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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Qualcomm Launches 48-core Centriq for $1995: Arm Servers for Cloud Native Applications [anandtech.com]

Following on from the SoC disclosure at Hot Chips, Qualcomm has this week announced the formal launch of its new Centriq 2400 family of Arm-based SoCs for cloud applications. The top processor is a 48-core, Arm v8-compliant design made using Samsung's 10LPE FinFET process, with 18 billion transistors in a 398mm² design. The cores are 64-bit only, and are grouped into duplexes – pairs of cores with a shared 512KB of L2 cache, and the top end design will also have 60 MB of L3 cache. The full design has 6 channels of DDR4 (Supporting up to 768 GB) with 32 PCIe Gen 3.0 lanes, support for Arm Trustzone, and all within a TDP of 120W and for $1995.

We covered the design of Centriq extensively in our Hot Chips overview, including the microarchitecture, security and new power features. What we didn't know were the exact configurations, L3 cache sizes, and a few other minor details. One key metric that semiconductor professionals are interested in is the confirmation of using Samsung's 10LPE process, which Qualcomm states gave them 18 billion transistors in a 398mm² die (45.2MTr/mm²). This was compared to Intel's Skylake XCC chip on 14nm (37.5MTr/mm², from an Intel talk), but we should also add in Huawei's Kirin 970 on TSMC 10nm (55MTr/mm²).

Previously: Qualcomm's Centriq 2400 Demoed: A 48-Core ARM SoC for Servers [soylentnews.org]

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