Intel will offer a performance boost for workstations and servers next week, with a pair of new Xeon chips.
The Santa Clara, Calif., chipmaker is expected to launch the new chips, running at clock speeds of 3GHz and 3.06GHz, on Monday.
Though they"ve yet to be officially unveiled, the new Xeon chips first appeared in workstations in early February.
Dell Computer and Hewlett-Packard, for example, have been selling 3.06GHz Xeon workstations since about Feb. 3. But a number of brand-name computer manufacturers are expected to announce on Monday plans to offer the chips in their server lines.
The Xeon line, which is similar to Intel"s Pentium 4 line, is designed for single- and dual-processor workstations--powerful desktop computers created for jobs such as the computer-aided design of automobiles. It"s also geared toward servers--heavy-duty computers used to conduct transactions or store files on computer networks. Collectively, these machines represent a fairly small, but often profitable, segment of the business PC market.