back to article Intel hands first Optane DIMM to Google, where it'll collect dust until a supporting CPU arrives

Intel has ceremonially "shipped" its first Optane DIMM to Google, despite no Xeon CPU support. Navin Shenoy, exec veep and GM of Intel's Data Center Group, theatrically presented the kit, fresh off the production line, to Google platforms veep Bart Sano at Chipzilla's Santa Clara CA headquarters during its Data-Centric …

  1. big_D Silver badge

    My guess is, if they have given Google a DIMM, they have also given them a test rig to try it on, just that stuff is "boring" and not worthy of the press event for Optane.

    If Intel can test them, they have kit somewhere that can use the DIMM therefore they can probably give GOOG one to play with as well.

    1. Roj Blake Silver badge

      Yep, I'd be shocked if Google didn't already have a few Cascade Lake servers in its labs.

  2. eswan

    "...features AI-focused Deep Learning Boost (DLBOOST) tech intended to provide an 11x AI performance boost over Xeon Skylake."

    Is that the replacement for NetBurst Technology?

  3. bldrco

    The CPUs surely exist...

    General availability just means when you can get them. Obviously Intel makes parts available to strategic partners ahead of that.

  4. FrankAlphaXII

    Its a PR exercise, big freaking deal. They probably have something that can support it anyway, but even if they don't its just so Intel has something to show off to distract people away from their 10nm issue that the other fabricators seem to have solved but for some reason Intel still can't handle and won't be shipping til 2020 at the earliest. AMD has a real opportunity here for x86, as do the ARM licensees for their architecture

    IMHO, its because Intel threw their weight into technologies that are either a dead-end like Silicon Photonics or niche tech like XPoint while Samsung, TSMC, and GlobalFoundries didn't waste their time with that.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Maybe this is where AMD could step in and fill the gap. If they could it would be a real slap in the face for Intel.

  6. Herring`

    Purley Microarchitecture?

    This suggests a horribly congested one-way system to me. Where are they getting the names from?

    1. Hawkeye Pierce

      Re: Purley Microarchitecture?

      Reminds me of the story that back in the early days, IBM used to name their internal and highly-secretive projects by picking the name of a road around their research establishments. Cue journalists also selecting road names at random and asking some IBMer "How''s project XYZ" going, to much consternation about how said journalist knew about that project!

  7. Uncle Ron

    1) When it happens, and is fully supported, Storage Class Memory will be a Big Deal. (Relatively huge, nonvolatile, fast memory with a direct, fast pipe to the CPU--no SATA interrupt bottleneck bus.) 2) Pricing, as well as performance, will have to be somewhere between Main Memory DIMM and SSD/Flash Memory. 3) "Full Support" means both the Processor and the OS need to be aware, and to be fully realized, the application stack needs to exploit. This will not happen in the next two years, but over time, it will offer 10x to 100x or even more, performance boost. To me, Storage Class Memory architecture (HW, OS, and Application) is the next revolution in computing. So far, IMHO, Optane is an evolution, and nothing more than a nonvolatile DIMM. Huh?

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