AMD announced that the AMD Opteron processor will power the 4P Sun Fire V40z server as well as the 1P Sun Java workstation W1100z and 2P Sun Java workstation W2100z, the latest in a family of AMD Opteron processor-based products from Sun Microsystems. The first offering from the AMD and Sun alliance, the Sun Fire V20z, began shipping last April and is one of the top-performing two-way x86 servers available today. Designed for high-performance enterprise computing environments, the Sun Fire V40z server is immediately available from Sun and is already being established as an industry-leading x86 four-way server based on recent industry benchmarks such as SPECweb99_SSL. Additionally, the new W1100z and W2100z workstations are the first AMD Opteron processor-based workstations from Sun and are designed to maximize end user productivity. "The flexibility of the AMD Opteron processor with Direct Connect Architecture uniquely addresses the costs and complexity of bringing four-way x86 solutions to market," said John Fowler, executive vice president, Network Systems Group at Sun. "By eliminating the bottleneck of a front-side bus and improving overall system performance, the combination of Sun's Solaris x86 platform and the AMD Opteron processor now gives enterprises a comprehensive x86 server and workstation solution that cannot be matched by other solutions on the market." "AMD is on a mission to obsolete 32-bit-only servers, taking a leadership role in transitioning the industry to pervasive 64-bit computing. The AMD Opteron processor is changing the economics of the four-way server market and is the only 4P processor available today that can offer simultaneous 32- and 64-bit x86-based computing," said Marty Seyer, corporate vice president and general manager of the AMD Microprocessor Business Unit. "Sun and AMD are helping ensure four-way solutions are no longer cost-prohibitive for IT managers, while the new AMD Opteron processor-based workstations from Sun will deliver new levels of performance for end users across a broad range of industry segments." The Sun Fire V40z server is suited to a wide variety of industries including financial services, scientific research, bioscience, oil exploration, electronic design, automobile and aerospace design, government, education and service providers. Target applications include mail and messaging, database, business intelligence/data warehousing, enterprise resource planning, simulation, high-performance technical computing, oil and gas, electronic design automation, mechanical computer-aided engineering, bioscience, file and print, Web services, applications servers and directory services. Many leading enterprise-application benchmarks recognize the AMD Opteron processor as the highest-performing x86 processor available today. The new AMD Opteron processor-based servers and workstations from Sun can run on the Solaris Operating System (OS), Linux or Windows Operating Systems with full Windows Hardware Qualification List (WHQL) certification. The W1000z and W2100z workstations are offered with Sun's Java Desktop System, which features a wide selection of productivity tools.