Videocardz did it again. A few hours before the official launch of AMD’s EPYC 3 line (codenamed Milan and officially the 7003 series), the full list of SKUs and prices were leaked by WhyCry. The AMD EPYC 7003 ‘Milan’ line features AMD’s Zen 3 microarchitecture and will provide a significant advance in IPC for corporate and data center customers in the EPYC ecosystem.
AMD launches EPYC 3 ‘Milan’ with EPYC 7003 processors, up to 64 Zen 3 cores at 3.5 GHz
Before we proceed, here is the official announcement: (which is due in about 4 hours at the time of writing)
AMD will host digital launch of 3rd generation AMD EPYC ™ processors on March 15, 2021
AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) will host a global digital launch of the new 3rd generation AMD EPYC ™ processors on Monday, March 15, 2021 at 8am PT / 11am ET.
The digital launch is scheduled to present presentations by AMD President and CEO Dr. Lisa Su, executive vice president of technology and engineering and CTO Mark Papermaster, senior vice president and general manager, Datacenter and Embedded Solutions Business Group, Forrest Norrod, senior vice president and general manager, server business unit, Dan McNamara and industry leading customer and data center partner holdings.
The launch will be accessible on the 3rd generation AMD EPYC launch site from 8am PT / 11am ET. A replay of the webcast can be accessed after the completion of the live broadcast event and will be available for one year after the event.
The main difference between Rome (EPYC 2) and Milan (EPYC 3) is the difference in microarchitecture. Where EPYC 2 used Zen 2, EPYC 3 will use Zen 3. The only other difference is in the clock speed (because of a more mature 7 nm process). While parts based on Zen 2 can have a maximum frequency of 3.9 GHz in the lightest SKU, Zen 3 can have a frequency of up to 4.1 GHz. The power remains the same at 280W and both parts have access to 128 PCIe 4 tracks. RAM also remains constant on 8 DDR4 3200 EEC channels. Rome and Milan have an 8 CCD design with 1 IO tile. All parts of EPYC 3 contain 128 tracks of PCIe 4.0, 8 channels of DDR4 and support for 3200 MHz EEC.
Source: unknown, image via Videocardz
The flagship SKU is the EPYC 7763 with 64 cores / 128 threads and a 3.5 GHz boost clock. It is coupled with a 256 MB L3 cache and will sell for $ 7,890 or $ 123 per core. This is really expensive when it comes to AMD prices, which have historically been as low as $ 55 per core. To be fair, however, you can also get an EPYC 7713P for $ 5010 or $ 78 per core, which is much more reasonable. The cheapest EPYC 3 SKU is the EPYC 7313P with 16 cores / 32 threads for $ 913 or $ 57 per core (which is almost the same as AMD’s historic price).
Keep in mind that all of these processors support error-corrected memory – which is essential in the data center environment and represents an overall reduction in TCO (total cost of ownership), considering the greatest savings in operating costs. AMD’s EPYC 3 platform will take on Intel’s Ice Lake server line, which is expected to launch in 2H 2020.
The only problem with AMD EPYC parts that we can anticipate that can give Intel the edge is supply. Since all roads lead back to TSMC and the Taiwanese foundry is currently experiencing severe supply bottlenecks due to orders from almost everyone and their mothers, AMD’s obviously winning EPYC parts will be limited by the number of wafers TSMC can to produce. This may give Intel some breathing space when the Ice Lake is launched – assuming, of course, that it is not delayed like all other 10 nm releases so far. The official launch will take place in a few hours.