I'm currently running a Xeon E3-1231v3. It's getting long in the tooth, supports only 32GB RAM, and has only 16 PCIe lanes. I've been butting up against the platform limitations for a couple of years now, and I'm ready to upgrade. I've been running this system for ~10yrs now.
I'm hoping to future proof the next system to also last 8-10 years (where reasonable, considering advancements in tech and improvements in efficiency), but I'm hitting a wall finding CPU candidates.
In a perfect world, I'd like an Intel with iGPU for QuickSync (HWaccel for Frigate/Immich/Jellyfin), AND I would like the 40+ PCIe lanes that the Intel Xeon Scalable CPUs offer.
With only my minimum required PCIe devices I've surpassed the 20 lanes available on desktop CPU's with an iGPU:
- Dual m.2 for Proxmox ZFS mirror (guest storage) - in addition to boot drive (8 lanes)
- LSI HBA (8 lanes)
- Dual SFP+ NIC (8 lanes)
Future proofing:
High priority
Low priority
- Additional dual m.2 expansion (8 lanes)
- USB expansions for simplified device passthrough (Coral TPU, Zigbee/Zwave for Home Aassistant, etc) (4 lanes per card) - this assumes the motherboard comes with at least 4-ports
- Coral TPU PCIe (4 lanes?)
Is there anything that fulfills both requirements? Am I being unreasonable or overthinking it? Is there a solution that adds GPU hardware acceleration to the Xeon Silver line without significantly increasing power draw?
Thanks!
Sounds like it may be time to consider threadripper, combined with an Intel arc/battlemage GPU, if you want more pcie lanes and quicksync
Mine's got all the slots filled and I think I still have spare PCIe lanes, Threadrippers are nuts.