Opteron - Definition and Overview

The AMD Opteron is the first eighth-generation x86 processor (K8 core), and the first of AMD's AMD64 (x86-64) processors, released April 22, 2003. It is intended to compete in the server processor market, particularly in the same market segment as the Intel Xeon processor.

The Top500 Supercomputer Sites webpage currently ranks an Opteron-powered machine at the Dawning 4000A project in China as the tenth fastest supercomputer in the world.

List of AMD Opteron microprocessors

Technical description

The Opteron's main advantage is the ability to run both current 32-bit applications without speed penalties, and new 64-bit applications that can directly access more than 4 gigabytes of RAM. The processor includes an integrated DDR SDRAM memory controller, avoiding the need for a Northbridge and reducing the latency penalty for accessing the main RAM. Although the memory controller may be supplanted by an external chip as new memory technologies enter the market, one will then lose the benefits of an in-core controller (thus necessitating the release of new processors with updated memory controllers to match the speed of new memory technologies). Also, because each Opteron has its own memory controller and bank of memory, Opteron servers can scale better than Xeon servers as the number of CPUs increases. Whereas Xeons have to share a diminishing memory bandwidth as the number of processors increases, Opterons have no such drawback as memory bandwidth increases with each CPU added.

Multiple Opterons on the same motherboard communicate through one or more high-speed HyperTransport links, so that each one can access the main memory of another processor in a way transparent to the programmer. All Opterons use Socket 940.

See also

• List of AMD CPU slots and sockets
• AMD64
• Athlon 64

External links

Official info:

• AMD's website: http://www.amd.com

More info on the Web:

• NerdyPC (http://www.nerdypc.org) - AMD Opteron article (http://nerdypc.wikinerds.org/index.php/AMD_Opteron)