The Intel Xeon D-1541 is a server/workstation processor with 8 cores, launched in November 2015, at an MSRP of $581. It is part of the Xeon D lineup, using the Broadwell-DE architecture with BGA 1667. Thanks to Intel Hyper-Threading the core-count is effectively doubled, to 16 threads. Xeon D-1541 has 1.5 MB of L3 cache per core and operates at 2.1 GHz by default, but can boost up to 2.7 GHz, depending on the workload. Intel is building the Xeon D-1541 on a 14 nm production process using 3,200 million transistors. The multiplier is locked on Xeon D-1541, which limits its overclocking capabilities.
With a TDP of 45 W, the Xeon D-1541 consumes typical power levels for a modern PC. Intel's processor supports DDR3 and DDR4 memory with a dual-channel interface. 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 computer, Xeon D-1541 uses a PCI-Express Gen 3 connection. This processor lacks integrated graphics, you might need a graphics card.
Hardware virtualization is available on the Xeon D-1541, 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 is including the newer AVX2 standard, too, but not AVX-512.