Press Releases

Latest AMD Opteron Processors with the Next Generation “Piledriver” Core Offer Record-breaking Java Performance

Madrid — Nov. 5, 2012 — AMD (NYSE: AMD) today unveiled its new AMD Opteron™ 6300 Series server processors based on its next-generation “Piledriver” core architecture. The new AMD Opteron processors deliver superior performance and scalability for virtualized server platforms that are central to private and public cloud deployments, big data systems and high-performance computing (HPC) clusters. The AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors strike the ultimate balance between performance, scalability and cost effectiveness to help IT organizations lower total cost of ownership (TCO).

The AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors offer industry-leading performance in SPECjbb2005, a server benchmark used to evaluate Java performance, with up to 24 percent higher performance versus the prior generation AMD Opteron 6200 Series processors[1]. Java is a critical element of the software ecosystem for next-generation data centers. Performance per watt is up to 40 percent higher than the prior generation solutions[2], which means businesses running robust large-scale software systems will be able to enjoy high performance as well as low TCO.

AMD continues to drive HPC performance with the AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors by leveraging optimizations in compilers and libraries, and combining it with the next-generation core architecture. AMD has delivered impressive results in key HPC applications such as the molecular dynamics workloads LAMMPs and NAMD[3].

“Across global IT organizations, cost-effective, scalable performance is a core requirement to support cloud computing, server consolidation and highly-threaded workloads common in HPC, big data and other areas,” said Suresh Gopalakrishnan, general manager, Server Business Unit, AMD. “The key to a winning solution for customers is working with OEMs and other solution providers to minimize TCO with acombination of cost effectiveness and superior performance per watt. AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors are uniquely positioned to be the difference-maker customers are seeking.”

Customer and Partner Traction
Servers from Dell and HP based on the AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors are expected to be available before the end of the year. Systems and platforms are available today from Cray, SGI, and Supermicro as well as AMAX, Appro, ASUS, ClusterVision, Colfax International, MEGWARE Computer, Microway, Penguin Computing, Silicon Mechanics and ZT Systems. AMD’s own “Roadrunner” platform, developed for the Open Compute Project, will be available in the first quarter of 2013. Moreover, AMD has already seen early traction with the AMD Opteron 6300 Series processor leveraged in a supercomputing deployment at Indiana University.

“Cloud computing, data warehouse systems and HPC clusters are at the top of many CIOs agendas, but many struggle to find the right balance of performance and scalability with price,” said Brian Payne, executive director of Platform Marketing, Dell. “Our PowerEdge and PowerEdge C server platforms are scalable and designed to integrate the latest technologies from AMD. The new AMD Opteron 6300 Series provides Dell customers with additional performance gains, lower cost of ownership and improved power efficiency, all of which are hugely beneficial for cloud computing, big data and other high-growth data center applications.”

“Greater performance levels, increased agility and innovations that deliver business value and productivity are fundamental requirements for our clients’ success,” said Jim Ganthier, vice president, Marketing and Operations, HP. “The new AMD Opteron 6300 Series processors in HP’s industry-leading ProLiant server portfolio meet those requirements, supporting demanding workloads that ensure enterprise productivity with lower lifecycle costs.”

Key Facts, Performance and Technical Detail
· Frequency: Up to 3.5 GHz base frequency and up to 3.8 GHz using AMD Turbo CORE technology for increased performance when applications demand it;

· Up to 16 cores per socket for scaling in thread-intensive environments;

· AMD-P power management features maximize performance-per-watt across workloads while giving IT managers more control over their data center power profiles;

· AMD Virtualization™ (AMD-V™) technology for near-native performance in virtualized environments and lowest cost per virtual machine (VM);

· Up to four memory channels with up to 1866 MHz memory;

· The only x86 processor to support ultralow voltage 1.25v memory;

· Supports up to 12 DIMMs per CPU for up to 384GB memory per processor;

· Up to four x16 HyperTransport™ technology (HT3) links at up to 6.4GT/s per link.

Full performance details can be found at www.amd.com/opteronperformance; current pricing is available at http://www.amd.com/us/products/pricing/Pages/server-opteron.aspx. AMD will be formally launching its Piledriver-based AMD Opteron™ 4300 and 3300 Series processors (code-named “Seoul” and “Delhi”) in December. Details on those systems will be made available at that time.

[1] SVR-168 -Comparison based on highest 2P SPECjbb2005 benchmark data as of Oct. 16, 2012. 1493967 bops (16 JVMs and 93373 bops/JVM) using 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6380 in Supermicro 1022G-URF server, 128GB (16 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008 Enterprise x64 Edition R2. 1199838 bops (16 JVMs and 74990 bops/JVM) using 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6278 in HP ProLiant BL465c Gen8 server, 128GB (16 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008 Enterprise x64 Edition R2. SPEC and SPECjbb are registered trademarks of the Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation. See www.spec.org.

[2] SVR-305 – Comparison based on 2P SPECpower_ssj2008 data as of Oct. 16, 2012: 77.9W at Active Idle, 308W and 1,636,298 ssj_ops at 100 percent of target load, and 4,040 overall ssj_ops/watt using 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6380 in Supermicro 1022G-NTF server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, Supermicro PWS-563-1H20 power supply, 240GB SATA disk drive, Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008 R2 x64 Enterprise Edition. 82.6W at Active Idle, 320W and 1,233,423 ssj_ops at 100 percent of target load, and 2,892 overall ssj_ops/watt using 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6278 in Supermicro 1022G-NTF server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, Supermicro PWS-563-1H20 power supply, 240GB SATA disk drive, Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008 R2 x64 Enterprise Edition. SPEC and SPECjbb are registered trademarks of the Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation. See www.spec.org.

[3] . LAMMPS: 304 rating with 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6380 in Supermicro H8DGT server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, SuSE Linux® Enterprise Server 11 SP2 64-bit, GCC 4.7.0 Compiler, OMPI 1.5.3

Compiler Flags: -O3 -freciprocal-math -march=bdver1 -mavx -mfma4. 301 rating with 2 x Intel Xeon processors Model E5-2690 in Supermicro X9DRT-HIBFF server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, SuSE Linux® Enterprise Server 11 SP2 64-bit, Intel Professional Compiler v12.1.3, OMPI 1.6.0+knem 0.9.8, Hyper-Threading disabled, Turbo Boost Technology enabled. Compiler Flags: -O3 -fno-alias -ip -unroll0 -no-prec-div. NAMD: 2268 rating with 2 x AMD Opteron™ processors Model 6380 in Supermicro H8DGT server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, SuSE Linux® Enterprise Server 11 SP2 64-bit, GCC 4.7.0 Compiler, OMPI 1.6.0+Knem 0.9.8. Compiler Flags: -O3 -m64 -march=bdver1 -mfa4 –mavx. 2193 rating with 2 x Intel Xeon processors Model E5-2690 in Supermicro X9DRT-HIBFF server, 64GB (8 x 8GB DDR3-1600) memory, SuSE Linux® Enterprise Server 11 SP2 64-bit, Intel Professional Compiler v12.1.3, OMPI 1.5.5+Knem 0.98, Hyper-Threading disabled, Turbo Boost Technology enabled.