The Intel Xeon E3-1220 v3 was a server/workstation processor with 4 cores, launched in June 2013, at an MSRP of $203. It is part of the Xeon E3 lineup, using the Haswell-WS architecture with Socket 1150. Xeon E3-1220 v3 has 8 MB of L3 cache and operates at 3.1 GHz by default, but can boost up to 3.5 GHz, depending on the workload. Intel is building the Xeon E3-1220 v3 on a 22 nm production process using 1,400 million transistors. The multiplier is locked on Xeon E3-1220 v3, which limits its overclocking capabilities.
With a TDP of 80 W, the Xeon E3-1220 v3 consumes a good deal of power, so decent cooling is needed. Intel's processor supports DDR3 memory with a dual-channel interface. The highest officially supported memory speed is 1600 MT/s, but with overclocking (and the right memory modules) you can go even higher. 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 E3-1220 v3 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 E3-1220 v3, 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.