Xeon Gold 5217 vs 5120

Primary details

Comparing Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217 processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and price.

Place in performance ranking	not rated	718
Place by popularity	not in top-100	not in top-100
Cost-effectiveness evaluation	no data	6.41
Market segment	Server	Server
Series	no data	Intel Xeon Gold
Architecture codename	Woodcrest (2006)	Cascade Lake (2019−2020)
Release date	June 2006 (18 years ago)	2 April 2019 (5 years ago)
Launch price (MSRP)	$45	$1,522
Current price	$172 (3.8x MSRP)	$1391 (0.9x MSRP)

Cost-effectiveness evaluation

Performance per price, higher is better.

Detailed specifications

Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217 basic parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters indirectly say of CPU speed, though for more precise assessment you have to consider their test results.

Physical cores	2 (Dual-core)	8 (Octa-Core)
Threads	2	16
Base clock speed	1.86 GHz	3 GHz
Boost clock speed	1.87 GHz	3.7 GHz
Bus support	no data	4 × 8 GT/s
L1 cache	0 KB	512 KB
L2 cache	4 MB	8 MB
L3 cache	0 KB	11 MB
Chip lithography	65 nm	14 nm
Maximum core temperature	65 °C	79 °C
64 bit support	+	+
Windows 11 compatibility	-	+
Unlocked multiplier	No	No
VID voltage range	B2=1.0V-1.5V, G0=.85V-1.5V	no data

Compatibility

Information on Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217 compatibility with other computer components: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.

Number of CPUs in a configuration	1	4 (Multiprocessor)
Socket	LGA771	FCLGA3647
Power consumption (TDP)	65 Watt	115 Watt

Technologies and extensions

Technological solutions and additional instructions supported by Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.

Instruction set extensions	no data	Intel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX, Intel® AVX2, Intel® AVX-512
AES-NI	no data	+
AVX	no data	+
vPro	no data	+
Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST)	+	+
Speed Shift	no data	+
Turbo Boost Technology	-	2.0
Hyper-Threading Technology	-	+
TSX	no data	+
Idle States	+	no data
Thermal Monitoring	+	no data
Demand Based Switching	-	no data
Turbo Boost Max 3.0	no data	-
FSB parity	+	no data
Status	Discontinued	Launched

Security technologies

Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217 technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.

TXT	-	+
EDB	+	+

Virtualization technologies

Virtual machine speed-up technologies supported by Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217 are enumerated here.

VT-d	no data	+
VT-x	+	+
EPT	-	+

Memory specs

Types, maximum amount and channel quantity of RAM supported by Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequencies may be supported.

Supported memory types	DDR2	DDR4-2667
Maximum memory size	no data	1 TB
Max memory channels	no data	6
Maximum memory bandwidth	no data	128.001 GB/s
ECC memory support	no data	+

Peripherals

Specifications and connection of peripherals supported by Xeon 5120 and Xeon Gold 5217.

PCIe version	no data	3.0
PCI Express lanes	no data	48

Synthetic benchmark performance

Various benchmark results of the processors in comparison. Overall score is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.

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Pros & cons summary

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Physical cores	2	8
Threads	2	16
Cost	$45	$1522
Chip lithography	65 nm	14 nm
Power consumption (TDP)	65 Watt	115 Watt

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