Intel microserver leaves door open for ARM

Rick Merritt, EETimes
2/7/2013 3:01 AM EST

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--Intel’s first microserver processor is less power efficient than its existing Xeon chips, leaving a significant opportunity for alternative SoCs, according to Linley Gwennap, principal of the Linley Group.

Intel released last year the Atom S1000, also known as Centerton, a dual core chip meant to fend off mainly ARM-based server SoCs from a growing group of vendors. While it reduced power consumption to 6.3W, it does not support Ethernet, Serial ATA or USB controllers or multithreading.

“According to data Intel provided, this chip is less power efficient than its Xeon, so it seems like we are going in the wrong direction,” Gwennap said. “It’s not really a system on a chip yet, it has significantly lower performance and only uses 32-nm process technology,” he said at the Linley Data Center Conference here.

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