Board with the highest possible PCI expansion options
Board with the highest possible PCI expansion options
Hi everyone, I'm planning to assemble a computer for my lab. We need as many PCIe slots as possible. The motherboard must fit into a 19-inch rack mount case. I want two hard drives for RAID data storage and an SSD for booting. For the CPU, it should be fast—at least four cores—and I'm looking for compatible RAM options. Right now we don't need a GPU, so budget isn't a concern. Thanks a lot!
We're discussing 4u or 5u cases versus something smaller. ATX reaches its limit with 7 PCIe slots, whereas standard E-ATX caps at around 8. Choosing a lower capacity means sacrificing bandwidth, and high-performance mining boards can support up to 19 x1 PCIe slots.
I want to make sure I ask the right question. Before I give you my answer, I’d like to mention that I’m aiming for seven PCIe slots. If I can get them all, I’ll be really pleased. The simplest reply might be “all should be x16,” but since that might not work here, let’s see what we need: one PCI, two PCLe x1, one PCLe x8, two PCIe x16, and two more PCIe x4 would be ideal for a 3U case. We were using H97-PRO, but I couldn’t find anything similar.