If you have been following our recent server reviews, you will have noticed that a key feature has moved off the motherboard, in a rare case of reverse integration. That feature is the baseboard management and rear I/O. Instead, the OCP DC-SCM project has taken the server world by storm. It is certainly worth taking a moment to show off the DC-SCM HFF..
The OCP DC-SCM is Taking Over Our Guide
Starting off, DC-SCM stands for Datacenter Secure Control Module. The HFF portion means we are talking about the horizontal form factor. There is also a VFF or vertical form factor that we have not seen as often.
The slot itself looks a lot like an OCP NIC 3.0 slot. Common these days is to see two OCP NIC 3.0 slots and then a DC-SCM slots as well. The DC-SCM 2 actually has a small shift so that it is incompatible with OCP NIC 3.0 cards and slots.
Typically there are a few key components on the DC-SCM. Those include the BMC, flash storage for the BMC and for the BIOS. You often also see the trusted platform module (TPM), and then a CPLD and or security processor.
On the rear of modules, we usually see I/O such as the management port, USB ports, and video outputs.
The DC-SCM has come a long way over the past few years. There was a neat Flex design a few years ago with a M.2 slot that we saw in Flex DC-SCM OpenBMC at OCP Summit 2022.
Still, the DC-SCM is just about everywhere these days.
One of the big benefits to the removable BMC and security is that it allows vendors like Dell to swap BMCs from iDRAC for longtime Dell customers to ASPEED solutions for more industry-standard management. That flexibility means that the motherboard and the rest of the system can be the same. It also allows for customers to pick solutions from companies like Axiado that are building higher-end BMCs with more telemetry data.
Another benefit, that you do not read of often in the general coverage, is that it also allows server vendors to make systems that are standardized globally, but with specific regional variations. For example, it is common to use different BMC options, encryption, and other features for China and for the rest of the world.
Final Words
The DC-SCM HFF is absolutely taking over the server industry. There are still models out there where using the platform does not work just due to form factor constraints. Still, this feels a lot like the OCP NIC 3.0 form factor where it is quickly gaining momentum and proliferating quickly across vendors.
What guide is the OCP DC-SCM HFF taking over exactly?
Should there be a hyphen in that title/sentence? I.e. Is this meant to be the ServeTheHome guide to the OCP DC-SCM HFF taking over in the server space?
Or should I read it as written, that the OCP DC-SCM HFF is taking over ServeTheHomes Guide?
This isn’t enough content to be any guide. This is a brief introduction to the new OOB management solution
It would have been a better takeover if the OCP NIC 3.0 and DC-SCM slots were planned to integrate into workstation motherboards (instead of only rack-style motherboards). I looked for workstation chassis and could only find the “PowerEdge T560 Tower Server” can take NIC 3.0 sized mezzanine and none were available for DC-SCM.
Even though it says DC in the name it would be a great way to update your motherboard for other than Data Center uses; and would make this article of more interest to those of us not deploying that equipment, and somehow not already aware of the above information.
Are the dimensions driven by external I/O; or are some people doing fairly beefy and considerably more demanding variations on traditional BMCs?
I assume that people who knew they would end up ordering some hundreds of thousands of them had their reasons; but I would not have expected that BMC functions would end up getting a card that is physically larger than an OCP NIC and gets an entire 4C+ worth of gold fingers, especially when they have LTPI for tunneling random low speed stuff.