AMD Launches Five New Six-core Opterons

By Marcus Yam
published

Three of AMD's new Opterons are energy misers.

AMD today rolled out three new six-core Opteron HE processors family that are designed for those who are energy conscious.

All three new chips are manufactured on a 45-nm process and consume 55W – marked improvement over 75W and 105W of other Opteron models. HP is now shipping 2-, 4- and 8-processor systems.

AMD said that the new six-core Opteron HE processor offers up to 18 percent lower platform-level power consumption over the standard wattage version and up to 18 percent better performance-per-watt compared to the quad-core version. AMD says that it will unveil processors with even greater energy efficiency later this year.

The new chips run at 2 GHz and 2.1 GHz and are priced from US$455 to $1,514 each in 1,000-unit quantities.

For those looking for more performance (at the expense of power efficiency), AMD is also unveiling two new, full-featured Six-Core AMD Opteron SE processors at 2.8 GHz for systems with up to 8 processors.

Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
22 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Upendra09
    Why are the opterons always on the slower side, i mean 2 ghz? come on my laptop can do that. Ignoring the fact it is a C2d
    Reply
  • Soul_keeper
    Because some moron will buy them ^^
    Reply
  • XD_dued
    Clock rate has little to do with speed or efficiency, for example the 2.66 i7 beats the 3.2ghz Phenom II(by a lot in many cases)
    Reply
  • bk420
    This will be huge for eco-friendly server farms!
    55W for six cores...that's amazing.
    I can't wait for the 12 core cpu's to come out.
    Reply
  • B-Unit
    Upendra09Why are the opterons always on the slower side, i mean 2 ghz? come on my laptop can do that. Ignoring the fact it is a C2dBecause unlike your laptop, a server receives greater benefit from more cores than clock speed. Add to that the savings in electricity both from the chip itself and in cooling and these are very nice CPUs.
    Reply
  • matt87_50
    I was so glad to see the athlon64 absolutely slaughter this stupid misconseption about "more ghz is bettarr!!"

    A 2.4ghz athlon would pwn a hot, noisy 3.8ghz p4! (or something like that, not sure on exact comparisons).

    so for those who forgot or weren't around: clock speed is MEANINGLESS when comparing different architectures, it is ONLY useful for comparing cpus in THE SAME LINE where higher clocks mean more power, in more ways than one.

    seeing as I am not currently in the market for 1000 $1.5k processors, i can only hope the desktop equivalents are on there way?
    Reply
  • Upendra09
    B-UnitBecause unlike your laptop, a server receives greater benefit from more cores than clock speed. Add to that the savings in electricity both from the chip itself and in cooling and these are very nice CPUs.
    I meant compared to the Xeon, the opteron is slow and Xeons also come in 4 cores at 2.6 ghz
    Reply
  • computabug
    Honestly, I don't think 200mhz or less would make such a big impact... so it's kind of pointless to spend more to buy a cpu with 1 more multiplier lol.

    >>off-topic
    Reply
  • justjc
    Am I the only one that's impressed that they managed to get 6 cores to run on 55W?

    I doubt even Intel can match that.
    Reply
  • ohim
    Upendra09I meant compared to the Xeon, the opteron is slow and Xeons also come in 4 cores at 2.6 ghzwhat part of "different architectures" you didn`t got ? Xeons and Opterons even thow they are designed for servers they are still different and don`t have the same computing power at the same frequency.

    justjcAm I the only one that's impressed that they managed to get 6 cores to run on 55W?I doubt even Intel can match that.no, you`re not :)
    Reply