Advanced Micro Devices Inc. today revealed its latest central processor unit family for servers, the Epyc 7003 series, which features a speedy seven-nanometer chip process architecture and new security technologies.

AMD says that the series can provide over double the performance of Intel Corp. silicon for some enterprise cloud workloads.

The Epyc 7003 series comprises 19 CPUs with starting prices ranging from $913 to $7,890. The top-end $7,890 model is the Epyc 7763, which features 64 cores that can run 128 processes between them with a 2.45-gigahertz base frequency. The chip is capable of temporarily increasing its frequency to as much as 3.5GHz when needed. Citing internal testing, AMD claims that the Epyc 7763 offers up to 106% more performance than Intel’s best comparable processor when running certain cloud workloads. 

The Epyc 7763 and the 18 other CPUs in the Epyc 7003 series are all based on AMD’s latest Zen 3 seven-nanometer core design. Compared with the previous-generation Zen 2, the core design manages 19% more instructions per cycle on average. Instructions per cycle is a key performance metric that, similarly to clock frequency and core count, directly influences how much data a CPU can process at once.

Another key architectural change in the Epyc 7003 series is the introduction of a large 32-megabyte L3 cache that’s shared among all the CPU cores. The shared cache acts as a kind of central information repository where the cores can store the data they’re currently processing. AMD says the cores’ ability to access one another’s data directly makes communications inside the CPU more efficient, which can in turn improve performance for certain computations.

Not all of the enhancements introduced with the Epyc 7003 focus on performance. Cybersecurity was another major focus for AMD during the chip design process.

The Epyc 7003 features a technology called shadow stack, which AMD describes as a silicon-level mechanism designed to block cyberattacks that target applications with a technique known as control-flow hijacking. Another new security technology, SEV-SNP, is aimed at reducing the risk of a breach in cases where the hypervisor running on a server is compromised by hackers. SEV-SNP prevents the hypervisor from manipulating the data used by the virtual machines it powers.

Such isolation can be particularly useful in cloud environments. With on-premises servers, a company has full control over the hardware and hypervisor, but in the cloud, both are managed by the infrastructure-as-a-service provider. Limiting how the provider’s hypervisor can access a company’s virtual machines reduces the risk that they will be breached if hackers somehow compromise the underlying infrastructure-as-a-service environment.

AMD told CRN that its hardware partners already have plans to incorporate Epyc 7003 chips into more than 100 new servers. Cloud service providers, meanwhile, are also expected to increase their use of the company’s silicon following the CPU series’ debut. More than 400 AMD-based cloud instances are reportedly set to become available by year’s end.

The introduction of the Epyc 7003 will further increase the competitive pressure on rival Intel, the leading player in the CPU market, which has seen AMD chip away at its dominant position over the last few years. AMD has also been gaining ground in the desktop CPU market. At the start of the year, Intel appointed former VMware Chief Executive Pat Gelsinger as chief executive to lead its strategy going forward amid the increasing competition from AMD and other rivals.  

Photo of AMD CEO Lisa Su: AMD