Xeon E5540 's Advantages
Higher specification of memory (1066 vs 3)
Higher base frequency (2.533GHz vs 2.1GHz)
Lower TDP (80W vs 115W)
Opteron 6272 's Advantages
Released 2 years and 8 months late
Larger L3 cache size (16MB vs 8MB)
More modern manufacturing process (32nm vs 45nm)