We've had the opportunity to take a look at a few E7500 based motherboards in the past, and although they were each different in their own right, they were also quite similar. Some had dual G0C NICs and some had U320 SCSI, but they were all SSI form factor (basically eATX), and they all required a high output EPS12V power supply.

While the EPS12V power supply is the defacto choice for SSI compliant motherboards, it is still relatively new and not always easy to come by. When you do find them they are usually pretty expensive as well. That's not a problem if your building budget is large, but if you're trying to get a decent server without breaking the bank, every little bit counts.

Your case choices are also limited by the sheer size of an SSI motherboard. Unless you have a large server tower or rackmount enclosure you're stuck buying a rather expensive case, on top of the cost of the proprietary power supply, etc. Again, not always an appealing option if you're purse strings are tight. So what is a cheap server builder to do? How can you harness the power of the current Xeons and take advantage of the cool new features of the E7500 chipset, all while not taking out a second mortgage? The Tyan Tiger i7500, that's how.

What you get

The Tiger i7500 is an entry level dual socket603 server board. As such, you won't get anything too fancy with it. The box contents consist of a manual, driver CD, IO shield, floppy and IDE cables, heatsink retention clips and Tyan's handy new "Quick Start" guide. Since there is no SCSI onboard, there are no driver floppies or SCSI cables included. Like I said, simple, and to the point.

Layout

If you weren't already aware, the Tiger i7500 is the first and only E7500 board to be released on a normal ATX sized PCB. This is awfully handy for anyone who has a smaller server or rackmount case already... Hell, I even fit mine into an Antec SX600 series case (a feat I couldn't accomplish with any of the other E7500 boards I've had). Don't worry though, the small PCB doesn't mean that you'll have to give up any of the E7500's cooler features.

The board is limited to only four DIMM slots with a capacity of 8gb total system memory. As with the other E7500 boards, registered ECC memory is required. If you already have a 1U rackmount case, you might want to look at the S2722GNN-1U version of the board that offers two angled DIMM slots instead of four upright ones as I have yet to see a registered ECC stick of DDR that would fit upright in a 1U case (I'm sure somebody makes some though).

My first gripe with a motherboard is usually the placement of the power supply connectors. Surprisingly, I have nothing to complain about with this board. Tyan mixed-up the layout a bit from what you might expect, and by relocating the DIMM slots to the back of the board, they left an easy path for wire routing to the 4/8 pin PSU connectors in the middle of the board. Speaking of which...

As I mentioned before, all E7500 boards up to this point have required an EPS12V power supply. The EPS12V spec calls for a 24pin main connector and an 8pin secondary connector, both of which are present on the Tiger i7500. Tyan pulled a fast one here though. Not only can you use the EPS12V connectors, but you can also use a regular old P4 compliant ATX12V PSU as well. You just insert the 20pin connector of the ATX12V PSU into the first 20 holes of the motherboard connector (leaving the last four empty), and the 4pin ATX12V connector into the first 4 holes on the secondary motherboard connector (also leaving the last four holes empty). Viola! No need for an expensive, proprietary power supply. Pretty cool, eh? It gets better. Lets say you're just such a tightwad that you can't even pony-up for an ATX12V power supply... Tyan included a standard 4pin Molex connector (same as a regular CDRom connector) on the Tiger i7500 as well. Just for cheap bastards like you.

While you probably can run this board on an older, lower wattage PSU, you probably shouldn't. There are reasons that the E7500 boards use the higher wattage/amperage EPS12V supplies. For a minimally loaded system I would recommend at least a capable ATX12V unit. I ran my test system on an Enermax 300W ATX12V supply and it ran perfectly fine for me, but I only had one optical drive and one hard drive installed.

Since the board is a true server level board, you'll find all of the normal goodies you'd associate with the E7500 chipset. You get onboard ATI video, two PCI-X slots and a single 32bit/33mhz slot (each PCI slot gets its very own bus as well, so there shouldn't be any slow-downs from filling all three slots). Not much, but enough for a server. Especially considering the dual onboard NICs (one 10/100, one 10/100/1000).

Despite the small form factor, I didn't have any problem with heatsink clearance (putting on or taking off), memory installation, etc. There is, surprisingly, plenty of room on the Tiger i7500. All six of the 3pin fan headers are also in easy reach for all of your RPM sensing cooling needs.

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