HP announces energy-efficient server with new Centerton-Atoms

HP has introduced a new server platform based on Intel’s upcoming Atom socs codenamed Centerton. With the Gemini servers, the manufacturer focuses on economy and less on applications where a lot of computing power is important.

Gemini will use cartridges with the processors on them. Users can add or remove modules as more computing power is needed. HP will initially provide the cartridges with Intel’s Atom socs, but the platform will also support ARM chips at a later stage. The Atoms are chips from the new Centerton generation, which should become available in the second half of this year.

Centerton is Intel’s chip for small and economical servers. It is a dual core with HyperThreading support and a maximum clock speed of 1.6GHz. The NM10 platform controller hub is integrated on the chip and there is no display controller, for example. Partly because of this, the tdp is relatively low at 6W. In addition, support is available for 64bit, hardware virtualization and error correcting code memory

According to HP will make the Gemini servers with the chips suitable for web servers, offline analytics and hosting, among other things. The manufacturer expects to be able to deliver the first systems before the end of the year, but prices are not yet known. HP includes Gemini under its Moonshot initiative for energy-efficient servers. The first result of that initiative was the Redstone, which uses Calxeda’s ARM socs. However, those servers were only released to a select group of companies for testing purposes.