Apple Xserve With Intel Xeon "Nehalem"

Apple have launched a new version of their Xserve server, based on Intel's Xeon "Nehalem" processors.  The new Apple Xserve is available in single or dual-processor setups, using the quad-core Xeon processor (up to 2.93GHz) paired with between 3GB and 24GB of DDR3 RAM. 

As standard the new Apple Xserve comes with a single 160GB 7,200rpm system hard-drive; that can be switched for a 128GB SSD (for $500) that doesn't take up a drive bay.  The three drive bays can then be outfitted with up to 1TB 7,200rpm SATA drives for a total of 3TB storage.  There's also various gigabit ethernet and fibre channel cards that can be optioned.

Connectivity includes two x16 PCI Express 2.0 slots (one 6.6-inch half-length, one 9.25-inch), two rear FireWire 800 ports and three USB 2.0 ports (one up front, two on the back).  There's also an RS-232 serial port.  Each runs Mac OS X Server v.10.5 unlimited-client edition and supports Intel Turbo Boost and Hyper-Threading.

The quad-core Apple Xserve is priced from $2,999, while the eight-core Apple Xserve is priced from $3,599.  The former ships within 24hrs, while the latter will ship in 3-5 business days