Supermicro Computer has unveiled a series of mainboards and servers based on Intel’s dual-core chip-based platform. The company said the new products were ready to ship immediately and that they grant new levels of performance for entry-level servers.

“Designed to deliver unprecedented performance and stability, these dual-core solutions provide our partners with the best feature sets available,” said Charles Liang, president and CEO of Supermicro.

Systems based on Intel’s Pentium D and Pentium Extreme Edition processors with two processing engines provide performance close to that of 2-way Intel Xeon machines, but cost less and require less energy, it was revealed earlier this year.

Supermicro’s new product lineup that supports dual-core Intel Pentium D and Intel Pentium Edition chip currently consists of two base models: SuperServer 5015P-8R and SuperServer 5025M-4R, both are based on Intel 7230 chipset, are compatible with LGA775 central processing units with up to 1066MHz processor system bus, can install up to 8GB DDR2 memory at 667MHz, are equipped with 400W power supply units, come with dual-channel Ultra320 SCSI controllers and provide other appropriate server functionality. The former comes in 1U form-factor and sports 1 full-length universal PCI-X 133MHz or PCI Express x4 slot as well as a low-profile PCI-X 100MHz connector. The server may be equipped with up to 4 hot-swap hard disk drives. The latter machine offers to install up to 4 PCI-X 100MHz/133MHz devices in addition to a PCI Express x4 and a PCI Express x1 card. Up to 6 hot-swap HDDs may be put inside.

Besides other features, Supermicro’s new servers are cooled by counter-rotating fans with fan speed control. Fan speed can be defined by the user and provides efficient cooling while reducing noise to meet specific application requirements.

“Our new E7230 chipset-based products integrate the latest dual-core 64-bit server technologies into a single-processor platform that optimizes the price-to-performance ratio for small business or departmental office applications,” Mr. Liang said.

The servers are available for orders right now. Exact pricing and its comparison to dual-processor Intel Xeon setups is unknown.