As we speak is AMD’s Monetary Analyst Day, the corporate’s semi-annual, analyst-focused gathering. Whereas the first goal of the occasion is for AMD to succeed in out to buyers, analysts, and others to show the efficiency of the corporate and why they need to proceed to spend money on the corporate, FAD has additionally turn out to be AMD’s de-facto product roadmap occasion. In any case, how are you going to correctly spend money on AMD should you don’t know what’s coming subsequent?
Because of this, the half-day collection of displays is filled with small nuggets of details about merchandise and plans throughout the corporate. The whole lot right here is high-level – don’t count on AMD handy out the Zen 4 transistor floorplan – however it’s simply our greatest have a look at AMD’s product plans for the subsequent couple of years.
Kicking off FAD 2022 with what’s at all times AMD’s most attention-grabbing replace is the Zen structure roadmap. The cornerstone of AMD’s restoration and resurgence right into a aggressive and succesful participant within the x86 processor house, the Zen structure is the premise of all the things from AMD’s smallest embedded CPUs to their largest enterprise chips. So what’s coming down the pipe over the subsequent couple of years is a really massive deal for AMD, and the trade as a complete.
Zen 4: Enhancing Efficiency and Perf-Per-Watt, Transport Later This Yr
Diving proper in, AMD is at present within the means of ramping up their Zen 4 architecture-based merchandise. This contains the Ryzen 7000 (Raphael) consumer CPUs, in addition to their 4th era EPYC (Genoa) server CPUs. Each of those are as a result of launch later this yr.
We’ve seen bits and items of data on Zen 4 up to now, most not too long ago with the Ryzen 7000 announcement at Computex. Zen 4 brings new CPU core chiplets in addition to a brand new I/O die, including help for options similar to PCI-Specific 5.0 and DDR5 reminiscence. And on the efficiency entrance, AMD is aiming for vital performance-per-watt and clockspeed enhancements over their present Zen 3-based merchandise.
In the meantime, AMD is following up that Computex announcement by clarifying just a few issues. Specifically, the corporate is addressing questions round Instruction per Clock (IPC) expectations, stating that they count on Zen 4 to supply an 8-10% IPC uplift over Zen 3. The preliminary Computex announcement and demo appeared to suggest that almost all of AMD’s efficiency good points had been from clockspeed enhancements, so AMD is working to answer that with out exhibiting an excessive amount of of their hand months out from the product launches.
Coupled with that, AMD can be disclosing that they’re anticipating an general single-threaded efficiency achieve of larger than 15% – with an emphasis on “larger than.” ST efficiency is a mixture of IPC and clockspeeds, so at this level AMD can’t get overly particular since they haven’t locked down closing clockspeeds. However as we’ve seen with their Computex demos, for frivolously threaded workloads, 5.5GHz (or extra) is at present on the desk for Zen 4.
Lastly, AMD can be confirming that there are ISA extensions for AI and AVX-512 coming for Zen 4. At this level the corporate isn’t clarifying whether or not both (or each) of these extensions will likely be in all Zen 4 merchandise or only a subset – AVX-512 is a little bit of an area and energy hog, for instance – however at a minimal, it’s cheap to count on these to indicate up in Zen 4 server components. The addition of AI directions will assist AMD sustain with Intel and different opponents within the quick run, as CPU AI efficiency has already turn out to be a battleground for chipmakers. Although simply what this does for AMD’s competitiveness there’ll rely largely on simply what directions (and knowledge sorts) get added.
AMD will likely be producing three flavors of Zen 4 merchandise. This contains the vanilla Zen 4 core, in addition to the previously-announced Zen 4c core – a compact core that’s for prime density servers and will likely be going into the 128 core EPYC Bergamo processor. AMD can be confirming for the primary time that there will likely be V-Cache geared up Zen 4 components as properly – which though new info, doesn’t come as a shock given the success of AMD’s V-Cache shopper and server components.
