AMD (Advanced Micro Devices) will release today its next-generation Opteron quad-core chip, which is code named Shanghai. The launch is ahead of schedule, and that’s because the company wants consumers to move their attention from the ill-fated Barcelona chip to this smaller and faster device.

The Shanghai chip will get an endorsement from IBM, which mentioned that it is producing four servers with AMD’s chip for use in high-performance applications, virtualization and collaboration environments, and big databases. As for the Barcelona chip, even if Intel had already launched a quad-core, AMD thought it will outsell that product. Announced in September 2007 at a corporate bash in San Francisco, the chip proved to be an ill one. A bug was discovered in the processor and, therefore, the launch was delayed until April 2008. From the previous chip, Shanghai brings a performance boost at 2.7 GHz, 0.4 GHz higher. Furthermore, it has 6MB of Lever 3 cache, 4 more than in the earlier quad-core.

The Shanghai chip was manufactured using a process called immersion lithography. In this process, ultra purified water is injected between the lens and wafer, acting like a contact lens that improves the accuracy of the manufacturing. This process is an excellent one for 32nm chips. Thanks to it, AMD has reduced the amount of time it takes for the CPU to shift control from one virtual machine to another by 25%.

Even so, analysts say that the chip won’t “steal” the market. It’s more like a maintenance product than something to try to move ahead in the market. The next chip AMD will probably launch is a six-core one, code-named Istanbul, due out late next year. After the Barcelona project mistakes, the company decided to create a separate fabrications plant, called The Foundry. This way, AMD would improve its ability to focus on developing new products.

As for the companies which will use the Shanghai Opteron, IBM will support the chip in the LS22 blades on a special bid basis and the company is pretty sure that customers will go for this approach. IBM is also supporting the Shanghai Opteron in its Systems x 3455, a 1U rack server aimed at HPC workloads that currently sells with Barcelona standard and Special Edition parts, and in its System x 3755, a four-socket server that IBM has priced at a two-socket level when only two Opteron chips are in the box.

The company will ship the chips for the LS22 blades in late November and early next year for the x 3455 and x 3755. Dell, another tech company, will have the Shanghai chip available in three PowerEdge blade servers, the M605, M805 and M905. Furthermore, Dell will launch the Opteron for 2790 and SC1435, which are older designs, and for R805 and R905, which are newer designs.