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AMD Barcelona Launch Coverage
Test System and Specifications:Our test system was kindly organized and based around an Asus motherboard. It is worth noting that currently Asus is the only manufacturer to offer a motherboard engineered specifically for the Barcelona. This should give them quite an advantage over all other providers which we estimate to still be months away from delivery of a motherboard with the capabilities of the Asus motherboard. Our PSSC model number A2400 test system was configured as follows: Asus KFSN4-DRE/SAS We tested the system under the following OS's:
Opteron X3XX Series Processor Specifications:
Opteron X3XX Series Processor Frequency by Model Number:
As you can see the cost of the new X3XX series processo is much much less than the Xeon's and for this reason alone allows for a great amount of processing power to be purchased for many organizations. The comparable E5320 quad core running at 1.8g Ghz currently has a street price of approximately $300 and will not have anywhere near the performance of the 2347 priced only $16 more. A single bios upgrade and many organizations are X3XX ready. If we compare the Xeon E5345 currently at $475 against the 2347 at $316 we see the price gap grow to $159 per processor. On the high end for 8-way systems the 8350 at $1019 is a full $350 cheaper than its Intel Xeon 7140M Processor at $1369. The Asus KFSN4-DRE/SAS:As mentioned earlier Asus is the first and currently only motherboard manufacturer to offer a motherboard specifically built and optimized for the Barcelona. The KFSN4-DRE/SAS impliments a number of unique features such as:
The motherboard layout diagram of the KFSN4-DRE/SAS:
Click on the Thumbnail for a larger Image. Asus makes a number of other "fine tuning" changes to their motherboards that other manufacturers may overlook. For example we found that Asus painstakingly engineers the bus lines on their boards so that all lines from a single point to another point are the same length, thus assuring that all signals arrive at the same time. What you see visually are pathways that appear snake-like to account for other pathways being shorter or longer. This kind of engineering looks like the following picture:
Click on the Thumbnail for a larger Image. Our test system was assembled, tested, and sent to us by PSSC Labs, a company specializing in super computers, workstations, and large storage solutions. A configuration page for the model A2400 1U server from PSSC is available here if you would like to see the combinations and prices for such a system with either Intel or AMD, they additionally have the X3XX series CPU's available right now. A big thanks goes out to them for helping arrange this review on short notice. The system arrived packed perfectly, fully operational, and flawlessly put together. AIC provided the 1U server chassis, RMC-1L-2 which is an excellent chassis taking only 1U of space and providing a lot of computing power inside. The chassis keps our components cool during all tests and was eay to work with.
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