When creating your own Tesla Supercomputer, there are many crucial steps that need to be taken to ensure that your computer will work properly with component compatibility. These steps should be taken from the Motherboard (main board) up. The motherboard should be your starting point as all the components must first be able to fit onto it. We will go through an example system showing you how each of the components match. To begin with, here are the specifications of the motherboard that you need to be looking at.

Asus P6T6 WS Revolution

-          Socket Type: LGA 1366

-          Memory Type: DDR3 1600(O.C)/1333 6x240pin (Triple channel enabled when 3 blue, 3 black or all 6 memory lanes are filled)

-          6 PCI Express 2.0 x16: (Either the Black or Blue lanes on the left)

o   2 x PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (at x16 or x8 mode) 
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (at x16 mode) 
2 x PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (at x8 mode) 
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16 slot (at x4 mode)
* True @ x16 3-Way SLI™ in slots 1, 3 and 5 when slots 2 and 4 are not occupied (From right to left)

-          Hard Drive/CD-DVD Drive: 6 SATA 3Gb/s

o   2 SAS Ports

-          Form Factor: ATX

-          Power Pin: 24 Pin

Processor: Starting from the top, this motherboard takes an Intel processor using an LGA 1366 socket type. This is typically i-series processors. Make sure that when you pick a processor, it has that exact socket type or else the processor will not fit into the motherboard. Be sure to remember that this is using a mother board designed for Intel processors. Below is an example of a Processor/CPU.

Memory: The memory type can be a little tricky at first to read so we’ll break it down. The type of memory that this motherboard uses is DDR3. Next, you see the speed of the memory the motherboard allows, “1600(O.C.)/1333”. The tricky part about this is that 1600(O.C.) is not the base speed that the motherboard will take; it’s the speed it will take when the memory lanes are overclocked, which is what the O.C. stands for. The actual speed of the memory lanes is 1333 so look for that type of memory for this specific motherboard unless you know how to overclock. The last part of the memory is the “6x240pin”. What this means is that there are 6 memory lanes that’s take 240pin memory which, in this case, the DDR3 memory already is. So when looking for memory for this particular motherboard, you should be looking for “DDR3 1333 240pin RAM”. Below is an example of Memory/RAM.

Graphics Cards: The PCI Express 2.0 x16 lanes look a little intimidating at first, but are fairly easy to understand once you get the hang of it. On this particular motherboard, there are 6 PCIE 2.0 lanes which run at different speeds when configured differently. When looking at that section, you see “* True @ x16 3-Way SLI™ in slots 1, 3 and 5 when slots 2 and 4 are not occupied”. This is very important to keep in mind. This states that the PCIE 2.0 lanes that will run at full speed with 3 graphics cards in are slots 1,3 and 5 when the other 2 are not occupied. If you occupy those slots (2 and 4) with graphics cards, the other 3 lanes (1,3 and 5) will not run at the full x16 speed. As you can see from the specs above, there are 3 lanes that CAN run at the full x16 speed, 1 slot that will run at x8 speed, and one that will run at x4 speed. So the more graphics cards you have in, the slower it will be UNLESS you put them in slots 1,3 and 5. We call this type of configuration 3-Way SLI in which all 3 graphics cards are running at the full x16 speed. Below is an example of a graphics card.

Hard Drives: The amounts of hard drives you can fit onto this motherboard are 6 SATA 3 Gb/s and 2 SAS. SATA, first off, is a type of hard drive fitting. The 3 Gb/s is how fast the transfer of data will go through that particular SATA port. In SATA, there are only 3 and 6 Gb/s ports in the differentiation of speed. SAS is another type of hard drive port in which the speeds are usually faster because of the RPM speeds of the hard drive. All hard drives can be put into what we call a RAID which, in layman’s terms, is a type of computer data storage that divides or replicates data among multiple hard drives.

Size of Motherboard: The Form Factor of the motherboard is really only applicable when buying a case. Certain cases handle certain sizes of motherboards such as Full ATX motherboard, Mini ATX motherboard, etc. Be sure to review the case specifications to see if it handles the size of the motherboard that you are purchasing.

Power Supply: This motherboard takes a 24 pin power connector which can vary among power supplies. Make sure to check the main connector on the power supply to ensure that it will connect to the motherboard. Also, make sure you have a high enough wattage in the power supply to cover all components in computer. Your main concerns for power consumption will be the Graphics Cards and the Processor. Processors at this level usually take 95w to 125w. The graphics cards, such as the Tesla, use just under 200w and some other graphics cards take more. When having multiple graphics cards, add up the max amount of wattage between the graphics cards and then add the processor to get a rough idea of how much power you safely need. If you were to have an i7 with 1 Tesla C1060 on this motherboard, a safe wattage for the power supply would be roughly 850w which will allow for expansion for up to 1 more card. When getting into 3 cards for this motherboard, you would need at least 1200w to be safe. Also, make sure that the power supply you choose has enough connectors to go to the processor and the graphics cards. The processor typically takes an 8 pin connector while the graphics cards take a 6 pin. Below is an example of a Power Supply.