Multi-Core Processors Outpacing Key Business Software

Multi-Core Processors Outpacing Key Business Software
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The relentless doubling of cores per microprocessor chip will result in servers with far more horsepower than software can use, says Gartner

The relentless doubling of cores per microprocessor chip will drive total processor counts in upcoming generations of servers well beyond levels for which key business software has been engineered, a market research firm said Wednesday.

Technologies that will be affected by this evolution include operating systems, middleware, virtualization tools, and other applications, Gartner said. As a result, companies and other organizations will be faced with "difficult decisions, hurried migrations to new versions and performance challenges."

"Looking at the specifications for these software products, it is clear that many will be challenged to support the hardware configurations possible today and those that will be accelerating in the future," Gartner analyst Carl Claunch said in a statement. "The impact is akin to putting a Ferrari engine in a go-cart; the power may be there, but design mismatches severely limit the ability to exploit it."

Intel Readies R0 Revision of Core 2 Quad Q8200

TC Magazine reports that Intel is preparing a little upgrade on its modest 2.33GHz 45nm Core 2 Quad Q8200 processors. The Q8200 CPUs will pass from M1 to R0 stepping next month. The revised R0 processors will begin to be supplied from February 23rd through April 20, 2009. As reported Q8200 R0 will feature a halide free package, new S-spec and MM numbers, a CPUID changed from 10677 to 1067A, and Power State Indicator (PSI) support with Intel 4 series chipsets. To decrease energy consumption and update monitoring functions, the R0 quad-core processors will bring in three new low power states (Extended Stop Grant State, Deep Sleep State and Deeper Sleep State) and new XSAVE/XRSTOR instructions. A BIOS update for your motherboard will likely be needed if you happen to own a R0 quad-core.

Intel Planning Low-Power Lynnfield Processors

Earlier this month, Intel released a series of its Core 2 Quad processors with low power ratings, rated TDPs at 65W. This move served two purposes: to bring down the energy footprints of the CPUs, and to propagate quad-core chips to even those platforms whose electrical components are built for CPUs in that 65W power range. An example of that would be small form-factor PCs, mini-ITX motherboards with LGA-775 sockets, and some variants that might make it to notebooks. Intel now has plans to bring in a low-power Lynnfield processor sometime in Q1 2010. Given the amount of machinery the Lynnfield processors hold: four x86 processing cores, a dual-channel IMC, internal QPI and PCI-Express root complexes, in some cases even an IGP, a low-power variant sounds like a great engineering feat. We don't exactly know as to what low-power in context of Lynnfield is, at this point, but we can tell it will bring down platform power consumptions, given that the processor could end up being the single largest power consumer on a motherboard, and its power consumption affects that of the entire platform significantly.

Intel to Call on AMD, to Discuss Possible License Violations

Silicon giant Intel flexed its IPR muscle by reportedly calling rival AMD to discussions on possible violations of past license agreements. AMD and Intel share license agreements dating back to 1976, which eventually transformed into the agreement of letting AMD use Intel's x86 micro-architecture in making its own products. Later in 2001, the two companies met again to share x86-related technologies. Such agreements bind licensees of the x86 architecture to confining their technologies to themselves as the license is non-transferable.

The two companies are expected to meet to discuss on how the past two major events in the recent history of AMD: the acquisition of ATI Technologies, and the spin-off of the manufacturing division to The Foundry Company respect the terms of the agreements. Earlier, AMD stated that the ATI acquisition does not violate any of its cross-agreements with Intel, while the company sounds optimistic about getting The Foundry Company to existence smoothly through one of its big hurdles: a clean-chit from Intel, after having crossed bigger hurdles such as government approvals and support from the various countries it holds its facilities in.

Nvidia releases Forceware 181.22 WHQL drivers

Nvidia has released a new set of WHQL-certified drivers to provide GeForce owners with support for some of the latest gaming applications and add a couple of new features. The new package, version 181.22, contains the latest PhysX System Software (9.09.0010) and features improved support for GPU accelerated physics effects in the highly anticipated Mirror’s Edge title by Electronic Arts.

Of course, just like with older drivers, PhysX requires a GeForce 8-series card or later sporting at least 256MB of dedicated video memory. Aside from this, a few bug fixes are also included, which can be found in the release notes available here in PDF form. The new driver supports Nvidia’s GeForce 6, 7, 8 and 9-series GPUs as well as the newer GTX 200-series, and can be downloaded for Windows Vista (32 or 64-bit) and Windows XP (32 or 64-bit).

Intel to cut up to 6,000 workers, close 2 plants

Intel is yet another big-name company with large job cuts in the near future, following the announcement that they plan to shut down some of their manufacturing plants and slimming production at others. Two overseas plants, located in Malaysia and the Philippines, will be shut down in the coming months, both of which produced older-technology silicon. In addition to the plants closing, the company will also be halting production of older 200mm technology at their famous Fab 20 in Oregon, which is one of their largest.

The plants closing and production halts will result in large job cuts, upwards of 7% of their workforce. That represents 5,000 to 6,000 people, though luckily for them some positions will be made open at other Intel facilities. All of this is an effort by Intel to reduce their overhead in producing older technology, allowing them to focus on newer development.

More Details Trickle in on Intel's New Atom Platform, the Pine Trial-D Based Nettop

Wednesday, January 21st 2009

Following the story which we covered just a few days ago, Expreview has got more information on the new Intel Atom platform, codenamed Pine Trail-D. From the new information, we see that the CPU, IGP and MCH will in fact all be integrated into one chip, as opposed to just being moved onto the same die. The CPU has also been listed as at least 1.6Ghz, double that of the current entry level Atom processor. Despite the platform having no need for a northbridge, with it all moved into the CPU, Intel have managed to keep the die size at 484 sq. mm. On that note however, it seems that the IGP is still DirectX 9 based, though further details on the graphical capabilities are still not yet known. We also see, that the new Tigerpoint southbridge, will support 8 USB devices, 4 PCI-E x1 lanes, 2 PCI ports, 2 SATA ports and HD audio.