AMD’s Zen 2 processor series will soon be commercially available, delivering more cores, more efficiency and more IPC performance. For the future, AMD plans to continue innovating in the processor market with the goal of bringing Zen 3 CPUs to market in mid-2020. Some of them will be the so-called EPYC “Milan”.
With the Zen 2 EPYC “Rome” processors, AMD plans to increase its 2666MHz DDR4 memory support to a higher speed. In this context, Forrest Norrod of AMD confirmed that the EPYC Zen 3 “Milan” processors will support the SP3 server socket, which is the same one currently used for the company’s first and second generation EPYC processors, confirming that “Milan” will also support DDR4 memory. However, the new DDR5 memory is not supported in this new generation.
“DDR5 is a different design”, and as such requires a new AMD CPU socket. Since Milan supports DDR4 and the same SP3 socket as the current EPYC processors, it is normal that the Zen 3 processors for AMD desktops continue to use DDR4 memory. The fourth generation Ryzen processors of 2020 are likely to be the last AMD CPUs to use DDR4 memory.
AMD is already committed to using a “7nm+” manufacturing process to develop its next-generation Ryzen and EPYC series CPUs, with Zen 3 aiming to remove “asterisks” from the company’s processor designs. With each new Zen architecture, AMD plans to eliminate more design flaws, hoping to eliminate all of Intel’s performance advantages over time, especially IPC performance.