Intel launches sixth-generation Xeon processor line

“Let’s say you take approximately 200 racks, which would be a typical mid-sized data center deployment, looking at about 15 kilowatt racks and 22U servers …  You look at the advancements that we’re delivering an Intel Xeon 6 with the perf per watt and overall perf performance improvement, and you get that three to one rack consolidation down to 66 racks. Huge, amazing savings,” said Langman.

He went on to predict and energy usage savings of upwards of 84,000-megawatt hours over a period of four years.

Gaudi pricing disclosed

In addition to the Xeon 6 news, Intel announced pricing for two of its latest Gaudi AI accelerators, which are designed to compete against Nvidia’s H100 and AMD’s Instinct MI300X in processing large language models.

Intel announced the pricing in terms of a cluster of eight accelerators, which AMD and Nvidia also do. Customers using a standard AI kit with eight Intel Gaudi 2 accelerators with a universal baseboard will pay $65,000, while a kit with eight Intel Gaudi 3 accelerators will be $125,000.

Gaudi is on track to ship in Q3 2024. Intel has numerous OEM partners lined up, including Dell, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, Lenovo, Supermicro and new partners Asus, Foxconn, Gigabyte, Inventec, Quanta and Wistron.