Server CPUs overview

As the CPU is still one of the most important cost factors in a server, we want to give an overview of the currently available server CPUs. We'll start with the Intel CPUs.
The biggest advantage of Intel's newest Bensley platform is the longevity: the Dempsey, Woodcrest, and quad core Clovertown Xeon all use the same socket and "Bensley" platform. Even the successor of Clovertown, the 45nm Harpertown, is confirmed to be compatible with the Bensley platform.

Intel Xeon Overview
Intel CPU Clock Codename L2 L3 FSB Mem bandwidth TDP In test? Price
Xeon MP 7140M 3.4GHz Tulsa 2x1MB 16MB 200 MHz Quad 6.4 GB/s 150W No $1,980
Xeon MP 7130M 3.2GHz Tulsa 2x1MB 8MB 200 MHz Quad 6.4 GB/s 150W yes $1,391
Xeon MP 7120M 3GHz Tulsa 2x1MB 4MB 200 MHz Quad 6.4 GB/s 95W No $1,117
.
Xeon DP 5160 3GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 333 MHz Quad 21 GB/s 80W Yes $851
Xeon DP 5150 2.66GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 333 MHz Quad 21 GB/s 65W No $690
Xeon DP 5148 2.33GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 333 MHz Quad 21 GB/s 40W No $519
Xeon DP 5140 2.33GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 333 MHz Quad 21 GB/s 65W No $455
Xeon DP 5130 2GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 333 MHz Quad 21 GB/s 65W No $316
Xeon DP 5120 1.86GHz Woodcrest 4MB - 266 MHz Quad 17 GB/s 65W No $256
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Xeon DP 5080 3.73GHz Dempsey 2x2MB - 266 MHz Quad 8.5 GB/s 130W No $851
Xeon DP 5063 3.2GHz Dempsey 2x2MB - 266 MHz Quad 8.5 GB/s 95W No $369
Xeon DP 5060 3.2GHz Dempsey 2x2MB - 266 MHz Quad 8.5 GB/s 130W No $316

The Opteron CPU comes in two forms: one for DDR and one for DDR-2. The DDR-2 version uses 4 model numbers, the DDR version three.

AMD Opteron Overview
AMD CPU Clock Codename L2 L3 HT Mem bandwidth TDP In test? Price
Opteron 8220 SE 2.8GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 119W No $2,149
Opteron 8218 2.6GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $1,514
Opteron 8216 2.4GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $1,165
Opteron 8214 2.2GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $873
Opteron 8216 HE 2.4GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 68W No $1,340
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Opteron 885 2.6GHz Egypt 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W No $1,514
Opteron 880 2.4GHz Egypt 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W yes $1,165
Opteron 875 2.2GHz Egypt 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W No $873
Opteron 875 HE 2.2GHz Egypt 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 55W No $1,514
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Opteron 2220 SE 2.8GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $786
Opteron 2216 2.6GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $611
Opteron 2214 2.4GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $450
Opteron 2214 2.2GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 95W No $377
Opteron 2216HE 2.4GHz Santa Rosa 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 8.5 GB/s 68W No $531
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Opteron 285 2.6GHz Italy 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W No $611
Opteron 280 2.4GHz Italy 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W No $450
Opteron 275 2.2GHz Italy 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 95W No $377
Opteron 275 HE 2.2GHz Italy 2x1MB - 1000 MHz DDR 6.4 GB/s 55W yes $611

The Opteron's TDP numbers are the maximum power consumption numbers, while Intel's numbers are "thermal solution design targets". In practice, this means that you should subtract about 5% from AMD's TDP numbers to compare the two brands. AMD is not doing too well in the dual CPU arena: it needs about 30W more power per dual core CPU and CPU clock speed has hardly increased the past two years. Luckily for AMD, the power disadvantage is negated by the use of FB-DIMMs instead of DDR2 on the Intel platform.

Intel SR6850HW4 Server Thanks and Server Configurations
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  • JohanAnandtech - Saturday, November 11, 2006 - link

    Well, we did mentione it at our price comparison. From a performance point of view, the G2 is within 2% of the DL585 given a similar configuration.

    Getting a server in the lab is not like getting a videochip for review. The machines are much more expensive, and you need much more time to review them properly. So OEMs are less likely to send you the necessary hardware. For a videocard they send out a $500 item that can be reviewed in a few weeks, maybe even a few days. For Server like these, they have to send out a $20000 machine and be able to miss it for a month or two at the least.
  • Viditor - Saturday, November 11, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Well, we did mentione it at our price comparison. From a performance point of view, the G2 is within 2% of the DL585 given a similar configuration


    I can certainly understand and empathise with the situation...and I did enjoy the article, Johan!
    The reason I mentioned it is that line in your conclusion...
    quote:

    The HP DL585 also has a few shortcomings: it does not offer any PCIe expansion slots, the SCSI controller is an old SCSI 160 model, and there are no USB ports on the front of the machine

    I thought that (considering the circumstances) it was a bit unfair and misleading...
  • JohanAnandtech - Saturday, November 11, 2006 - link

    I just pointed out that it is a bit weird that a newer revision of the DL585 (it was thé HP Opteron machine just a few months ago) used SCSI 160. There is no reason at all why HP could not replace this: they revised the server anyway.

    I should mentioned that these results were solved in the G2, but still it is a missed chance... eventhough I reported it a bit too late :-)
  • photoguy99 - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    yes, bring it on!
  • finalfan - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    On page The Official SPEC Numbers, in second table SPEC FP 2000 Performance, the positions of (4/8) HP Opteron AM2 and (8/8) Hitachi Itanium 2 should be switched. No Itanium runs at 3.4G and no way a 4way 1.6G AM2 can sit in second place.
  • JohanAnandtech - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    Corrected. It is weird, the accurate numbers were in the orginal document. The generation of the table went wrong. I have double checked and now the FP numbers should all be accurate
  • JarredWalton - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    Probably my fault. I think when it got put into Excel that the various x/y numbers were converted to dates. I thought I fixed all of those, but probably missed one or two. Sorry.
  • icarus4586 - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    quote:

    There has been a relentless assault without any mercy on the Server CPU market...


    This report brought to you by the department of redundancy department.
  • bwmccann - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    When are you guys going to start benchmarking server CPUs using applications that are widely used in organizations on a daily basis?

    Most companies have a very high percentage of servers running Windows. With that I would love to see some test on SQL, Oracle, Exchange, and other core components of enterprises today.

    Also it would be nice to see a closer comparison of the servers. For example you tested a DL585. A DL580 (Intel Woodcrest) would have been better suited since some of the components would be the same.
  • JohanAnandtech - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link

    http://www.anandtech.com/IT/showdoc.aspx?i=2793">http://www.anandtech.com/IT/showdoc.aspx?i=2793

    Most of the time Jason does the Windows benchmarking, me and my team do the Linux benchmarking.

    Java, MySQL and SSL are also core components of many enterprise apps.


    We are working on Oracle and got access to a realworld Oracle database a few weeks ago (for the first time), but it takes time to really understand what your benchmark is telling you and how you must configure your db. And Oracle is ...very stubborn, even patching to a slightly higher version can lead to big trouble.

    The DL585 is a direct competitor (quad socket) in this space, more so than the DL580 (DUal Socket)



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