Intel releases quad-core Tigerton processor
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(InfoWorld) - Intel plans to unveil a version of its Xeon processor on Wednesday that's designed for high-end servers with multiple processors -- setting the stage for a showdown with rivalÂ Advanced Micro Devices' upcoming quad-core Barcelona chip. The Xeon 7300 chips, called Tigerton, are the first quad-core processors from Intel designed to be used in servers with four or more processors, a relatively small but lucrative segment of the server market. Previously, the Xeon processor for this segment of the market had two cores, despite the availability of quad-core Xeon chips for single-processor and two-way servers. The new chips offer significantly better performance compared to their predecessors,Â Intel's Xeon 5300 chips, said Adesh Gupta, regional platform architecture manager at Intel Asia-Pacific's Server Platforms Group. "Across the spectrum of different applications, we're seeing really, really good performance," Gupta said. Benchmarks run by Intel showed significant gains for many enterprise applications, including SAP's ERP (enterprise resource planning) software, Gupta said. The 7300 series chips can handle roughly 82 percent more ERP users and 92 percent more database transactions than the 5300 chips, he said. The 7300 is part of theÂ Caneland chip package, which also includes Intel's 7300 chip set, known as Clarksboro. The new chip set has four 1,066MHz interconnects that are linked to an individual processor, helping reduce latency between the processors and main memory. Caneland is the last release expected from Intel before AMD announces the availability of its Barcelona server chips on Sept. 10. Barcelona is widely expected to offer significant performance increases over AMD's existing dual-core server chips, and should mean tighter competition with Intel in the server space. Intel will initially offer six versions of Tigerton. At the top of the range is the X7350, a 2.93GHz chip designed with 8MB of shared on-chip cache and a thermal design power (TDP) of 130 watts. TDP is the highest sustainable level of power for applications that Intel expects to be run on the chip, and the number describes how much heat a system must be able to dissipate from the chip. Intel is also offering several Xeon 7300 chips with a TDP of 80 watts. The E7340 runs at 2.4GHz and offers 8MB of shared on-chip cache. The E7330 also runs at 2.4GHz, but has 6MB of cache. The E7320 and E7310 both have 4MB of shared cache and run at clock speeds of 2.13GHz and 1.6GHz, respectively. Intel will also release a 50-watt version that runs at 1.86GHz. The L7345 has 8MB of shared on-chip cache and is designed for blade servers and high-density rack servers. Two dual-core versions of the Tigerton chip, the E7220 and E7210, will also be available, running at speeds of 2.93GHz and 2.4GHz with a TDP of 80 watts. Both chips have a shared on-chip cache of 8MB and are designed for high-performance computing applications. Tigerton's improved performance doesn't come cheap. The processors are priced from $856 to $2,301 per chip in 1,000-unit quantities, a standard measure of processor pricing. The 7300 will also be the last server chip announced by Intel, before itsÂ upcoming Penryn chipsÂ are made available later this year. Made using a 45-nanometer process that will allow more cache to be put on each chip, the first Penryn server chips are expected to be released in November. Those chips are intended for use in single-processor and two-way servers. The Penryn server chip for multiple-processor servers is called Dunnington and will not be available until late 2008, Gupta said.
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Core 2 Duo to dominate through Q3 2007 Intel does not expect quad-core processors to make any major impact on the desktop PC market through to the end of Q3 2007 if a presentation slide allegedly leaked from the chip giant is to be believed.â¦
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Dual-core processors to be considered single chip, company says.
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Intel expanded its line of "Extreme" processors to include chips for notebooks, as well as a new flagship desktop processors on Monday.
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New quad-core CPUs running at an energy-efficient 50 watts per processor will hit the market Monday.
