Tachyum plans to sample server platforms early next year — oft-delayed Prodigy chips slated for production in Q2 2024
Another postponement?
Tachyum on Tuesday announced that it will offer 1U and 2U server reference designs based on its Prodigy processors to OEMs and ODMs to enable them to quickly evaluate the 192-core Universal Processor and build their own machines using the new chips. The company plans to sample these server reference designs in Q1 2025, following its planned start of Prodigy chip production in Q2 2024.
For now, it is hard to say when or if Tachyum's Prodigy Universal Processor will hit the market in mass quantities. Prodigy was originally scheduled to launch in 2020 following a 2019 tape-out. But its release date has been postponed several times — first to 2021, then to 2022, then to 2023, then to 2024. Increasingly bold performance claims have accompanied these delays, yet no prototypes have been shown to prove that the processor architecture is functional and performant.
Tachyum shared block diagrams of its upcoming server motherboards, which are designed to fit into standard Chenbro chassis. However, it is unclear whether the company has working samples of the platform for internal testing.
In the first quarter of next year, Tachyum plans to offer samples of dual-socket 2U machines supporting 1TB of DDR5-7200 SDRAM using 32 memory modules, 16 hot-swappable E1.S SSDs, and Broadcom’s Thor 2 400 Gb/s NIC. The Chenbro-assembled servers will pack two 192-core Prodigy processors for AI and HPC applications and use air cooling to address data centers with air cooling.
Tachyum intends to sample 1U 2-way Prodigy air-cooled machines in the second quarter of 2025. The company says that 4-way Prodigy machines with liquid cooling are set to arrive later, though the company hasn't disclosed a timeline.
Earlier this year, Tachyum announced plans to start volume production of its Prodigy processors in the second half of 2024 without elaborating, which could technically mean December 2024. However, in December 2023, the company said it would sample its Prodigy processor in Q2 2024, months before it hits mass production later this year. But while the start of Prodigy mass production is still set for H2 2024, now the sampling of full servers is now slated for Q1 2025.
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Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.