Intel hopes new microchips can win market

Intel today released its latest server microchips as it seeks to maintain its dominance over rival Advanced Micro Devices.

The microprocessors, designed to power servers and desktop PCs, are the first of Intel's server chips featuring smaller transistors that bring stronger performance while improving energy efficiency.

Intel has also built security features into the chips it says can encode and decipher files much faster, effectively removing the poor computer performance caused by protecting files.

The chips will be released under the Xeon brand for servers and Core i7 for desktop computers, which Intel hopes will be popular with the entertainment and video game markets.

Intel's general manager of server marketing, Boyd Davis, said the biggest opportunity was with servers, where an estimated one third of the market is running on chips made more than four years ago.

Patrick Patla, general manager of AMD's server division, set up a challenge to Intel by saying his company's newest chips, which are due out in the next few weeks, would also offer increases in speed.

"There will be no single bigger performance jump in the history of Opteron [the server chips] than the jump we are going to take from 2009 to 2010," he said.