AMD launched their 3rd generation EPYC processors based on the Zen 3 architecture during a virtual event on the 15th of March.
Impressive performance compared to the competition
The processors codenamed “Milan” are reportedly delivering up to 19% IPC increase over the previous generation EPYC processors. According to AMD, the 32 core EPYC 75F3 outperforms the 28 core Xeon 6258R by 70%. If only we would see such numbers in the consumer market!
In some workloads the performance is even more impressive compared to its competitor Intel’s processors.
That being said, the Intel processors referred to in AMD’s comparison are by now more than one year old and by themselves refreshes of Intel’s “Cascade Lake” server processors, which were originally released in 2019. Intel still hasn’t disclosed or officially launched their Ice Lake-SP line of processors. I’m curious if they will be able to provide a suitable answer to AMD’s 3rd generation EPYC product stack.
More of an iterative upgrade compared to their own stack
Compared to the previous generation EPYC processors, the improvements aren’t as spectacular, but as mentioned earlier, should still see a solid increase of up to 19% more performance depending on the processor and workload.
The main new features of this generation are the following:
- All Zen 3 architectural improvements
- Infinity Fabric frequency in sync with RAM frequency
- Cache addressable per core from 16MB to 32MB
- Expanded security features
The previous generation EPYC processors launched about 1 and a half year ago. The increase in performance of the new generation doesn’t seem to be big enough to warrant upgrading from that generation. It might make the offering just a tad more attractive for parties that were on the fence before though!
A short summary video of the event is available on YouTube. Their website has further information.