Doug S (foo.delete@this.bar.bar) on October 10, 2018 12:10 pm wrote:
> nobody in particular (nobody.delete@this.nowhe.re) on October 10, 2018 8:55 am wrote:
> > More info here
> >
> > "In essence, requests per second (RPS) per Watt is a critical metric that Qualcomm’s
> > ARM64 46 core Falkor chip had a big advantage over Intel’s Skylake 4116. Embracing
> > the value of optionality and market competition, we made some noise.
> >
> > Intel proposed to co-innovate with us an off-roadmap 24-core
> > Xeon Gold CPU specifically made for our workload
> > offering considerable value in Performance per Watt. For this generation, we continue using Intel as system
> > solutions are widely available while we’re working on realizing ARM64’s benefits to production."
> >
> > Looks like Centriq was far less of a done deal for Cloudflare than many assumed.
>
>
> Intel can't afford to have a major business go ARM, that will legitimize it as an option and others
> will begin looking. So makes sense for them to do a customer SKU (which is probably a normal core
> that's had settings tweaked) which also offers a backdoor method of offering better pricing without
> making it a discount on a SKU on the official price list (which would piss off other customers)
>
> On the other hand, Cloudflare might never have been that serious about ARM,
> and was using this was a way to get what they wanted out of Intel...

Either way it will encourage others to take a proper close look at Arm! ;-)