Quad-Core Upgradeability of Second-Generation

UPCOMING QUAD-CORE AMD OPTERON™ PROCESSORS:
REVOLUTIONARY PERFORMANCE WITH AN EVOLUTIONARY DESIGN
Extraordinary performance and efficiency in a consistent thermal envelope, thanks to a native core design like no other.

AMD introduced the first multi-core technology for x86-based servers and workstations with the Dual-Core AMD Opteron™ processor launch in April 2005. Second-Generation AMD Opteron processors add DDR2 memory and AMD Virtualization™ to further enhance AMD’s industry leading virtualization capabilities. Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors, planned for 2007, represent the next milestone in our multi-core roadmap.

While the quad-core launch is still months away, platforms that will support quad-core processing are available today. Second-Generation AMD Opteron processors with DDR2 are designed to offer seamless upgradeability to Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors. This seamless transition to quad-core computing will maintain the existing thermal infrastructure, helping leverage existing investments, and providing improvements in application performance and system performance-per-watt.

The upgrade path built into Second-Generation AMD Opteron processors is enabled by AMD64 technology with Direct Connect Architecture. We designed the AMD64 computing platform from the ground up to be optimized for multiple cores. At the heart of AMD64 is our innovative Direct Connect Architecture, which helps eliminate the bottlenecks inherent in traditional front-side bus architecture by directly connecting the processors, the memory controller, and the I/O to the central processing unit (CPU).