SCIENCE

By Chris O’Neal – Today, AMD introduced the Quad-Core AMD Opteron processor, previously code-named "Barcelona." Appro announced support for native Quad-Core AMD Opteron 2300 and 8300 Series processors in all of Appro’s systems including the HyperBlade cluster series and the XtremeServer and workstation series. Daniel Kim, CEO of Appro International, spoke with Supercomputing Online about the importance of the new Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors to his company’s customers. document.write(''); SC Online: How important are quad-core servers to your customers? How does quad-core improve the value proposition/performance of high-performance computing? Kim: Many customers in many industries will benefit from quad-core servers, in particular industries that are using applications that are memory intensive such as design automation, oil and gas, government labs, or manufacturing markets. Any compute-intensive multi-threaded applications will see an immediate benefit. Appro XtremeServers powered by AMD Opteron processors value proposition has been based on improved performance and memory availability for the traditional high-performance computing (HPC) and commercial applications while adding reliability and flexibility for our end-users with the best performance/value. The Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors improve our server’s value proposition by having a new cache structure to handle data even more efficiently and by reducing the latency of accessing main memory. In addition, the AMD Opteron processors with Direct Connect Architecture are better by design as this architecture drastically improves the memory and I/O latency for HPC customers that are using 64-bit applications and it makes 32-bit applications run faster as well. In the end, the importance of AMD Opteron Multi-core technology became vital for computational-intensive business productivity. SC Online: What impact do you expect to have on your business with the introduction of the new Appro’s servers and workstations based on Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors? Kim: Good impact. Customers are already requesting samples as of today. Appro is AMD’s Platinum Partner provider and we work together to provide customer-focused innovations that our High-Performance and Enterprise computing customers' require. Appro matches AMD’s roadmap for all server and workstation processor product introductions. We believe that the AMD Barcelona processor will be well received in the market place, but in order for us to remain competitive; we need to have higher speed CPUs available for Quad-Core to satisfy our true HPC customers. SC Online: What is your company’s game plan with the new Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors? Kim: Appro’s products have been tested with the new processors and are all set to launch as soon as the processors are available. Thanks to AMD’s common core strategy consistency across one-, two-, four-, and eight-socket systems minimizing the costs of transition and maximizing past investments. Customers are excited about this and already requesting seed units for testing purposes. SC Online: Are you familiar with some of the reported benefits of Barcelona such as native quad core, better power mgt. and performance per watt, floating point improvements, improved virtualization, improved cache memory, and easy upgradeability in same slot as existing dual-core Opteron? What stands out as the most important benefit to your customers? Kim: For our HPC customers, native quad-core and floating point improvements are the best benefits to maximize their compute-intensive technical applications needs. In addition, customers are happy to know that Enhanced AMD PowerNow technology works with the operating system to deliver performance-on-demand while reducing power consumption. SC Online: What would you advise customers to do now that Barcelona has been formally introduced? Kim: To have our customers test the systems with their applications to check performance and memory productivity gains. SC Online: Are there any new products that Appro is planning to introduce to take advantage of the Quad-Core AMD Opteron announcement? Kim: Yes, Appro will introduce a new 1U-1512H –entry level, one socket – XtremeServer based on dual or quad-core AMD Opteron Processors 2000 series. This new single socket server is unique in the market today providing an entry-level server solution that meets the demands of today’s small high performance computing users with the need for multi-core computing capabilities. Stay tuned for more information soon! SC Online wishes to thank Daniel Kim for his time and insight.