This year looks set to see a return to form for AMD processors with the launch of the Ryzen range of products. AMD has already posted impressive benchmarks - at least compared to similarly-specced Intel CPUs, which promises some much-needed competition in the market. Not everything is known about what AMD will release in terms of CPUs, other than a three-tier product range - SR3, SR5 and SR7, but the latest rumor points to them being either 4-core or 8-core products.
That means there's no mid-range 6-core part, which is surprising given that Intel's current 6-core CPUs, the Core i7-6800K and Core i7-6850K, are popular with enthusiasts using its X99 chipset platform. They offer two additional cores and four additional threads over the flagship mid-range CPU - the Core i7-7700K, which offer more performance in multi-threaded tasks such as rendering and video editing. The news comes from www.Zolkorn.com, which posted the table below.
Image via www.zolkorn.com
That said, Ryzen CPUs are likely to be cheaper than their Intel counterparts, with even the Core i7-6800K retailing for a hefty $400+, which could mean things will still lean in AMD's favor. The move means that the SR3 and SR5 range could either be exclusively 4-core parts as previous rumours have suggested, or some or all SR5's will be 8-core parts, as the above table suggests. All will be unlocked for easy overclocking, and will do battle with Intel's Core i3 and Core i5 CPUs.
This is perhaps a little disappointing, though, given that one feature many enthusiasts have been requesting throughout the seemingly lackluster gains offered by Intel from generation to generation for a while, was more cores for the mid-range CPUs. The likes of the Core i5-2500K and even previous generation CPUs have only had four cores, with hyper-threaded models such as the Core i7-2600K offering more threads thanks to hyper-threading support.
The only Intel desktop CPUs with more than four cores have been exclusive to its high-end chipsets such as X99. It's possible AMD doesn't view 6-core CPUs as worth the effort, given they only offer modest gains in multi-threaded performance over 4-core parts. An 8-core CPU would offer much better performance here, all other things being equal. That said, there are rumors that Intel does have mid-range 6-core CPUs in the works for release next year as part of its 'Coffee Lake' microarchitecture.
Read all the latest news on AMD's Ryzen CPUs in my previous post : AMD Ryzen CPU News: Coolers, Prices, Release Date And Motherboards
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