VIA announces dual-core Eden X2 embedded processor

VIA has announced what it claims is the world's most power-efficient dual-core processor. The Eden X2 is optimized for commercial and industrial embedded systems and is light enough on power consumption to rely solely on passive cooling. To express its confidence in the Eden X2's fanless operation, VIA backs the new chip with a seven-year component longevity guarantee.

The Eden X2 is built on a 40nm process using a VIA's NanoBGA2 package measuring 21mm x 21mm with a die size of 11mm x 6mm. That die is home to two 64-bit Eden processing cores which supposedly offer "enhanced multitasking and superb multimedia performance." Although VIA doesn't cite any specific benchmarks or examples in its press release, they provided a list of product highlights:

• Industry-leading power-efficient architecture
• 7 year longevity guarantee
• Advanced multi-core processing
• Native support for 64-bit operating systems
• High-performance superscalar processing
• Out-of-order x86 architecture
• Most efficient speculative floating point algorithm
• Full processor virtualization support
• Advanced power and thermal management
• VIA AES hardware security features
• Pin-to-pin compatibility with VIA processors range

VIA is showing the chip during the Embedded World 2011 conference in Nuremberg (hall 12, booth 574 if you're attending). The Eden X2 is already in the sampling phase and should appear in systems and motherboards by the second quarter of this year. We haven't seen any specific details regarding OEM customers or upcoming products and we suspect that the chip will go largely unnoticed.