Intel announced the release of two new processors from the Xeon product line, the X5365 and the L5335, almost a month before the AMD Barcelona processors are due to hit the market. The new Xeon processors are based on the quad core architecture and they are designed for use inside servers.

According to the news site PCW, the new server processors will prove that Intel takes the battle for performance and energy efficiency very seriously. The high end X5265 Xeon comes with a standard clock frequency of 3.0GHz, which is a heavy blow for AMD since it will only have a 2.0GHz reaching Barcelona processor to compete with. And that almost a month from now. On the power efficiency side, the X5265 is the first Xeon in its class that fits into the 120W power envelope, but still a lot over the maximum 95W of the slower speed Barcelona. Over the last few weeks, AMD changed its position when it comes to promote Barcelona and switched the light from performance to power efficiency, another critical component when it comes to server farms and data centers.

A cost and energy oriented Xeon processor, the L5335 model, was also launched at the same time and this processor will cause much damage to the low end Barcelona processors as it is slightly faster, running at 2GHz compared to 1.9GHz and uses less power, fitting in the 50W power envelope, while the 1.9GHz Barcelona needs 65W. While losing the battle for energy efficiency, lower end Barcelona processors may win the one for performance against Intel's L models as AMD processors are true native quad core designs and no linked dual cores sharing the same silicon die.

Both of these new Intel processors will use the 1333MHz frontside bus and are socket compatible with already existing motherboard designs. Pricing will vary from $1172 for the high end X5335 to $380 for the lower end L model. At the same time Intel announced the launch of these new processors, it also stated the fact that all Pentium class processors, both single core and the dual core ones like the 945, 935, 925 and 915 models, will enter a discontinuance program, eliminating a brand that proved to be one of the most successful in the whole history of computer industry.