Intel's Update To vPro For 2012
Intel's vPro technology is composed of several features that the company says protects businesses in four ways: threat management, identity and access, data and asset protection, and monitoring and remediation. Although a number of vPro's capabilities are accessed through software, specific hardware hooks are required to enable things like out-of-band management and high-res remote access.
Satisfying the hardware requirements to enable vPro can be tricky; your processor, chipset, firmware, and network controller all need to be compatible. This is made more challenging by Intel's nomenclature, which doesn't make it particularly clear whether a given CPU supports vPro or not. For example, the flagship enthusiast Core i7-3770K is not vPro-enabled. It's missing Trusted Execution Technology and VT-d, too.
Beyond limiting compatibility at the high-end, Intel also clips support from its lower-end chips, likely in a move to sell more expensive CPUs into businesses requiring vPro's feature set. The Core i5-3450 we used in our Small Business Advantage-capable machine isn't even on the company's list. Rather, you need at least a Core i5-3470 to get vPro support from Ivy Bridge-based hardware. What follows is a current list of vPro-enabled CPUs from the third-gen Core family:
| Intel Third-Gen Desktop Core Processor | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Model | Cores / Threads | Clock Rate | Max. Turbo Frequency | L3 Cache | TDP | MSRP |
| Core i7-3770S | 4/8 | 3.1 GHz | 3.9 GHz | 8 MB | 65 W | $294 |
| Core i7-3770T | 4/8 | 2.5 GHz | 3.7 GHz | 8 MB | 45 W | $294 |
| Core i7-3770 | 4/8 | 3.4 GHz | 3.9 GHz | 8 MB | 77 W | $294 |
| Core i5-3475S | 4/4 | 2.9 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 6 MB | 65 W | $201 |
| Core i5-3570S | 4/4 | 3.1 GHz | 3.8 GHz | 6 MB | 65 W | $205 |
| Core i5-3570 | 4/4 | 3.4 GHz | 3.8 GHz | 6 MB | 77 W | $213 |
| Core i5-3470T | 2/4 | 2.9 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 3 MB | 35 W | $184 |
| Core i5-3470S | 4/4 | 2.9 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 6 MB | 65 W | $184 |
| Core i5-3470 | 4/4 | 3.2 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 6 MB | 77 W | $184 |
| Core i5-3550 | 4/4 | 3.3 GHz | 3.7 GHz | 6 MB | 77 W | $205 |
| Core i5-3550S | 4/4 | 3 GHz | 3.7 GHz | 6 MB | 65 W | $205 |
| Core i5-3570T | 4/4 | 2.3 GHz | 3.3 GHz | 6 MB | 45 W | $205 |
Intel's standard-voltage processors are 77 W parts. The -S and -T suffixes indicate low-power options, which, remember, include the thermal ceiling for processing and graphics resources (they share the die's TDP).
Increasingly, mobile platforms are a big focus for vPro, and an additional 13 Ivy Bridge-based mobile CPUs include vPro support, too.
| Intel Third-Gen Mobile Core Processor | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Model | Cores / Threads | Clock Rate | Max. Turbo Frequency | L3 Cache | TDP | MSRP |
| Core i7-3920XM | 4/8 | 2.9 GHz | 3.8 GHz | 8 MB | 55 W | $1096 |
| Core i7-3555LE | 2/4 | 2.5 GHz | 3.2 GHz | 4 MB | 25 W | $360 |
| Core i7-3517UE | 2/4 | 1.7 GHz | 2.8 GHz | 4 MB | 17 W | $330 |
| Core i7-3520M | 2/4 | 2.9 GHz | 3.6 GHz | 4 MB | 35 W | $346 |
| Core i7-3667U | 2/4 | 2 GHz | 3.2 GHz | 4 MB | 17 W | $346 |
| Core i7-3820QM | 4/8 | 2.7 GHz | 3.7 GHz | 8 MB | 45 W | $568 |
| Core i7-3615QE | 4/8 | 2.3 GHz | 3.3 GHz | 6 MB | 45 W | $393 |
| Core i7-3612QE | 4/8 | 2.1 GHz | 3.1 GHz | 6 MB | 35 W | $426 |
| Core i7-3610QE | 4/8 | 2.3 GHz | 3.3 GHz | 6 MB | 45 W | $393 |
| Core i5-3610ME | 2/4 | 2.7 GHz | 3.3 GHz | 3 MB | 35 W | $276 |
| Core i5-3360M | 2/4 | 2.8 GHz | 3.5 GHz | 3 MB | 35 W | $266 |
| Core i5-3320M | 2/4 | 2.6 GHz | 3.3 GHz | 3 MB | 35 W | $225 |
| Core i5-3427U | 2/4 | 1.8 GHz | 2.8 GHz | 3 MB | 17 W | $225 |
Intel also enables vPro on some of its Xeon processors, though many of those chips don't include integrated graphics, which is necessary for Remote KVM support.
If you have a vPro-enabled workstation with Intel's C216 chipset and a Xeon E3-12x5 V2 CPU, you can use a number of the technology suite's features, in addition to more enterprise-oriented hardware like ECC-capable DDR3 DIMMs.