Power7+ Processor And Intelligent Energy; Comparison Of The Power7+ And Power6 Processors - IBM Power 780 Technical Overview And Introduction

2.1.6 POWER7+ processor and Intelligent Energy

Energy consumption is an important area of focus for the design of the POWER7+ processor,
which includes Intelligent Energy features that help to dynamically optimize energy usage and
performance so that the best possible balance is maintained. Intelligent Energy features, such
as EnergyScale, work with IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager to dynamically
optimize processor speed based on thermal conditions and system utilization.

2.1.7 Comparison of the POWER7+ and POWER6 processors

Table 2-2 shows comparable characteristics between the generations of POWER7+ and
POWER6 processors.
Table 2-2 Comparison of technology for the POWER7+ processor and the prior generation
Technology
Die size
Maximum cores
Maximum SMT
threads per core
Maximum frequency
L2 Cache
L3 Cache
Memory support
I/O bus
Enhanced cache
mode (TurboCore)
Sleep and nap mode
a. Not supported on the Power 770 and Power 780 4-socket systems.
b. For more information about sleep and nap modes, see 2.14.1, "IBM EnergyScale technology"
on page 115.
POWER7+
32 nm
2
567 mm
8
4 threads
4.4 GHz
256 KB per core
10 MB of FLR-L3 cache
per core with each core
having access to the full
80 MB of L3 cache,
on-chip eDRAM
DDR3
Two GX++
No
b
Both
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview
POWER7 POWER6+
45 nm 65 nm
2
567 mm 341 mm
8 2
4 threads 2 threads
4.25 GHz 5.0 GHz
256 KB per core 4 MB per core
4 MB or 8 MB of FLR-L3 32 MB off-chip eDRAM
cache per core with ASIC
each core having
access to the full 32 MB
of L3 cache, on-chip
eDRAM
DDR3 DDR2
Two GX++ One GX++
a
Yes No
Both Nap only
2
47