While hardware fans eagerly expect AMD’s Zen processor for their desktop computers, the US chip maker has some huge plans for this processor and its architecture – according to new online information AMD plans to produce a 7 nm Zen processor with 48 cores inside. As a comparison Zen will be introduced on 14 nm and will pack up to 8 cores.
The upcoming processor is currently known as Starship and when released it will power servers. The chip will be made by GlobalFoundries, which currently makes all AMD processors, and in addition to this it will come with some form of Hyper-Threading so a 48-core Starship processor will be able to deal with 96 threads at once. There will be a version of this chip with fewer cores that will make it into mainstream servers and desktop computers so with Zen AMD users will get a clear upgrade path.
The 48-core Zen processor is expected in 2018 and while there’s a lot of time and a lot can change until then, Starship looks impressive. Of course, things may not happen as intended but back in 1998 when AMD talked about the Athlon there were quite a few people laughing. Well, we all know what happened a year later.
Source: Fudzilla.com