I saw this and thought it was worth sharing - now that performance includes scaling "on chip", this 4 core chip is the next step.  This chip is for servers, so I don't expect to see it on my desktop any time soon!

Chips pass two billion milestone

By Jonathan Fildes
Science and technology reporter, BBC News

The chip has four separate cores

The first chip to pack more than two billion transistors has been launched by silicon giant Intel.

The quad-core chip, known as Tukwila, is designed for high-end servers rather than personal computers.

It operates at speeds of up to 2GHz, the equivalent of a standard PC chip.

It marks the latest milestone in chip technology; Intel released the first processor to contain more than one billion transistors in 2006.

"It's not revolutionary, it's another evolutionary step," said Malcolm Penn, an analyst at Future Horizons, of Tukwila.

Lots more at BBC NEWS | Technology | Chips pass two billion milestone

ttfn

David