Detailed AMD Zen 7 leak reveals new 3D Core, IPC uplift, release date, and more
By all indications, we are still more than a year away from seeing AMD’s next-gen Zen 6 CPU architecture. But this hasn’t stopped Moore’s Law Is Dead from sharing details about Zen 7, the successor to Zen 6. We reported recently that AMD had big plans regarding Zen 7, including the introduction of a 3D Core.
Moore’s Law Is Dead now gives us a deeper look into Zen 7 and AMD’s new 3D Cores. The leaker claims that, where Zen 7 is unlikely to bring any major core count increases over Zen 6, AMD is focusing on efficiency, IPC, and frequency upgrades for all the core variants. So far, AMD is reportedly developing a single Zen 7 CPU architecture and segmenting it into five different variants:
- Classic cores with a focus on IPC and frequency
- Dense cores that prioritize efficiency and IPC over frequency
- Low-Power cores that maximize space utilization and power
- Efficiency cores that focus on power efficiency and IPC
- 3D Cores that are aimed at maximizing IPC or per-core performance
While MLID shares some of AMD’s architecture and design goals for Zen 7, the more interesting details are of the purported 3D Core.
AMD Zen 7 architecture details
According to internal documents that MLID has allegedly seen and verified through his AMD contact, AMD is opting for the cutting-edge TSMC 1.4 nm process node for Zen 7 core chiplets and 4 nm for V-Cache chiplets. Despite the increased costs that such a move would introduce, AMD has seemingly decided to always employ the latest process node from TSMC for its CPU cores.
Using the latest process node, Zen 7 is reportedly aiming for a 15-25% IPC uplift over Zen 6. This IPC could be, in part, affected by the cache changes that AMD could be implementing in Zen 7 CPUs. The leaker claims that Zen 7 chips will have 2 MB of on-die L2 cache per core alongside 7 MB of L3 per core in the form of V-Cache chiplets. This way, AMD is taking the 3D V-Cache concept that it first introduced with the Ryzen 7 5800X3D and giving each Zen 7 CPU core its own V-Cache, hence the term “3D Core”.
It is easy to see how, if AMD does bring a 3D Core to the market, the Zen 7 CPUs could offer phenomenal gaming performance, as the best gaming CPUs on the market are AMD chips with a dedicated L3 “3D V-Cache” block.
MLID also claims that AMD’s Epyc Zen 7 server chips will use 33-core chiplets, resulting in a core count as high as 264. Moreover, the Zen 7 Epyc core chiplets seem to be backward compatible with Zen 6 IODs that AMD will introduce next year.
AMD Zen 7 release date
MLID claims that AMD’s current “Tape Out target” for Zen 7 is October 2026. Team Red is allegedly targeting full release for late 2027 or early 2028.
Finally, Zen 7 being 2+ years away should tell you not to take the details shared by MLID at face value. It is only after Zen 6 CPUs are on the market that we are going to be hearing some official confirmations around Zen 7.
Source(s)
