Intel’s “Era for Tera” project delivered this week the first programmable chip that integrates 80 cores and was able to pass the 1 teraflop mark. It took only a little more than 10 years for a processor the size of a finger nail to reach the performance of the supercomputer that passed the same mark in 1996, a supercomputer which integrated 10 000 processors and consumed about 500 kW back then.

Furthermore the new Intel chip managed to reach this record using just 65 watts, less than many current processors found in todays desktop computers and more than 7500 times less energy than 10 years ago. Although Intel has no plans of releasing this processor on the market, we will certainly see this technology applied in the next generation processors that are currently in development in their laboratories.

Filed under Hardware