Intel Xeon D-2100

The Intel Xeon D-2100 processor is a system on a chip (SoC) designed with low power requirements for computing data at the device-level of the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart devices.

The Xeon D-2100 processor enables processing for smart devices to happen directly at the device for the fastest, most responsive processing with minimal latency. Low latency and fast calculations enable time-sensitive operations such as industrial sensor area networks, self-driving vehicles and processor-intensive IoT devices.

Intel Xeon D-2100 processors were announced with features including:

• 14nm photolithographic process.
• 4-18 cores with base clock speeds from 1.6-2.2Ghz boost clock speed up to 3Ghz.
• Thermal design point between 60-110 watts.
• Available Intel Quick Assist 100Gbs cryptographic acceleration.
• 512GB memory addressing.
• Up to 4 built-in 10Gigabit Ethernet ports.

Putting processing power on the device level or edge contrasts with the centralized processing model of client-server or cloud models. Recent trends have seen storage, applications and processing moving to the cloud. However, there are now processors designed to perform the processing onboard smart devices, autonomous vehicles and drones. In some cases, the change is because the application demands instantaneous response.

Onboard processing is part of the cyclical nature of computing models. As compute requirements are ever increasing, the computing world has traditionally moved to a centralized processing model - until developments in processors enable more to be computed on the device with less power. The move is also made in recognition that the sheer number of things in the IoT will make the possibility of all of them, depending on a connection to the cloud, a recipe for network congestion.