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Intel bids adieu to aging NetBurst microarchitecture Intel has at last brought its high-end Xeon processor out of the stone age, replacing its geriatric microarchitecture and doubling the number of cores to four.â¦
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(InfoWorld) - Motherboards that use Intel's 3-series chip sets, codenamed Bear Lake, seem to be everywhere at the Computex exhibition -- signalling they will soon find their way to store shelves and hardware makers around the world. Intel took advantage of the Taiwanese hardware show, which started Tuesday,Â to announceÂ that the first chip sets from the series -- the P35 and G33 -- are now available. And more will come later this year, including the G35 and X38, which Intel plans to start shipping within 90 days. Based on the large number of 3-series motherboard designs developed, Intel expects the new chip sets to catch on quickly and lay the foundation for future processor advances. "They're all going to be able to support quad core from entry-level motherboards on up," said Sean Maloney, executive vice president and general manager of Intel's sales and marketing group. Intel is billing the 3 series as the prelude to its planned launch of the Penryn family of 45-nanometer processors later this year. The new chip sets, which also support the company's existing chips, are needed because Intel has changed the voltage used with Penryn's front-side bus, which connects the chip set to main memory, said Steve Peterson, director of chip set and graphics marketing at Intel. The 3-series chip sets, which all support quad-core processors, are labelled to reflect their respective capabilities. The models labeled with the prefix G include an integrated graphics core, while the P models do not. The X model is the top-of-the-line model and includes the ability to decode Blu-ray and HD-DVD movies. At the low end of the lineup, the G31 is designed specifically for emerging markets. This chip set is basically the same as the G33, but Intel has removed the ability to play high-definition movies, allowing it to reduce the chip set's price.
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Expect more information this week on Tukwila, Intel's upcoming quad-core Itanium processor.
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Specially designed laptops required? Intel looks set to release a quad-core microprocessor for notebooks at long last, but you're not likely to get your hands on a laptop containing the chip for the best part of a year.â¦
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(InfoWorld) - Intel and Advanced Micro Devices will square off next week at the annual Computex exhibition in Taipei, where many of the world's largest hardware makers will be showing off products slated for release later this year. Computex 2007, which begins on Tuesday, will see Intel launch its P35 Bear Lake chip set and the debut of motherboards featuring the chips from many of Taiwan's top motherboard makers. The chip set handles interaction between the processor and the rest of the computer and Bear Lake promises speedier data paths for performance improvements. Laptop computers based on Santa Rosa, the recently launched version of Intel's Centrino package of chips, should also be prominent. AMD will be talking up itsÂ new Phenom quad-core processor, which was unveiled in mid-May, and the show should see some demonstrations from Taiwanese companies of Phenom-based desktop PCs. Taiwan is home to the world's largest and most important computer hardware makers -- the companies who manufacture the guts of products that typically appear under more famous brand-names -- and Computex is where they show off their newest and most advanced products. The show is an important barometer of hardware trends because Taiwanese companies like Asustek Computer and Hon Hai Precision Industry, which uses the Foxconn brand, supply many of the components and finished computers sold by Hewlett-Packard, Dell, and others. Thus the support of Taiwanese companies -- or lack of it -- can make or break a new technology. This year wireless networking will be one such technology in the spotlight. The emerging 802.11n standard is expected to be seen in many laptop designs, but how fast it might penetrate markets beyond computing, such as wireless multimedia players, will become evident at the show. Computex is also the home turf of Acer, the world's third-largest PC maker. The company doesn't plan any major announcements at the show but its aggressive expansion guarantees that the products on display at its booth will be closely watched. Local newspapers and hardware technology blogs are already full of reports -- confirmed and otherwise -- about what else might be on show in Taipei. The reports say Acer will show mini-PCs based on Intel CPUs and Asustek will show a laptop PC with a "bamboo-like leather" finish and a Linux-based laptop with NAND flash memory and 7-inch LCD. Intel will demonstrate its 45nm quad-core Harpertown server processors and server makers will show both it and the Penryn 45nm processor, the reports said.
