Intel's high-end server platform "Brickland" would make its debut this year with the arrival of 22nm Ivy Bridge-EX processors. The Brickland platform would span over three generations of CPUs including Ivy Bridge-EX, Haswell EX and Broadwell-EX.

Ivy Bridge-EX - First Intel CPU To Enable 15 Cores

The Ivy Bridge-EX would be the high-end server offering by Intel based on its 22nm Ivy Bridge architecture using the highlyefficientTri-gate transistors technology. Ofcourse, beingefficientisn't the primary role of these CPUs, they also have to be marginally faster than older generations and to achieve this goal, the Ivy Bridge-EX would sport upto 15 cores and 30 MB of L3 cache. The top end Westmere-EXparts were only limited to 10 Cores on the flagship part but with Ivy Bridge-EX, server and workstation users would get the power of 15 high performing cores at their end.

The lineup would be split into Ivy Bridge-EX "Xeon E7" and Ivy Bridge-EP "Xeon E5" lineups. With Ivy Bridge-EX 10 to 15 cores on the top E7-8800 v2, E7-4800 v2, E7-2800 v2 parts and Ivy Bridge-EP starting from 6 to 10 cores on the Xeon E5-4600 v2 processor family. Computerbase reveals that a further 12 core Ivy Bridge-EX model could show up within the lineup. Both Ivy Bridge-EX and Ivy Bridge-EP would remain compatible with the C600 chipset.The new EXProcessorswould also be able to supportECC DDR3-1600 andDDR4-2133/2400/3200 configurations along with a new version of Quick Path Interface upgraded to v1.1 for v1.0.

In addition to the server lineup, we have a few updates that the Ivy Bridge-E HEDT (High-End Desktop) lineup by Intel would also benefit from a larger core count this round with the most entry level CPUs featuring 6 cores and top end models with 8-10 cores. It is alsobelievedas per some leaks during the last few months that an 8-Core E Sandy Bridge "Core i7 3980X" may be headed for the current lineup. Little is known but if it arrives earlier than Ivy Bridge-E lineup than it would be the first native 8 Core offering by Intel.