Socionext SC2A11 24-core Arm Cortex-A53 processor has gotten into more hardware recently. We recently showcased a demo of an upcoming Banana Pi 24-core Arm server, but they’ll be joined by South Korea based XSLAB which prepare to launch their own V-Raptor 24-core microserver in February 2019.
The server is based on SC2A11 processor coupled with their own BMC (Baseboard Management Controller). A 24-core micro server node is shown below with SC2A11 processor covered by a black heatsink, as well as a RAM stick.
As I understand it, one or several V-Raptor microserver can then be inserted into a PCIe slot of the mainboard which supports up to 32 nodes on 2U rack size, so that would be a total of 24 x 32 = 768 Arm Cortex A53 cores.
The detailed specifications of the server are not shown yet on the almost empty company website. The company may also have made a separate server, as shown in the photo below, where we can see some RAM slots, Ethernet ports, SFP cages, SATA interfaces, and several USB 3.0 ports. But it seems unrelated to the PCIe server card above. [Update: It is definitely not related since the chip is from Applied Micro]
We’ll find a few more details and the first two pictures at the top this post on FunFun Yoo twitter account which shows Ubuntu 16.04, OpenStack with DevStack, and netdata dashboard running on the platform.
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> the V-Raptor BMC can then be inserted into a PCIe slot of the mainboard
The twitter post suggests something differently: ‘We have 32 nodes ARM cluster server on 2u size. 1 node have 24 cores’. So these modules are supposed to be inserted in some sort of a backplane with 32 PCIe slots connecting the ‘blades’ to power and BMC/network?
No idea whether the background image of their website is of any relevance here…
I’m very confused now. In the beginning, I actually thought the PCIe cards came with SCA211 SoC and meant to be inserted into a main board. But then I saw the main photo on the website, and derived from it that the card must be the BMC instead.
The picture of the 1u server boards might show something else (they mention they’re ‘official Qualcomm partner’ on twitter). At least the size of the heatsink (90x90mm if we compare with the DIMMs next to it) suggests this or that this system is sufficient for passive cooling while the ‘blades’ most probably want forced airflow?
The serverboard on the last picture hosts an Applied Micro chip, so it’s likely unrelated.
Good spot! Might be an X-Gene 2 then?
Perhaps. Outside of the AMP company logo, I find it impossible to tell any nomenclature from this picture.
Thinking about X-Gene 2 since the first gen would most probably be only interesting for historical reasons while X-Gene 3 having a TDP of 125W and being sold these days most probably only with Ampere logo on it as eMAG 8180.
I agree X-Gene 2 is the most likely candidate, but that’s about as far as we can reason.
I got into contact with the company, and it’s indeed Applied Micro’s X-Gene2. That’s their first generation server that also integrates their BMC. They call the server “V-Raptor XG2”.
The SocioNext nodes are called “V-Raptor SQ”, and as discussed above they’ll offer a 2U Chassis with up to 32 Server Nodes and 1 BMC Node.
They have a third model called “V-Raptor TX2” based on two Cavium ThunderX2 32-core processors, and made in collaboration with GIGABYTE.
Wow, that’s quite a lineup they have there, covering a large spectrum! Thanks for the follow-up!
Well, given that Gigabyte produces servers with 4 different ARM server CPUs right now…
Edit: Talking about Annapurna Labs AL514, Cavium ThunderX, Broadcom Vulcan (rebranded as ThunderX2 now) and Qualcomm Centriq 2400 soon.
> made in collaboration with GIGABYTE
Which kind of ‘collaboration’ is this? Simply rebranding/reselling Gigabyte servers as a lot of others do? https://b2b.gigabyte.com/ARM-Server/Cavium-ThunderX2
“Co-Worked with GIGABYTE : GIGABYTE (Hardware) + XSLAB (Software)”
Yes, they only worked on the software for that one.
Got it now. I rewrote part of the post.
Make a MiniPC or Laptop with this processor and 16 gb of RAM to run Linux or Android and with some Graphic GPU