Sun on Tuesday launched an updated line of Sun Fire x64 servers and Sun Blade systems using AMD's latest Opteron processor, formerly code-named "Shanghai".
Sun claims the new servers offer up to 35 percent better performance over the previous generation of systems, while also improving energy efficiency.
AMD launched Shanghai, its first 45-nanometer server processor, in November, and it is hoping it will help re-establish the company's competitiveness, following problems and delays with the previous-generation, 65nm Barcelona chip.
In a marked change from its previous processor launches, AMD chose to put more emphasis on improved power consumption than on faster performance. However, raw performance is improved through 6MB of L3 cache, up from 2MB on its 65nm predecessor, and a clock range from 2.3GHz to 2.7GHz, up from 2.0GHz to 2.54GHz, while the chip's power envelope stays the same as Barcelona, at under 100W.
At the time of the launch, large server makers including Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Fujitsu, Sun and Cray offered their support for Shanghai, with Dell, IBM and Microway introducing Shanghai-based products timed to coincide with the launch.
Sun's new systems include two Sun Blade blade servers: the Sun Blade X6440, a four-socket blade server supporting up to 32 Dimm memory slots, with pricing starting at US$14,105; and the Sun Blade X6240, a two-socket system supporting up to 16 Dimm slots, with pricing starting at US$3,850.
Sun also introduced five new Sun Fire servers. The Sun Fire X4440 is a four-socket server supporting up to 256GB of main memory, with pricing starting at US$15,745. The Sun Fire X6400 M2 is a server scaling from two to eight sockets and supporting up to 256GB of main system memory, with pricing starting at $12,595.
The Sun Fire X4240 is a two-socket system supporting 16 Dimm slots and 128GB of main memory, with pricing starting at US$7,245. The Sun Fire X4140 can scale from one to two sockets and comes with 16 Dimm slots and 128GB of main system memory, with pricing starting at US$3,545. The Sun Fire X2200 M2 is a two-socket system with eight Dimm slots and up to 64GB of main system memory, with pricing starting at US$1,895.
Sun's new servers offer a choice of Solaris 10, Linux, Windows and VMware software. The company said the servers can run up to 100 virtual servers on a single hardware system using Sun virtualization technology such as Solaris Containers.
The company is next scheduled to update its AMD-based server line in January.
ZDNet UK's Colin Barker contributed to this report.
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