bank loan first. 
Banker: So what do you need this loan for
steelkane: POWER


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## hat (Mar 17, 2010)

Gotta love the PS/2 port... lol

Man, that's a whole lot of power, but look at the thing... it's physically huge, and it will eat a huge amount of power. Is the board taking PCI-E power connectors in addition to the 24 pin and the 2 8 pins?


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## theorw (Mar 17, 2010)

They ve gone MAD!!!


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## csendesmark (Mar 17, 2010)

Looking good, but Dual CPU socket is totally waste for gaming. One four_(six)_ core cpu is enough for everything 

but the 7 PCIe slot is sweet


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## InnocentCriminal (Mar 17, 2010)

Hopefully games have come on a fair bit since Skulltrail which had the adverse effect in games and performed horribly. However, I wouldn't want to use this machine for gaming, I'd primarily use it for folding.


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

csendesmark said:


> Looking good, but Dual CPU socket is totally waste for gaming. One four_(six)_ core cpu is enough for everything
> 
> but the 7 PCIe slot is sweet




The motherboard is a work station motherboard

"Workstation
Main article: LINKY

A workstation is a high-end personal computer designed for technical or scientific applications. Intended primarily to be used by one person at a time, they are commonly connected to a local area network and run multi-user operating systems."


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## Papahyooie (Mar 17, 2010)

Personally, it would be a treat simply to SEE a rig with this board, completely maxed out with graphics cards and such, much less own one.


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## Breit (Mar 17, 2010)

you might want to take a look at this... 8)


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## CDdude55 (Mar 17, 2010)

As a heavy gamer, this is an absolute waste.

Looks very awesome though, congrats to all the rich people picking it up!


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## mtosev (Mar 17, 2010)

OMG. look at the size of that mobo


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## cbupdd (Mar 17, 2010)

Something I didn't understand, Is this mobo capable of quad pci-e 2.0 @x16 ?


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## pantherx12 (Mar 17, 2010)

cbupdd said:


> Something I didn't understand, Is this mobo capable of quad pci-e 2.0 @x16 ?




Yes, says right at the top : ]

"The 5520 gives out two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 lanes which connect to two NVIDIA nForce 200 chips that give out two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 links each"


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## aCid888* (Mar 17, 2010)

I wonder how many people who complain about multi-rail PSU's will buy that 1200w beast that has *6* rails 12v just because its made by eVGA and says "Classified"??  :shadedshu


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## cauby (Mar 17, 2010)

call me when they have a chassis big enough to put this thing...


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## hat (Mar 17, 2010)

Breit said:


> you might want to take a look at this... 8)



lol, extremesystems is blocked by the school but tpu isn't


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## caleb (Mar 17, 2010)

I like evga's style. They don't care about the price but the goal. Considering there are phat ppl in the world why not ?


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## Roph (Mar 17, 2010)

Could those SATA ports be positioned in a more annoying manner?


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## WSP (Mar 17, 2010)

that is indeed a workstation motherboard, but I dont think it would fit into a server motherboard.

why would a server needs an onboard audio? an onboard gpu is more needed.
and overclocking feature in bios? not gonna do much good in server

put this puppy and slap 2 i7 980X, plus 3-way SLI GT470/480 and you have a crunching monster


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## btarunr (Mar 17, 2010)

WSP said:


> put this puppy and slap 2 i7 980X, plus 3-way SLI GT470/480 and you have a crunching monster



Put this puppy and slap 2 i7 980X and stare at a blank screen.


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## Saakki (Mar 17, 2010)

Sick benchies with that MovieMan`s monstermachine @ xtremesys


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## runnin17 (Mar 17, 2010)

btarunr said:


> Put this puppy and slap 2 i7 980X and stare at a blank screen.


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## jasper1605 (Mar 17, 2010)

isn't this the mobo that fitseries is putting into his dream system?


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## Frick (Mar 17, 2010)

modder said:


> have a card like this and without utility,it's pure bling .I have the biggest



On a forum like this, that's more than enough reason. 

On the other hand, if you have it you might as well crunch with it.


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## Salsoolo (Mar 17, 2010)

HPATX ?!

what kind of chassis this board will go in? i cant figure out.
the same goes for XLATX, i cant find a case for XL


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## Deleted member 3 (Mar 17, 2010)

pantherx12 said:


> Seems they are actually photos of motherboards that have been covered in, for instance on the blue one you can see SATA ports XD
> 
> Anyway Dan this board is not marketed for you, its marketed for High endservers/super computer builders and OTT enthusiasts.



You just described two uses that require reliability, yet it clearly states 





> Apart from a plethora of overclocker-friendly features at the hardware and BIOS levels, the board supports the proprietary EV-Bot module that helps on-the-fly overclocking.


My point being that I would prefer one at the price of the entry level 5500 boards (or even the 5520 used in this one) with the overclocking features. I guess we have to wait for Asus to do it now, and they have been less than reliable lately.


