AMD vs Intel: Opteron “Istanbul”, better performance per watt

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) announced yesterday that they are to launch an updated Opteron server chip road map, in which they hope will help to lure customers from Intel. The new processor named Istanbul is much the same as Intel’s current Xeon processors, as it uses a 45-nanometer manufacturing process, but will offer better value for money and will be ready by 2010.

Information Week also tell us that AMD plan to launch eight- to 12-core 45-nm processors code-named Magny-Cours, in 2011 they also plan to launch 32-nm 12- to 16-core chips code-named Interlagos. Seems that AMD love its racetracks, maybe it has something to do with them being sponsors of the Ferrari Formula 1 team.

Both Magny-Cours and Interlagos are just the codename; the official name will be the Opteron 6000 series. These new AMD processors will run on a new platform, which has the codename Maranello, just, to point out; this is where the Ferrari F1 team is based.