The Xserve Xeon 2.8 "Quad Core" (Early 2008) is powered by a 2.8 GHz Quad Core 45-nm Intel Xeon E5462 (Harpertown/Penryn) processor with 12 MB of "on-die" level 2 cache (each pair of cores shares 6 MB) and an independent 1.6 GHz 64-bit frontside bus. Also offered, via custom configuration, were two 2.8 GHz Quad Core Xeon E5462 processors for US$500 more and two 3 GHz Quad Core Xeon E5472 processors for US$1300 more.

By default, it was configured with 2 GB of 800 MHz DDR2 ECC fully-buffered (FB-DIMM) memory (but can support up to 32 GB of RAM), an 80 GB (7200 RPM) SATA "Apple Drive Module" with 8 MB cache, a slot-loading 8X double-layer SuperDrive, and built-in ATI Radeon X1300 PCI Express graphics with 64 MB of GDDR3 memory. Ports include onboard mini-DVI, three USB 2.0 ports, and two Firewire "800" ports.

Compared to the original Intel-powered Xserve that it replaced, the Xeon 2.8 "Quad Core" uses a more advanced architecture with faster and more efficient processors with larger level 2 caches, a more advanced vector engine, a faster frontside bus (1.6 GHz instead of 1.33 GHz), and faster memory (800 MHz instead of 667 MHz). Apple reports that these improvements result in a system that is "up to" twice as fast as its predecessor.

Despite the age of this system, site sponsor Other World Computing has RAM, hard drives, SSDs, and other upgrades available for this specific Mac while supplies last.