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DAILY NEWS AND INFORMATION
FOR THE GLOBAL GRID COMMUNITY /
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Breaking News -
Platforms:
New Processors Drive Lower Cost
Intel Itanium 2-Based Systems
Intel Corp announced two Intel Itanium 2 processors. Servers based on the
new
processors are approximately 28 percent lower in price and up to 25 percent
higher performing than previous dual processor Itanium 2-based servers.
The new processors broaden the Itanium processor family support of
lower-cost
server solutions for front-end applications and complement existing Itanium 2-
based systems in large scale deployments. A wide range of Itanium 2-based dual
processor servers are offered by more than 50 system manufacturers worldwide.
Entry level systems start at $2,100, while fully configured systems with the
new processors will be available for approximately $8,000.
"As Itanium 2-based servers push further into enterprise infrastructures we
are able to reduce the overall system cost while increasing the performance,"
said Richard Dracott, general manager of Enterprise Marketing and Planning at
Intel. "End users will benefit from the flexibility and choice that Intel-
based solutions bring to their organizations."
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The price/performance improvements of these new processors are the next
step
toward achieving Intel's goal of delivering Itanium 2-based systems with up to
twice the performance as Intel Xeon processor based systems for the same
system cost in 2007.
Intel has two server architectures, which makes up approximately 85 percent
of
the server market segment share. The Itanium 2 processor family is targeted at
business critical enterprise servers and technical computing clusters while
the Intel Xeon processor family is broadly used for general purpose IT
infrastructure.
"In the next few years, system manufacturers will be able to design an
Itanium
2 processor and Intel Xeon processor-based system using the same low cost
components," Dracott said. "Every product and technology we roll out moves us
one step closer to a common system with common infrastructure costs."
Audi AG, the international high-quality car manufacturer, recently switched
from RISC-based servers to HP Integrity dual processor servers running Itanium
2 processors.
"Audi is a pioneer in the innovation of exquisite automobiles that are
attractive, sophisticated and technically perfect," said Hans-Ulrik von Bülow,
senior CAE systems and methods analyst at AUDI AG. "We rely on the technology
we use to create designs so that when the car leaves our warehouse, we know
that it will deliver on the Audi brand promise to our customers. That is why
we switched from RISC-based systems to Itanium 2-based DP systems to help
design car ventilation systems. We get better price/performance and increase
our ability to perform a wide range of what-if scenarios to discover more
innovative designs and possibilities."
The Itanium 2 processor at 1.40 GHz with 3MB level three (L3) cache is
available worldwide today and the Itanium 2 processor at 1.6 GHz with 3MB L3
cache is expected to be available worldwide in May. Both processors enable
systems for technical computing clusters and entry-level, front-end enterprise
systems. In addition, Intel offers to manufacturers a rack-optimized, dual
processor Intel server platform for both of these new Itanium 2
processors.
The Itanium 2 processor at 1.40 GHz with 3MB of cache improves the
performance
up to 25 percent over the Itanium 2 processor at 1.40 GHz with 1.5MB of cache.
Furthermore, it delivers up to twice the price/performance of comparable RISC-
based systems. The increased performance will enhance the speed and efficiency
of technical computing applications such as computer aided engineering (CAE),
which enables faster product design and more accurate simulations.
The Itanium 2 processor at 1.60 GHz with 3MB of cache delivers outstanding
floating point performance per compute node, resulting in an industry-leading
DP performance based on Linpack measurements (or floating point operations per
second).
New dual processor systems are available from a variety of system
manufacturers including Bull, Dell, Fujitsu Siemens, HCL, IBM, Kraftway,
Lenovo, Maxdata, Samsung and Transtec AG.
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