The Intel Xeon D-2899NT is a server/workstation processor with 22 cores, launched in December 2023, at an MSRP of $2138. It is part of the Xeon D lineup, using the Ice Lake-D Refresh architecture with BGA 2579. Thanks to Intel Hyper-Threading the core-count is effectively doubled, to 44 threads. Xeon D-2899NT has 30 MB of L3 cache and operates at 2.2 GHz by default, but can boost up to 3.1 GHz, depending on the workload. Intel is building the Xeon D-2899NT on a 10 nm production process, the transistor count is unknown. The multiplier is locked on Xeon D-2899NT, which limits its overclocking capabilities.
With a TDP of 135 W, the Xeon D-2899NT consumes a lot of power, so good cooling is definitely needed. Intel's processor supports DDR4 memory with a quad-channel interface. The highest officially supported memory speed is 3200 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 D-2899NT uses a PCI-Express Gen 4 connection. This processor lacks integrated graphics, you might need a graphics card.
Hardware virtualization is available on the Xeon D-2899NT, 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.