We now know almost everything about AMD’s first processors for enterprise market, the Opteron. One thing we miss the most if the actual performance of this x86-64 processor in real applications, but unfortunately no official from AMD is going to share it with us until the processors are available. Well, in this case let us be happy with what we have here and now. AMDboard web-site published some details concerning launch schedule of the AMD Opteron processors. The information is unofficial, but you should not get upset – even officials roadmaps are subject to change without notice.

They say that Opteron processors with 141, 142, 241, 242, 841 and 842 model numbers will be unveiled in April, while in May AMD will launch its Opteron 143, 243 and 843 CPUs, followed by Opteron 144, 244 and 844 chips in June.

Confused with AMD’s new model numbers for Opteron processors? I am not surprised. The first digit in the model number tells us how many processors are supported by the platform the particular chip is intended for. The second and third digits communicate relative performance within each product line. For example, 444 is slower than 446, but you should not compare it to 248, as it is another platform. AMD states that the second two digits are not directly related to processor’s core frequency. I wonder how AMD will measure the performance of its new babes. Again using “approved set of benchmarks” to test the speed or what?

According to the plans unveiled in late 2002, AMD intended to launch 1.40GHz and 1.60GHz Opteron processors in the first quarter, to unveil 1.80GHz and 2.0GHz in the second quarter, to present 2.20GHz Opteron chip in the Q3, while 2.40GHz and 2.60GHz x86-64 CPUs for servers were scheduled to come (see this news-story) during the last quarter this year. Although AMD’s roadmap was adjusted several times after its December edition, I believe that you can figure out possible core-clocks range for the forthcoming processors considering these changes.