At almost the same moment when Core-based Xeons entered the market, Intel started to roll out a tweaked version of the 70xx line, capable of very fast data manipulation, especially when several small threads were executed at the same time. Because these CPUs were based on the Netburst architecture, they could work at frequencies beyond 3GHz without losing any stability. Moreover, Intel silently added yet another feature that was earlier integrated into older Extreme Edition Pentium 4 CPUs: a very large level 3 cache (16MB), which proved to be very helpful in various multitasking scenarios.



The 7140N CPU uses a standard 667MHz FSB, coupled with 3.33GHz of power coming from both CPUs. Netburst also translates into Hyper Threading support, so a single 7140N CPU will appear as 4 processing units in Task Manager (2 logical and 2 physical cores). Using a special motherboard, you can fit as much as 4 x 7-series Xeons into a single 1U unit, and that will result in a great performance/volume index. However, due to the fact that the level 3 of cache has grown significantly, so have the power requirements with some 150W + being drawn from the PSU by the CPU alone.



Obviously, this Xeon too makes good use out of Intel's latest technologies, such as Enhanced Halt State (C1E) or Enhanced INTEL Speed Step (EIST). As a matter of fact, most of you will completely ignore these things, but it's enough to know that they are there when you need them. Price-wise, you can buy the 7140N version for at  least $4500. That is if you are able to find it, since mostly large system integrators can get their hands on such monster CPUs.



In the end it's up to you if you prefer an older designed Netburst Xeon (such as the 7140N) or you'd better switch your server directly to Core-based Xeons. These tent to be faster in clock/clock usage but the 16MB of level 3 cache is also something worthy of your attention