Apple Computer named the dual-core Xeon server processors from Intel to power its next-gen high-performance professional Mac Pro desktops according to AppleInsider. The 64-bit chips Woodcrest (Xeon 5100 series) pack a 4MB L2 cache and run at speeds of up to 3.0GHz on a 1333MHz front-side bus. Apple will offer versions of its upcoming Mac Pro professional desktops that will sport two of the dual core chips. The new systems will also be available in a single processor configuration for a substantially reduced cost.

Aside from being the fastest of Intel's chips suited for a personal computer system, Woodcrest is also the first microprocessors to utilize Intel's "Core" microarchitecture. The architecture's advance cache technology allows one core of a dual-core processor to use the entire memory reservoir while the other core remains idle. It also supports "Smart Memory Access" that hides memory latency and bottlenecks and the "Wide Dynamic Execution," which widens the execution core and allows for more instructions per cycle.

Apple chief executive Steve Jobs is expected to showcase the new computers along with the debut of the Mac OS X 10.5 "Leopard" at the annual Apple World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) in San Francisco next month.