Intel has created an experimental “Single-chip Cloud Computer,” (SCC) a research microprocessor containing the largest number of Intel Architecture cores ever integrated on a silicon CPU chip — as many as 48 cores. It incorporates technologies intended to scale multi-core processors to 100 cores and beyond, such as an on-chip network, advanced power management technologies, and support for “message-passing.”
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=825
Architecturally, the chip resembles a cloud of computers integrated into silicon. The novel, many-core architecture includes innovations for scalability in terms of energy-efficiency including improved core-to-core communication and techniques that enable software to dynamically configure voltage and frequency to attain power consumptions from 125W to as low as 25W.