Apparently, AMD is planning on utilizing each 5nm and 4nm processes for the Zen 4 household. We already know that Ryzen 7000 and Genoa are slated to make use of one in every of TSMC’s 5nm processes, and that Zen 4c chiplets are set to be constructed on the HPC model of N5. So it’s not instantly clear the place 4nm suits into AMD’s roadmap, although we will’t rule out that AMD is enjoying a bit quick and free with terminology right here, since TSMC’s 4nm processes are an offshoot of 5nm (slightly than a completely new node) and are usually labeled as 5nm variants to begin with.
At this level, AMD is anticipating to see a >25% improve in performance-per-watt with Zen 4 over Zen 3 (based mostly on desktop 16C chips working CineBench). In the meantime the general efficiency enchancment stands at >35%, little doubt making the most of each the larger efficiency of the structure per-thread, and AMD’s beforehand disclosed greater TDPs (that are particularly helpful for uncorking extra efficiency in MT workloads). And sure, these are horrible graphs.
Zen 5 Structure: All-New Microarchitecture for 2024
In the meantime, carrying AMD’s Zen structure roadmap into 2024 is the Zen 5 structure, which is being introduced immediately. Provided that AMD isn’t but transport Zen 4, their particulars on Zen 5 are understandably at a really excessive stage. None the much less, additionally they point out that AMD received’t be resting on their laurels, and have some aggressive updates deliberate.
The massive information right here is that AMD is terming the Zen 5 structure as an “All-new microarchitecture”. Which is to say, it’s not merely going to be an incremental enchancment over Zen 4.
In apply, no main vendor designs a CPU structure utterly from scratch – there’s at all times going to be one thing ok for reuse – however the message from AMD is evident: they’re going to be performing some vital remodeling of their core CPU structure as a way to additional enhance their efficiency in addition to vitality effectivity.
As for what AMD will disclose for proper now, Zen 5 will likely be re-pipelining the entrance finish and as soon as once more growing their subject width. The satan is within the particulars right here, however coming from Zen 3 and its 4 instruction/cycle decode charge, it’s straightforward to see why AMD would wish to concentrate on that subsequent – particularly when on the backend, the integer items have already got a 10-wide subject width.
In the meantime, on high of Zen 4’s new AI directions, Zen 5 is integrating additional AI and machine studying optimizations. AMD isn’t saying a lot else right here, however they’ve a big library of instruments to select from, protecting all the things from AI-focused directions to including help for much more knowledge sorts.
AMD expects the Zen 5 chip stack to be just like Zen 4 – which is to say that they’re going to have the identical trio of designs: a vanilla Zen 5 core, a compact core (Zen 5c), and a V-Cache enabled core. For AMD’s clients this sort of continuity is essential, because it provides clients a assure that AMD’s extra bespoke configurations (Zen 4c & V-Cache) can have successors within the 2024+ timeframe. From a technical perspective none of that is too shocking, however from a enterprise standpoint, clients wish to make certain they aren’t adopting dead-end {hardware}.
Lastly, AMD has an attention-grabbing manufacturing combine deliberate for Zen 5. Zen 5 CPU cores will likely be fabbed on a mixture of 4nm and 3nm processes, which in contrast to the 5nm/4nm combine for Zen 4, TSMC’s 4nm and 3nm nodes are very totally different. 4nm is an optimized model of 5nm, whereas 3nm is a complete new node. So if AMD’s manufacturing plans transfer forward as at present laid out, Zen 5 will likely be straddling a serious node leap. That stated, it’s not unreasonable to suspect that AMD is hedging their bets right here and leaving 4nm on the desk in case 3nm isn’t as far alongside as they’d like.
Wrapping issues up, the Zen 5 structure is slated for 2024. AMD isn’t giving any additional info on when within the yr that is likely to be, although Zen 3 and Zen 4, each of these had been/will likely be launched afterward in 2020 and 2022 respectively. So H2/EOY 2024 is nearly as good as guess as any.
