The Intel Xeon 6553P-B is a server/workstation processor with 36 cores, launched in February 2025, at an MSRP of $2402. It is part of the Xeon 6 lineup, using the Granite Rapids-D architecture with BGA 4368. Thanks to Intel Hyper-Threading the core-count is effectively doubled, to 72 threads. Xeon 6553P-B has 144 MB of L3 cache and operates at 2.6 GHz by default, but can boost up to 4 GHz, depending on the workload. Intel is building the Xeon 6553P-B on a 5 nm production process, the transistor count is unknown. The multiplier is locked on Xeon 6553P-B, which limits its overclocking capabilities.
With a TDP of 235 W, the Xeon 6553P-B is extremely power hungry, which means you need top-notch cooling. Intel's processor supports DDR5 memory with a quad-channel interface. The highest officially supported memory speed is 6400 MT/s. ECC memory is supported, too, which is an important capability for mission-critical systems, to avoid data corruption. For communication with other components in the system, Xeon 6553P-B uses a PCI-Express Gen 5 connection. This processor lacks integrated graphics, you might need a graphics card.
Hardware virtualization is available on the Xeon 6553P-B, which greatly improves virtual machine performance. Additionally, IOMMU virtualization (PCI passthrough) is supported, so that guest virtual machines may directly use host hardware. Programs using Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX) will run on this processor, boosting performance for calculation-heavy applications. Besides AVX, Intel has added support for the newer AVX2 and AVX-512 instructions, too.