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(InfoWorld) - Intel Corp. quad-core microprocessors that work at an energy-efficient 50 watts per processor will officially be on the market starting Monday, according to the company. Each of the four cores in its new Xeon L5320 and L5310 will consume just 12.5 watts of electricity, according to Intel. The company claims the new Xeons use between 35 percent and nearly 60 percent less power than its existing 80-watt and 120-wattÂ quad-core server products. The L5320 operates at 1.86 GHz and the L5310 at 1.60 GHz. They both feature 8M bytes of on-die cache for faster memory data communication. In quantities of 1,000 units, the L5320 is priced at US$519 and the L5310 at $455. The new Xeons can be coupled with Intel's existing Bensley server platform, replacing existing dual-core or quad-core Intel processors. Intel and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. are locked in competition for dominance in the quad-core chip market, as enterprises demand more performance out of servers. Meanwhile, customers are demanding greater energy efficiency as data center electrical costs rise. AMD in February released details of its coming new quad-core chip,Â code-named Barcelona, at a technical conference in San Francisco. Barcelona, due to be released midyear, improves performance and energy efficiency over the competition and over AMD's own dual-core processor, the Opteron, which it introduced in 2003, said Brent Kerby, product marketing manager for Opteron, in an earlier IDG News Service interview. Servers based on the new Xeons are expected to be available worldwide over the next few months from such server manufacturers as Dell Inc., Hewlett-Packard Co., IBM Corp. and others.
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HP's new server is based on Intel's Tigerton quad-core Xeon processor.
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Technical details of the new low-power mobile CPU, expected to ship this year, are being released at a chip conference this week.
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Intel on Monday is expected to detail Tukwila, its next generation of 64-bit Itanium processors that are used in enterprise servers.The new processor, due for release by the end of 2008, has a quad-core design that doubles the performance of systems with&#160;Intel&#39;s Itanium 9100 dual-core processors, said Justin Rattner, chief technology officer at Intel.Tukwila will be detailed during a session&#160;at the International Solid State Circuits Conference&#160;in San Francisco this week.The processor will run at up to 2GHz and include the QuickPath Interconnect system architecture with an integrated memory controller for improved communication links between system components, Rattner said. The architecture, different from Intel&#39;s x86 architecture, is designed to support data-intensive applications. The processor works with Unix, Linux and Windows Server OS software.The boost in performance provided by Tukwila will be an upgrade for the set of developers writing applications for Itanium processors, which are targeted at vertical markets with data-intensive applications, like data warehousing, said Richard Doherty, director of analyst firm The Envisioneering Group.The QuickPath Interconnect architecture will also be part of Nehalem, Intel&#39;s next-generation x86 processor due out later in 2008. In the first public demonstration of the&#160;Nehalem processor&#160;at Intel Developer Forum at San Francisco last year, Intel CEO Paul Otellini said QuickPath Interconnect helps Nehalem deliver better performance-per-watt and better system performance.The Tukwila architecture will include 30MB of on-die cache, a 10 percent increase over the current Itanium. It will also include dual-integrated memory controllers, Rattner said.Tukwila is targeted at servers running enterprise applications, so the design includes an advanced RAS (reliability, availability and serviceability) feature to reduce data corruption and ensure reliable system performance, Rattner said. Advanced RAS features correct errors that may occur when data is being crunched on a processor.The system is built on a record number of transistors, Rattner said. &quot;To our knowledge, that&#39;s the first 2 billion transistor [microprocessor],&quot; he said.The Tukwila processor will be manufactured using the 65-nanometer process technology. Intel will skip the 45-nanometer process and jump to the 32-nanometer for the Tukwila processor upgrade, code-named Poulson, said Susan Tauzer, director of Itanium marketing at Intel. No release date was provided for Poulson.Intel is working closely with Microsoft, Novell/SUSE, Red Hat, Hewlett-Packard, and other key OS, system and application vendors on the delivery of Tukwila systems, Tauzer said.
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Ten months after Intel shipped its first quad-core server processor, Advanced Micro Devices finally released a quad-core Opteron that the upstart vendor hopes to use to recapture its momentum in the server market.
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InfoWorld - At the Intel Developer Forum trade show in San Francisco last week, Intel CEO Paul Otellini said the company will ship quad-core processors for servers and gaming PCs, beginning in November.
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Welcome to the age of 45-nanometer chips. Intel's first 45-nm processor, the quad-core Penryn QX9650 for the desktop, is being discussed by the press and industry in anticipation of its official November 12 launch. The initial response to the powerful new processor has been positive, although many are suggesting that it begs for innovation in software.