26
June
2006
|
06:25 AM
America/Los_Angeles

Intel says it will win back server market share from AMD


Intel (an SVW sponsor) got a good turn out from the media Monday morning when it presented a roadmap on how it would stay ahead of rival Advanced Micro Devices in low power consuming high-performance server chips.


The chips are strategic to Intel (INTC) keeping its dominance in server chips as data centers turn to computing systems that use less electric power--the single most limiting factor to expanding computing facilities. AMD's Opteron has managed to win support because it use less electric power and offers good performance.


Monday also marked the first day that Intel is shipping its first Opteron-killer product, the 5100 Series Xeon microprocessor.


Tom Kilroy, Intel vice president presented a broad message that Intel is going to maintain a power and performance lead over Opteron because it can make the chips smaller; it has fast buses and other system technologies such as virtualization; and it has long established relationships with thousands of vendors, developers, customers, etc.


There was lots of discussion about Intel's lead in 25 key benchmarks, lots of technical discussion about buses, memory controllers and shared caches etc. There were also a lot of questions on the subject of benchmarks, making apples to apples comparisons, etc.


One important point was that the socket for the new 5100 Xeon chips would remain the same through to the end of 2009. This means faster chips can be inserted without having to swap out all the other components or buy completely new systems.


The new Xeons use 40 per cent less power yet offer about a 3 times performance increase compared with one-year ago Xeons. But it is not just the microprocessor it is other system components and technologies that are also important in reducing power consumption. Intel said it is working with many other third-party companies to help reduce overall power consumption.


SVW Take: AMD will have trouble maintaining its share of the server markets simply because of Intel's massive manufacturing prowess which is a full generation and more, ahead of AMD. Intel can also leverage long established business relationships in enterprise vendor markets while AMD is still very new to this space. Intel also has a large ecosystem of software tools and support that it offers customers.


The subject of benchmarks and making a fair comparison against Opteron chips is a subject that many journalists have focused on lately. Nathan Brookwood, head analyst at Insight64 was advocating a type of cook-off between Intel and AMD with both optimizing their systems to their fullest degree.


Benchmarks however, are not the way data center managers typically make purchasing decisions. They usually run their own tests because of the different designs,implementations, and application loads that servers carry.


Greg Brandeau, VP at Pixar, the computer animation studio said he preferred plugging a system into the wall and using a commonly found wattage meter to measure electric power consumption. He said that Pixar uses Opteron systems and he would continue using them alongside the latest Xeon servers as an easy comparison. He praised Intel's software development tools which he said helped optimize Pixar's graphics software.


Enterprises are traditionally conservative and Intel offers a safe bet that it will be able to deliver on its multi-year roadmap and leverage its long standing industry relationships to continue to produce highly competitive server systems.


AMD is a newcomer to enterprise hardware markets and it will have to work hard to build the relationships and trust that it needs to do compete against Intel. AMD could try to cut prices to gain market share but it is a dangerous game to play against Intel, which can pump out more chips per wafer. And since chip manufacturing costs are constant, more chips per wafer means a lower manufacturing cost for Intel. Plus, AMD has to expand its chip manufacturing fabs, and move production from 90nm to 65nm - a tricky process but one that Intel has already achieved.


AMD will maintain a position in server markets because IT customers like choice and they know it will keep Intel on its toes. But the question becomes will AMD's slice of the server markets be large enough to pay for the design and manufacturing that goes with it.


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Intel's benchmark site: http://www.intelstartyourengines.com/


AMD Opteron site




From SVW:

Intel + HP 's data center push - saving power and saving labor


AMD Tech Day: Forecasts continued gains against Intel