Intel Will Release Sapphire Rapids HEDT CPUs by Q2 Next Year, According to Leaked Roadmap

RJ Pierce, Tech Times 03 July 2021, 10:07 am

Intel plans to release their next-generation high-end desktop (HEDT) processors by Q2 2022 if a certainly leaked roadmap is believed.

According to a report by WCCFTech, the aforementioned roadmap reveals Intel's future plans for their Sapphire Rapids CPUs, as well as their upcoming Glacier Falls chips. There's also mention of Alder Lake-S (12th-gen), which states that it's likely due to release during Q3 this year. But that's a topic for another time.

The roadmap, which was first spotted by Videocardz, reveals that the Intel Sapphire Rapids CPUs are going to be on the W790 chipset. Allegedly, they'll also be made on the 10nm SuperFinFET process, which isn't too exciting considering that current-gen Threadripper CPUs from AMD are already on 7nm.

Among the purported chips coming with the Sapphire Rapids architecture is the Intel Xeon-based Sapphire Rapids-SP, which is expected to have as many as 56 cores on the LGA 4677 socket. Workstation (designated by 'W') and HEDT (designated by 'X') chips, on the other hand, could be on a different socket than the Xeon.

For the HEDT platform on the W790 chipset, Intel could release it alongside their much-anticipated Raptor Lake, which comes after the still-unreleased Alder Lake chips touted for their Arm-like big.LITTLE architecture.

Intel Sapphire Rapids: What Features Can Customers Expect?

If the leaked roadmap is to be believed, then the Sapphire Rapids HEDT chips from Intel are prepared for the foreseeable future.

Among the biggest draws of HEDT platforms is support for tech not available for mainstream consumer offerings. Take, for example, a massive amount of PCIe lanes. The top-end Sapphire Rapids HEDT chip is rumored to feature 64 lanes of PCIe Gen 5 support, music to the ears of power users who want to install as many PCIe expansion cards as they want.

Aside from that, Intel should also be equipping these chips with support for blazing-fast DDR5 memory, which can support clock speeds previously unachievable on DDR4 without extreme cooling solutions. Combine that with a boatload of cores and threads, and the platform will truly live up to its HEDT designation.

Will This Bring Intel Over the Threadripper Hump?

Considering Team Blue's recent history in the HEDT market (and the desktop CPU market in general), there's not a lot of confidence. AMD Ryzen is just that good, especially their Threadripper line of HEDT chips.

Let's go back to the manufacturing process because it's a very telling thing on its own. According to the roadmap, the Sapphire Lake HEDT chips are on 10nm SuperFinFET. Competing processors from AMD are at 7nm. When it comes to tech (thanks, Moore's Law), the smaller, the better. 7nm is a huge jump from 10nm, no matter how much Intel tries to spin it with continuous node revisions.

And if rumors about Zen 4-based Threadripper CPUs are to be believed, they're going to be on 5nm, according to HotHardware. The jump's performance improvement will be nuts unless Intel manages to price their Sapphire Rapids HEDTs competitively.

Well, at least Tiger Lake-H managed to close the gap with Ryzen a little bit.

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Written by RJ Pierce