Intel Introduces First Dual-Core Low-Voltage Xeon Processor

The historical need for raw computing performance has evolved into a drive for energy–efficient performance to meet people’s expanding demands – whether for smaller devices, lower cooling bills or better price/performance per watt. Energy–efficient performance enables equipment manufacturers to optimally balance processing capabilities with power and space constraints to help meet those demands. Intel is driving innovations in multi–core computing architectures through a combination of silicon, architecture, platform and software innovations to enable new levels of performance, capabilities and energy efficiency.

With total dissipated power (TDP) of 31 watts, the new low–voltage Dual–Core Intel Xeon processor is ideal for deployments requiring high compute density and power optimization, including single–height (1U) chassis and blade servers, SAN and NAS solutions, and network infrastructure equipment. The new processor excels at handling demanding multi–threaded, multi–tasking applications such as high–performance computing and financial services.

“The low–voltage Dual–Core Intel Xeon processor’s combined enhancements in performance and energy efficiency, along with the efficient power and cooling design of IBM’s industry–leading BladeCenter, deliver a leadership integer performance–per–watt solution,” said Doug Balog, vice president and business line executive, IBM BladeCenter. “The new IBM BladeCenter Ultra Low Power HS20 blade is a solid example of the innovation being brought to market through Intel and IBM’s blade collaboration.”

To accelerate time to market for telecommunications equipment makers and original equipment manufacturers, Intel also plans to introduce the AdvancedTCA–compliant Intel NetStructure MPCBL0040 Single Board Computer (SBC). This new, high–density–compute SBC features two of the new low–voltage Intel Xeon processors, which equates to four high–performance cores per SBC. With the performance boost of the new dual–core processor, the MPCBL0040 is expected to service far more transactions and subscribers per system than previous generation products, which can help significantly reduce the cost per subscriber and/or transaction and total cost of ownership. This powerful processing capability, offered in the AdvancedTCA standard, is ideal for applications where transaction and subscriber load can increase dramatically in a very short time, such as IP Multimedia Services (IMS), Internet Protocol Television (IPTV), and Wireless Control Plane applications.

Intel is also planning to offer a blade server solution powered by up to two of the new Dual–Core Intel Xeon processors LV for ultra–dense, low–power environments where density is limited by power and cooling capabilities. The Intel Server Compute Blade SBXD62 will enable server OEMs and resellers to offer their small– and medium–sized business customers a blade server platform to help reduce operational costs and extend IT resources through improved price/performance/watt, operational efficiencies, deployment flexibility and simplified management.

The Dual–Core Intel Xeon processor LV 2.0 GHz and 1.66 GHz are available from Intel now for $423 and $209 per unit, respectively, in 1,000–unit quantities.

Source: Intel