Evaluating Energy Efficient Server Processors

I’ve been looking over the offerings from AMD and Intel for energy efficient server processors. Specifically I want the latest generation of Quad-core processors suited for a dual-processor system. AMD offers the Opteron 2346 HE and the 2347 HE. Intel offers the Xeon L5410 and L5420. I decided to compare the offerings on clock speed and pricing.

For AMD, who have a more efficient server platform at this time, the price different between the 2346 HE and 2347 HE is more than 50%. For that 50% extra you only get 100MHz or about 5.3% more performance. In my opinion this makes the 2347 HE far too expensive for what it delivers.

On the Intel front, the L5420 is only 18% more expensive than the L5410. This buys an speed increase of about 7.5%. That may be an option for those wanting to maximize performance and remain as efficient as possible in their server builds.

This also creates a price structure for those constrained by money:

• AMD Opteron 2346 HE - $259
• Intel Xeon L5410 - $390
• Intel Xeon L5420 - $459

If you were to consider the AMD and Intel chips as being generally equivalent clock-for-clock as some reviews have stated then the jump from the AMD to Intel chips costs 50% more for about 30% more performance. That seems to leave AMD the winner in terms of bang for the buck, assuming one’s server needs could be met with a processor running at 1.8GHz.