Intel announces a number of technologies boosting cloud datacentre efficiency-- including Corning co-development MXC optical interconnect, ClearCurve optical fibre and the 13 configuration of the Atom C2000 microserver SoC family. 

MXC is a protocol-agnostic optical interconnect standard Intel says will slim down datacentre cabling, should enough major vendors adopt it. It connects microserver trays (as seen in an Intel demonstration), links servers to a top-of-rack switch, connects switches to a bigger switch and can form a datacentre network backbone. 

It should also find use in rack-level computing, connecting parts separated and packed into multiple rack units within a datacentre. 

Intel claims MXC carries up to 25Gbps over each fibre for up to 300m, a speed-range combination greater than the 10Gbps over 300m offered by VCSEL (vertical cavity surface-emitting laser) technology. A single MXC cable (aka ClearCurve cable) packs up to 64 fibres, pushing capacity to up to 1.6Tbps. 

MXC connectors should also withstand up to 20kg of pull force before getting dislodged (compared to the 5kg of current fibre connections), and a "beam expander" feature ensures dust does not interrupt connections. 

Also shown off by Intel is the Atom C2000 microserver SoC family-- featuring up to 8 cores, 6-20W TDP range, integrated ethernet and support for up to 64GB of memory. The company will sell 13 specific models optimised for different lightweight workloads, including entry dedicated hosting, distributed memory caching, static web serving and content delivery. 

Go Intel Unveils New Technologies for Efficient Cloud Datacentres