Hewlett-Packard has become the first major vendor to offer a four-processor server based on Advanced Micro Devices" 64-bit Opteron chip.
On Monday, the company will announce the ProLiant DL585, a 4U Opteron-powered sister product to its Xeon-based DL580.
The new server will have two more PCI-X (Peripheral Component Interconnect Extended) slots than the 580, and will support up to 64GB of memory--32GB more than the DL580, according to HP Group Manager for ProLiant Systems Steve Cumings.
Opteron systems accounted for only about 800 of the 228,000 four-way x86 servers that shipped in 2003, Melenovsky says. And while IDC has not estimated how many four-way Opteron systems will ship in the year ahead, it expects the total x86 four-way market to grow to 245,000 units in 2004, fuelled in part by the new HP system, as well as a planned four-way Opteron server from Sun, which is expected by the end of June.