Intel Readies Xeon MP Upgrade

Processors will feature faster clock speeds and a much larger memory cache.

Robert McMillan, IDG News Service

Intel is two weeks away from launching an upgrade to the high end of its Xeon MP processor line designed to boost performance in systems with four or more processors, according to sources familiar with the chip maker's plans. The company plans to launch its next-generation Xeon MP platform, code-named Trueland, at a press event scheduled for March 29 in San Francisco, the sources say.

The Trueland platform will be comprised of three main components. It will include a high-end Xeon MP processor, code-named Potomac, which is expected to ship with clock speeds as high as 3.33 GHz and with an 8MB L3 cache, according to Intel. Trueland also includes an entry-level Xeon MP processor code-named Cranford and a new chip set called the E8500.

"This is Intel moving ahead on their strategy of enhancing the Xeon platform," says Kevin Krewell, editor-in-chief of Microprocessor Report in San Jose, California. "They've got some tough competition from AMD's Opteron."

AMD's Approach

The new Xeons will be the latest Intel x86 processors to support both 32-bit and 64-bit processing, an approach pioneered by Advanced Micro Devices but which Intel has also embraced over the last year.

"Architecturally, AMD still has the advantage, but Intel has thrown everything they can at it to keep competitive," Krewell says.

With Trueland, Intel has added a much larger memory cache to Xeon, and it has re-designed the chip set architecture so that the processors can more quickly communicate with other components on the chipset. The E8500 will have a 667-MHz bus speed, compared with 400-MHz for Intel's previous Xeon chip set, says Intel spokesperson Erica Fields.

To further improve the speed with which components on its chip sets can communicate, Intel is working on a next-generation interconnect architecture, called CSI, that will compete with AMD's HypterTransport interconnect, according to Krewell. But CSI, which is being designed for both Itanium and x86 processors, is not expected until 2007, according to Krewell. Intel's Fields declined to comment on CSI.

Performance Leader?

At present, neither Xeon nor Opteron can claim to be the uncontested performance leader, says Gordon Haff an analyst with Illuminata in Nashua, New Hampshire. "Intel does better for some types of applications. Opteron does better for others," he says. "At this particular moment, Opteron probably does better at more workloads than Intel does, but certainly the larger cache [in Intel's product] clearly does favor some types of applications."

Xeon server vendors IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell are expected to begin shipping systems based on Trueland around the time of the Trueland launch. "We will be offering all of the new processors," says Bruce Anderson, a Dell spokesman. "When Intel announces [the new processors] we will be a supporter."

IBM has already said it will support the Cranford processor as part of its IBM eServer xSeries 366 server, which will begin shipping within the next few months. Pricing for the x366 will start at $6999, IBM says.

Intel's Fields declined to comment on the March 29 announcement.