Quad-Core Xeon Clovertown Rolls Into DP Servers

Intel Xeon 5300 Aka Clovertown

The 5000 series marks the dual-processor capable Xeon processor of Intel's portfolio. 5000 stands for the dual-core Xeons. (Paxville) and 50xx represents the first 90-nm dual core (Dempsey), which was still based on the NetBurst architecture. The Xeon "Woodcrest", which is based on the latest Core 2 microarchitecture, is called 5100. The quad-core Xeon Clovertown was baptized 5300. The two remaining digits represent both the CPU and the bus clock speed. Have a look at the following table to find the Xeon model for your platform.

Xeon Model Overview

Swipe to scroll horizontally
ProcessorNumberArchit.CacheClockSpeedFrontSideBusPowerSystem TypeQuadCoreDualCoreHTTech.
X535565nm8 MB L22.66 GHzFSB1333120WDPXRow 0 - Cell 8 Row 0 - Cell 9
E534565nm8 MB L22.33 GHzFSB133380WDPXRow 1 - Cell 8 Row 1 - Cell 9
E532065nm8 MB L21.86 GHzFSB106680WDPXRow 2 - Cell 8 Row 2 - Cell 9
E531065nm8 MB L21.60 GHzFSB106680WDPXRow 3 - Cell 8 Row 3 - Cell 9
516065 nm4 MB3.0 GHzFSB133380WDPRow 4 - Cell 7 XRow 4 - Cell 9
515065 nm4 MB2.66 GHzFSB133365WDPRow 5 - Cell 7 XRow 5 - Cell 9
5148 LV65 nm4 MB2.33 GHzFSB133340WDPRow 6 - Cell 7 Row 6 - Cell 8 Row 6 - Cell 9
514065 nm4 MB2.33 GHzFSB133365WDPRow 7 - Cell 7 XRow 7 - Cell 9
513065 nm4 MB2.00 GHzFSB133365WDPRow 8 - Cell 7 XRow 8 - Cell 9
512065 nm4 MB1.87 GHzFSB106665WDPRow 9 - Cell 7 XRow 9 - Cell 9
511065 nm4 MB1.6 GHzFSB106665WDPRow 10 - Cell 7 XRow 10 - Cell 9
508065 nm2x2 MB3.73 GHzFSB1066130WDPRow 11 - Cell 7 XX
506365 nm2x2 MB3.20 GHzFSB106695WDPRow 12 - Cell 7 XX
506065 nm2x2 MB3.20 GHzFSB1066130WDPRow 13 - Cell 7 XX
505065 nm2x2 MB3.00 GHzFSB66795WDPRow 14 - Cell 7 XX
503065 nm2x2 MB2.67 GHzFSB66795WDPRow 15 - Cell 7 XX

Intel combines two Woodcrest-type Xeon 5200 processor into a single processor to create the quad-core Clovertown. Effectively, it is a double-dual core, with both dual cores having their own 4 MB shared L2 cache.

Socket 771, FSB1333 Or FSB1066

All Xeon 5300 processors are designed for Socket LGA 771, which dominates the Intel server offerings today. There are four versions available: 1.6 and 1.86 GHz for FSB1066 platforms and 2.33 and 3.0 GHz for FSB1333 solutions. Be sure to get one of the latest platforms, ideally with Intel's 5000 chipset family, to support FSB1066 or FSB1333.

The Intel processor busses are based on quad data transfer rate (QDR) technology, which basically means that four chunks of data can be transferred per clock cycle. Knowing this, you'll realize that FSB1333 is based on a 333 MHz clock speed and FSB1066 runs at 266 MHz. It's good to see that Intel went after the faster 333 MHz system bus speed for its quad-core processors, since this pushes the bottleneck threat back for the time being.

Xeon Clovertown Architecture

If you are interested in architecture details of the Core 2 micro architecture (which powers the new Xeon), we recommend our IDF Spring 2006 article: IDF Spring 2006: Will Intel's Core Architecture Close the Technology Gap?.

  • Should I buy one of these xw8400 Workstation Dual Xeon Dual-Core 5160 3.0GHz and put a good card in it?
    Reply
  • Hello1

    Where can you buy this chip? I need to update my macpro 1,1. Please advise,

    Tony -
    Reply