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## epicfail (Mar 17, 2010)

jasper1605 said:


> isn't this the mobo that fitseries is putting into his dream system?



yes hes waiting for it to be released were suppose to contact him when its able to buy it, but he didnt give me his phone number lmao


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## EarlZ (Mar 17, 2010)

If I had the $$$ to purchase this I would and hoping Dragon Age runs with DUAL socket ( just for giggles )


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## Deleted member 3 (Mar 18, 2010)

EarlZ said:


> If I had the $$$ to purchase this I would and hoping Dragon Age runs with DUAL socket ( just for giggles )



Software is not aware of the number of sockets, it won't care whether you run a quad core or two dual cores. It's exactly the same as far as the software is concerned.


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## MadClown (Mar 18, 2010)

Damn, I might have to get one of these, max out the ram, and load as many copies of Crysis that I can and see what happens.


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## Completely Bonkers (Mar 18, 2010)

Oh dear, this thread sounds like a schoolboy trip to the local brothel.  I'm with Dan on this, if you follow the 2 or 4 CPU market, this really isnt anything to get too excited about.

There are (IMO) much *better value* boards out there from ASUS, Tyan and Supermicro.  Yes, the EVGA is interesting, but not at this super-premium price


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## REVHEAD (Mar 18, 2010)

I am thinking about getting one, but  are there any cases in the market atm that will take this puppy? If I was to build a system with this I think it would see me through untill cloud computing takes over, this will most likely be the last of its kind, high power consumption, high price, high specs ect ect, they wont build them like this again.


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## InnocentCriminal (Mar 18, 2010)

Fits posted a link in another thread regarding this board to a MountainMods custom case.


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## Breit (Mar 18, 2010)

Completely Bonkers said:


> Oh dear, this thread sounds like a schoolboy trip to the local brothel.  I'm with Dan on this, if you follow the 2 or 4 CPU market, this really isnt anything to get too excited about.
> 
> There are (IMO) much *better value* boards out there from ASUS, Tyan and Supermicro.  Yes, the EVGA is interesting, but not at this super-premium price



neither a tyan board nor a sm board will ever allow you to overclock, not even adjusting bclk... i think that indeed is a reason for some folks to go evga don't you think? 

asus had its last dual-socket xeon board with mild oc-adjustments (fsb and vcore) with its Z7S-WS (look at my system specs) back in the days, but as far as i know there is nothing in the works right now for the nehalem/westmere flavored xeons...


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## Completely Bonkers (Mar 18, 2010)

Good point.  And also true about the s771 xeons; very few had any OC capability.  Server and workstation boards are generally not designed for OC. The Z7S-WS did, but was horribly unstable IIRC and many people had warranty returns or just "gave-up". 

My solution was to avoid the Z7S-WS and go with the very stable server ASUS DSEB and then do the BSEL FSB 1333 to 1600 OC.


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## Breit (Mar 18, 2010)

my z7s-ws lasted for over 2 years now without complaining, but i know what you mean, i've read the storys over at xs too...


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## Deleted member 3 (Mar 18, 2010)

I only broke a single Z7S, which isn't much compared to some other people  Due to some accident it ended up in my server ebing complete overkill, too lazy to swap it. Asus has had some enthusiast dual socket board for most generations, so I would not be surprised if they come with one anyway. The Z7S wasn't announced officially until after Skulltrail was on the market. They had the NCCH-DL, PCH-DL, PC-DL and whatnot before that.
Besides, being unable to overclock at all is new since the 5500's, and from what I understood it is a bug that is present in early x58 boards as well. (in fact, you can raise your bclk about 4mhz) Nearly all boards before that did allow adjustments to the FSB via pinmods and software.
And perhaps some other manufacturers will follow EVGA's example, Gigabyte had some 771 boards, so who knows.


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## Assassin48 (Mar 18, 2010)

I wouldn't doubt that Asus will bring out a Rampage version just like this Classified


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## Icejon (Mar 18, 2010)

There is no decent chassis to support this for two reasons.

#1.  This motherboard is too long for any chassis that's common.  Taking measurements, HAF 932, no, ATCS 840 no, 800D no, TT Armor no, Antec 1200 no.  The motherboard overlaps the hard drives area.

#2.  This motherboard has a really bad/nonstandard heat sink I/O layout.  This is because the motherboard's first PCI slot is 2 expansion slots lower than normal.  The heatsink of the motherboards move the stuff down.  This means when matched up with a chassis you LOSE 2 expansion slots.  EVGA recommends 10 PCI slots and here is why

Imagine you have 7 PCI slots on a normal chassis HAF 932.
7 - 2 = equivalent to having 5 accessible PCI slots!
Say you have an 800D with 7 and a vent PCI slots same.

8 - 2 = 6 actual PCI slots (maybe enough for 2 cards)
9 - 2 = 7 PCI slots which brings us to normal level ATX functionality

10 - 2 = 8 PCI slots actual!

This is madness, and EVGA is not Sparta.


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