Intel seemingly confirms that Sapphire Rapids server parts will feature next-gen "Golden Cove" cores

A patch for the Linux kernel submitted by Intel's Andi Kleen served as a very lowkey confirmation about the future of Intel's Sapphire Rapids server lineup. The patch notes state that Sapphire Rapids will utilize Golden Cove cores instead of the previous-gen Willow Cove, found currently in Tiger Lake chips for laptops. 

Golden Cove offers a 20 percent IPC boost over Willow Cove, and will likely feature highly clocks than existing Cascade Lake parts, thanks to the move to the 10nm process. Higher sustained frequencies and improved IPC could be Intel's key to putting pressure on AMD, with the Zen 4-based EPYC Genoa set to arrive sometime next year. 

AMD has been eating into Intel's server market share over the past few years. This quarter, AMD's server share grew by 3.8 percent, its largest quarterly increase in the segment in the past 15 years. It will be interesting to see how Sapphire Rapids fares at launch, and whether a new architecture and new process node will be enough to help Intel stave off AMD's server ambitions.