Intel details 10-core Westmere-EX server silicon

Intel has confirmed that its upcoming Westmere-EX server processor will be a 10-core, server-enhanced, single-die beastie.

No surprise. Back in June, when the program for this week's Hot Chips conference was published, it listed a session in which Intel would discuss "A 20 Thread Server CPU". It was a no-brainer to deduce the Westmere-EX's core count from that bit of info, seeing as how Intel's Hyper-Threading Technology is a two-threads-per-core scheme.

And that's exactly what Intel announced on Tuesday at the conference, held on the campus of Stanford University in Palo Alto, California.

Also unsurprising was that Intel engineer Dheemanth Nagaraj, the lead microarchitect for the Westmere-EX and its presenter at Hot Chips, neither revealed any details about the processor's eventual clock speeds nor made any definitive predictions of its performance.

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http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/08/25/westmere_ex/

Fujitsu 8-Socket Server Brings x86 Price Performance into Mission-Critical Computing

Driving the computing performance and speed of connectivity of FujitsuFujitsu's new eight-socket rack server is an innovative 'glue-less' design, where no additional Hardware is necessary to run all eight CPUs, therefore providing the shortest route between processors, memory modules and I/O hubs. More often, vendors simply 'glue together' multiple dual-socket server blades, which leads to I/O bottlenecks.

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http://www.zawya.com/Story.cfm/sidZAWYA20100714082238/Fujitsu%208-Socket%20Server%20Brings%20x86%20Price%20Performance%20into%20Mission-Critical%20Computing/lok082200100714

Supermicro Intros Servers Optimized for AMD Opteron 6100 Series

Server technology innovator Super Micro Computer Inc. launched this week its first servers optimized for the new 8- and 120-core AMD Opteron 6100 Series processors (codenamed "Magny Cours").

The launch includes Supermicro‘s new 2U Twin2 systems with four hot-plug DP computing nodes (supporting up 96 processing cores), quad-processor 1U servers that support up to 48 processing cores in 1U, and new GPU-optimized systems.

In addition to these system architectures, Supermicro is also introducing advanced new UP, DP, and MP solutions in standard 1U, 2U, 4U, and tower form factors.

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http://www.channelprosmb.com/article/17502/Supermicro-Intros-Servers-Optimized-for-AMD-Opteron-6100-Series/

AMD's 'Magny-Cours' Server Chip Aims at Volume Market

On Monday, Advanced Micro Devices announced Magny-Cours, the code-name for both 8- and 12-core processors which will be sold under the name Opteron 6100.

A second family, a 4- and 6-core chip, will be sold as part of the Opteron 4000 family, or the "Lisbon" code name.

Systems using the chip will be available from Cray, Dell, and Hewlett-Packard in the United States; Acer will also build servers around the new Opterons in Europe. HP will offer "broad-based support" for the new chip, according to John Fruehe, the director of marketing for server and workstation processors for AMD. Dell, meanwhile, will offer the chips as part of its Data Center Solutions (DCS) service, as well as in PowerEdge servers.

Although AMD announced the new processors on Monday, chips from the new line began shipping in February.

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http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2361926,00.asp

AMD Opteron 6100 Series Processor

Intel Partners See 'Easy' Upgrade Path With Xeon 5600 Chips

One word to describe upgrade opportunities around Intel's new Xeon 5600 series of server and workstation processors? "Easy," said a number of Intel system builder partners following Tuesday's launch of the chip giant's Westmere-class series of quad-core and six-core Xeon chips.

"It's a complete drop in to the existing platforms, which is great," said Todd Swank, director of marketing at Burnsville, Minn.-based system builder Nor-Tech. "With just a BIOS upgrade needed, it makes it easy to upgrade our current Intel server offerings."

Swank, like many Intel partners in attendance at this week's Intel Solutions Summit (ISS) in Las Vegas, said a simple swap-out of last year's quad-core Xeon 5500 series chips for a new six-core Xeon 5600 series part would deliver "an automatic 30 percent increase in performance."

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http://www.crn.com/white-box/223900139;jsessionid=CBV35XMXL4VTDQE1GHPCKH4ATMY32JVN

Intel to Launch Eight-core Nehalem-EX This Month

Intel will release its fastest and highly anticipated eight-core Nehalem-EX server processor later this month, a company executive said late Thursday.

The processor will be targeted at four-socket servers, said Shannon Poulin, Xeon platform director at Intel. Each physical core will be able to run two threads simultaneously, giving the chip 64 virtual processing cores on servers.

Intel's CEO Paul Otellini has described Nehalem-EX as Intel's fastest processor to date. The chip maker announced the processor last year, and said it would release the chip in the first half of this year, but did not provide an exact release date.

Poulin declined to provide the clock speed of the chips. However, the company has said it will include 24MB of cache, and 2.3 billion transistors.

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http://www.pcworld.com/article/190906/intel_to_launch_eightcore_nehalemex_this_month.html