AMD Launches New Line of Low-Power Processors

AMD-Kyoto-wafer

The wafer for the AMD "Kyoto" series processors, which make their debut today, offering improved power efficiency. (Image: AMD)

In the continuing trend towards featuring ultra-low power processors in new classes of servers designed to run Internet-scale workloads AMD announced the Opteron X-Series, a new family of low power server processors formerly known as "Kyoto." Optimized for scale-out server architectures, the new X1150 and X2150 processors feature four x86 CPU cores.

"The data center is at an inflection point and requires a high number of cores in a dense form factor with integrated graphics, massive amounts of DRAM and unprecedented power efficiency to keep up with the pace of innovation of Internet services," said Andrew Feldman, corporate vice president and general manager, Server Business Unit at AMD.  "AMD has a proud history of server innovation, and the AMD Opteron X-Series processors challenge the status quo by providing unmatched capabilities to drive the most energy-efficient servers in the industry."

At as little as 11 watts, AMD says the Opteron X2150 is the first server APU system-on-a-chip integrating CPU and GPU engines with a high-speed bus on a single die. This enables customers to take advantage of leading-edge AMD Radeon HD 8000 graphics technology for multimedia-oriented server workloads. The AMD Opteron X1150, which consumes as little as 9 watts, is a CPU-only version optimized for general scale-out workloads. The X-Series processors will be a good fit for initiatives like Project Moonshot, HP's low-power, many-core servers converged infrastructure.

"Fundamental changes in computing architectures are required to support space, power and cost demands organizations need to deliver compelling, new infrastructure economics," said Paul Santeler, vice president and general manager, Hyperscale Server business segment, HP. "The new x86 AMD Opteron X-Series processors integrated into future HP Moonshot servers will continue to push the boundaries of power efficiency for social, mobile, cloud and big data workloads."

Both X-Series processors have four "Jaguar" 64 bit x86 CPU cores, up to 32 gigabytes of DRAM and 2MB of L2 Cache. The X2150 also features 128 Radeon HD 8000 GPU cores.  Both Opteron X2150 APU and X1150 CPU are generally available now.