Hi all,

I am pretty eager to upgrade my aging ESXi server, and the Opteron 3250 looks perfect for me. I have found a few retailers that claim to sell it on special order, and was planning on placing an order for one, but before I do, I want to make sure I can get a server motherboard it will work on.

At launch, AMD referenced an MSI motherboard called the MS-S023, but I can not find any information about this motherboard, from MSI or anywhere else.

Since it is a socket AM3+ CPU it ought to physically work in desktop AMD motherboards, but I'm not sure if current BIOS revisions in those would recognize it, and I'm really looking for a more stable server platform than a desktop board.

AMD's website is very lite on details about the 3200 series (it is missing from its compatibility and support pages, for instance)

Does anyone have any idea what motherboard would be a safe bet for this CPU now? Does anyone have one? What board are you using?

Much obliged,
Matt

If anyone else is interested, I was able to confirm that this is the board that AMD was referencing in their launch publicity:

http://www.msi.com/product/server/MS-S0231.html

The AVL lists Opteron 3200 series compatibility!

Now if I can only figure out where to get one...


Also, I am not that familiar with server hardware. Whats up with the odd dual inline PCIe 4x slots? Can I use those for standard cards? How do I make them reach the back of the case?