AMD has the most powerful processor in the world, but at what price?

AMD and Intel seem immersed in a race to see who has the most powerful processor in the world at all times, and the latest leaked benchmarks of the new AMD EPYC Genoa processor with 96 cores based on Zen 4 architecture seems to put those in red in the lead . Of course, having the most powerful processor in the world has a high price, and not only for the money it would cost to buy it…

The AMD EPYC Genoa 9000 that has been leaked this time around is one of many Zen 4 architecture server chips that AMD will release later this year. We have already seen the technical specifications of many of these models on previous occasions, but the new leak that has taken place today means having the first real performance information, despite the fact that, as you may already guess, what we have in hand are engineering samples.

AMD has the most powerful processor in the world

This is the most powerful processor in the world

In these leaks, the exact reference of the processor that has been used has not been mentioned, but looking at the screenshots it could be the AMD EPYC 9654P , with 96 cores and 192 process threads based on Zen 4 architecture. The chip has 384 MB of cache L3 with a base frequency of 2.15 GHz, up to 3.05 GHz Boost frequency for all cores and up to 3.5-3.7 GHz Boost for a single core.

In the benchmarks that have been leaked, a dual processor configuration has been used, which means that we are looking at 192 cores and 384 process threads. However, it must be taken into account that none of the benchmarks used support more than 128 cores, a fact that also makes it well comparable with previous benchmarks of other processors.

In the leak, Cinebench data also appears in three of its versions (R15, R20 and R23). In Cinebench R15, the chip scored 188 points in the single-core test and 11,577 points in the multi-threaded test. In the R20 version, 416 points were scored for a single core and 26,285 points in the multi-threaded test, while in the R23 version, 1,227 points were scored for a single core and 100,776 points in the multi-threaded test.

Here, the AMD processor is shown as the most powerful to date and of course it leaves the Intel processors in the lurch, but again it must be taken into account that only 128 cores are used for the benchmarks, and also with a relatively low clock rate that falls short of the boost rate of 3.05 GHz.

A processor you can’t afford

It is true that AMD is ahead of Intel for now in the race to see who has the most powerful processor in the world, but it is also true that it is not something that ordinary users are going to be able to enjoy. To begin with, as part of the EPYC family, it is a processor designed for servers and needs certain specific hardware requirements, such as the server motherboard and much more.

Procesador AMD Servidores Socket SP5

Also keep in mind that while this processor draws about 360 watts at full power, the socket’s power limit is 700 watts, which means you can have an advanced cooling solution (VERY advanced in fact) for be able to keep it at a good temperature, and a power source capable of servicing it properly. Essentially, you would have to invest in a server infrastructure if you wanted to have it in your home, and we are talking about tens of thousands of Euros (especially considering the price that this processor will have).

Finally, we must talk about the price of the processor itself; Although it is true that AMD will not launch these new EPYC Genoa based on Zen 4 until the end of this year, looking at the price of the previous lines of processors, we can get the idea that the chip alone will cost more than 6,000 Euros. Of course, it is very good to see figures for what is currently the most powerful processor in the world, but in the end it is not something that users are going to be able to have in our homes.