AMD 12-core "Magny-Cours" Opteron 6174 review
While this year is only just starting to see the emergence of six-core CPUs within the desktop processor market, the demands of the server CPU sector is of course even more demanding in terms of raw processing power. To fulfil this demand, AMD have recently launch a massive twelve-core Opteron part - Just how much performance can it offer?
AMD's offering today is very different. Magny-cours is the CPU version of the American muscle car. It's a brutally large 12-core CPU: two dies, each measuring 346mm2 connected by a massive 24 link Hyper Transport pipe. AMD's Magny-cours Opteron has almost two billion transistors and 19.6MB of cache on-die.
It's not all raw horsepower though. At 2.2GHz this 12-core monster is supposed to be content with only 80 precious watts, and 115W at most. HT assist also makes an appearance to keep CPU-CPU accesses to a necessary minimum, a problem that could get out of hand with 12 cores otherwise. AMD originally added HT assist with its first 6-core Opterons. So Magny-Cours is a like hybrid V12 Dodge Viper with traction control. Will this cocktail of raw core muscle and energy savings be enough to beat the competitor from Portland?
It's not all raw horsepower though. At 2.2GHz this 12-core monster is supposed to be content with only 80 precious watts, and 115W at most. HT assist also makes an appearance to keep CPU-CPU accesses to a necessary minimum, a problem that could get out of hand with 12 cores otherwise. AMD originally added HT assist with its first 6-core Opterons. So Magny-Cours is a like hybrid V12 Dodge Viper with traction control. Will this cocktail of raw core muscle and energy savings be enough to beat the competitor from Portland?
Anandtech has the full review.
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Interview with NVIDIA's Bryan Del Rizzo on the GeForce GTX 400 series
Now that NVIDIA's first GF100/Fermi-based consumer graphics boards have launched, what is the company's own take on the release of their first DirectX 11 products? Senior PR Manager of Consumer Products Bryan Del Rizzo shares his thoughts.
TechREACTION.net: Were the causes of these delays things that you anticipated internally given the immensity of the architecture?
So, yes and no. When you’re talking this complex a level of silicon, you never really know. You can design everything on paper first, and then you really have to wait for the silicon to come back. You have to test it, you have to make sure it validates and it’s working the way you think it is. If it’s not, you have to go back, you have to make some tweaks to the silicon, and that just takes time right? So I mean, it’s just a matter of doing business. You generally never go to production with the first rev of the silicon anyway, if you do, you are awfully lucky. It is what it is right? We’re not looking back, we’re looking forward.
So, yes and no. When you’re talking this complex a level of silicon, you never really know. You can design everything on paper first, and then you really have to wait for the silicon to come back. You have to test it, you have to make sure it validates and it’s working the way you think it is. If it’s not, you have to go back, you have to make some tweaks to the silicon, and that just takes time right? So I mean, it’s just a matter of doing business. You generally never go to production with the first rev of the silicon anyway, if you do, you are awfully lucky. It is what it is right? We’re not looking back, we’re looking forward.
Read the full interview from PAX East at Tech Reaction.
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