On 8/12/2013 11:01, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
VERY STRONG RECOMMENDATION: DON'T buy Supermicro. They have a *lot* of trouble with this new, fuzzy concept called "quality control".
We have a *lot* of SuperMicro based systems in the field, and they aren't failing. In fact, I can't remember the last time we had to fix an actual motherboard issue. It seems like every field hardware failure for years has come down to dying HDDs.
We did once upon a time have a QC problem with SuperMicro, around Y2K, but that was because we chose to use AMD processors, and AMD OEM fan/heat sink combos at the time used little 60mm 6000 RPM pancake fans that would seize up after a few years. This was before processors had overtemp shutdown features, so once the fan seized, the processors would cook themselves.
You can't really lay that one at SuperMicro's feet. AMD screwed up.
The real fix was switching back to Intel processors, which shipped with bigger and slower-moving fans, which lasted longer.
You'll notice that both of these failure modes are due to mechanical wear. I can't say I've *ever* seen a SuperMicro board fail in any of the solid-state components, solder joints, capacitors, etc.