Intel proposes new power efficiency focused CPU benchmark

San Francisco (CA) - Pat Gelsinger, senior vice president and general manager of Intel's digital enterprise group, formally launched the Xeon 5300 quad-core series as well as the Xeon 5300 series during his keynote at IDF. Gelsinger also mentioned that Intel is working on a new benchmark that will focus on the power efficiency of a processor.

If you are closely following benchmark values in processor tests than you may soon find a new, somewhat standardized official discipline, which has been covered by Tom's Hardware for quite a while. According to Gelsinger, Intel is working with Bapco on "Ecomark," a Sysmark-based benchmark that will take into account sleep times of a processor and even indicate how the user has to spend to run a computer system (without monitor) based on a very specific processor. Preliminary numbers provided by Intel indicate that an entry-level desktop Core 2 Duo system may cost just under $14 per year, while the mobile T7600 version is estimated to cost less than $10.

The new effort falls under what competitor typically refers to as "benchmarketing" and the increased performance of the Core 2 Duos may extend Intel's leadership in Ecomark when compared to other performance data or pure processing horsepower alone. Intel; executives previously mentioned in conversations with TG Daily that current benchmarks do not take into account that faster processors finish their tasks earlier than slower ones and therefore save power during the time chips are still working. Ecomark will recognize such scenarios and most likely will provide benchmark data that is very different from today's power-related benchmarks, such as Mobile Mark.

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Gelsinger continued Intel's quad-core frenzy continued with the unveiling of Intel's Xeon 5300 CPU series. The processors, which combine two Xeon 5100 Woodcrest cores and were previously known as "Clovertown" CPUs, will be available with clock speeds of 1.6 GHz (E5310), 1.86 GHz (E5320), 2.33 GHz (E5345) and 2.66 GHz (X5355). The chips are rated at a thermal design power of 80 watts, the high-end X5355 makes an exception at 120 watts. The 5320 and 5310 models will run on FSB1066, while the E5345 and X5355 will support FSB1333. A low-power, 50 watt model will join the series later on.

The executive also had some dual-core news, such as the Xeon DP 5148, a 40 watt-processor based on the Woodcrest core and targeted at ultra-dense server environments. Completely new is the Xeon 3000 series, also based on the Woodcrest core and strictly aimed at 1-way, entry-level servers. There will be two processors (3070, 2.66 GHz; 3060, 2.4 GHz) that integrated 4 MB L2 cache and two (3050, 2.13 GHz; 3040, 1.86 GHz) with 2 MB L2 cache. The 3000 series does not support Hyperthreading.

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