Diane Bryant, senior vice president and general manager of Intel's datacentre group, today introduced the Xeon Processor E5 2600 v2 family of chips at the annual Intel Developer Forum (IDF). Xeons typically employ architectures that are first introduced on the desktop, and to this end, the Xeon E5 2600 v2 chips are based on the Ivy Bridge design we first saw last April.
Bringing to market a total of 21 Xeon products, the smaller 22nm process, inherent to Ivy Bridge, enables Intel, for the range-topping model, to increase the Xeon core count to 12 and last-level cache to 30MB, up from 8 and 20MB, respectively, all the while keeping power utilisation at or below the levels exhibited by the first-generation E5s built using Sandy Bridge technology.
Further improvements are to be found with DDR3 memory speed upgraded to 1,866MHz (up from 1,600MHz) and a doubling of usable memory, up to 1.5TB from 750GB.
The introduction of the Xeon E5 2600 v2 chips means that Intel now packs in more power than ever before for two-socket systems. Keeping the same Socket 2011 form factor should enable drop-in upgrades for customers who have already invested in the Sandy Bridge-EP parts.
Xeons based on Ivy Bridge-EP architecture further cement Intel's dominance in the two-socket server market. Those who can't quite stretch to the $2,000-plus pricing for the best Xeon E5-2697v2 processors may find some solace in the architecturally-similar Core i7-4960X.
A full review of the Xeon E5-2697 v2 processor can be found here.
