Qualcomm says it has started shipping samples of the Centriq 2400, built on the 10nm FinFET process that has as many as 48 custom ARMv8-compliant cores. The recent Qualcomm 10nm distribution of engineering samples marks the world's first, which means it is a significant milestone for Qualcomm, and for the server processor business in general.
Qualcomm 10nm: Something To Intimidate Intel
Qualcomm's 10nm server chip is a clear shot across Intel's bow, given Intel is still hard at work with their 14nm process, reports Tom's Hardware. Qualcomm believes that by going straight to 10nm, it will motor ahead of Intel, which is as of the moment shipping 14nm CPUs.
In Intel's fortress, processors are manufactured using a certain process node first for laptops and desktops, followed by its server CPU family about a year later. For instance, Intel's own 10nm, dubbed Cannonlake, should arrive in the second half of 2017, and 10nm Xeon server parts catch up approximately 12 months later in 2018. Qualcomm 10nm on the other hand is on target to ship in volume in H2 2017, which is a year ahead of Intel.
Intel's CPUs make up 99 percent of the world's datacenter compute processors. Intel might be PC-led, but Qualcomm says it is mobile-led. In fact, its 10nm FinFET Snapdragon 835 SoC for smartphones will be engineered by Samsung and will be shipped before next summer, reports The Registrar.
Qualcomm 10nm: Reshape The Future of Datacenter Computing
Qualcomm's 10nm processors are targeted towards cloud giants and white-box server makers. Right now, reports say that the top cloud companies, such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Tencent and Baidu, are test-driving Centriq.
The Qualcomm 10nm commercial release is a bit off on the horizon, but it should be enough to intimidate Intel. Details of Qualcomm's new chips are limited for now, such as cache alignments or memory controllers, but concrete details are expected before its official launch.
