Intel Xeon 600 Workstation CPUs Launched: Up To 86 Cores, 8000 MT/s Memory, 128 Gen5 Lanes, 350W TDP With OC Support, & More Cores/$ Than Threadripper 9000

Intel has unveiled its next-gen Xeon 600 workstation CPUs codenamed Granite Rapids, featuring up to 86 cores & better cores/$ value than Threadripper.

Intel Fires Back At AMD Threadripper 9000 With Better Cores/$ Value On Xeon 600 Workstation CPUs

Today, Intel is officially introducing its latest workstation CPU family, Xeon 600. These processors are based on the same Intel 3 process technology with Redwood Cove P-Cores, and are aimed at content creators, professionals, data scientists, and several other workstation segments such as AI Dev, Media, Energy & Geo-Sciences, Life Sciences & Healthcare, and Financial Services. These chips will replace the older Xeon W-3500/2500 families.

One of the interesting changes that Intel is making to its workstation segment is that it is combining both mainstream and expert workstation families under the same Xeon 600 branding instead of making them separate as with the prior generation (Xeon W-2500 for mainstream and Xeon W-3500 for Expert).

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Intel states that the Xeon 600 "Granite Rapids" CPUs are designed to "Unleash Heavy-Duty Compute", offering higher performance efficiency in an expandible platform, with vPro technologies, and designed for modern-day AI developers. With that said, let's take a look at the official specifications.

Intel Xeon 600 "Granite Rapids" CPU Specs: Now Up To 86 Cores

The Intel Xeon 600 lineup features 11 SKUs, which include six "Expert" class or "X" offerings, and five "mainstream" offerings. These include the Xeon 698X, 696X, 678X, 676X, 674X, 658X, 656, 654, 638, 636, and 634. All chips have the same package but come with a distinct set of dies. The top two SKUs, the Xeon 698X and Xeon 696X, are based on the XCC dies, so these are two compute tiles or chiplets. The 48-core, all the way to the 24-core, are based on the HCC die, while the 20-core and down to 12-core SKUs are based on the LCC dies.

So to make things easier:

• Granite Rapids XCC - Xeon 698X/696X
• Granite Rapids HCC - Xeon 678X/676X/674X/658X
• Granite Rapids LCC - Xeon 656/654/638/636/634

The reason why Intel didn't go all the way up to the UCC-class chips with 128 P-Cores is due to physical constraints, such as the size of the package. Those chips are designed primarily for servers, and their large size doesn't make them a good choice for workstation platforms. Intel also said that UCC-class chips break a lot of form factors for desktop-like configurations. It's just way too big to even fit in a standard chassis for workstations.

For the top SKU, the Xeon 698X, Intel has gone with 86 cores, 336 MB of L3 cache, a base frequency of 2.0 GHz, a boost frequency of up to 4.8 GHz, an all-core boost frequency of 3.0 GHz, a base TDP of 350W, an MTP (Maximum Turbo Power) of 420W, a fully unlocked design, 128 PCIe Gen5 lanes, and support for 8-channel memory with speeds of up to 6400 MT/s (DDR5 UDIMM) and 8000 MT/s (MRDIMM). Compared to the last-gen Xeon flagship, we have the following upgrades:

Xeon 698X vs Xeon 3595X:

• 43.3% More Cores (86 vs 60)
• Same Base/Boost Clocks
• 2.98x Higher L3 Cache (336 vs 112.5)
• 35W Lower Base TDP (350W vs 385W)
• 42W Lower MTP TDP (420W vs 462W)
• 33.3% Higher DDR5 Support (6400 vs 4800)
• DDR5 MRDIMM Support Added (8000 MT/s)

The rest of the SKU stack varies in terms of core configurations, clocks, TDPs, and memory support, but the underlying architecture remains the same. Some other features of the Intel Xeon 600 lineup include AVX-512 support, AMX (INT8, BFloat16, FP16) support, CXL 2.0 support, and optimized software tools for CPU, GPU, and FPGAs through Intel's oneAPI.

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In terms of security, Intel's vPro technology offers a range of features such as Intel Total Memory Encryption, Intel Trusted Execution Technology, Intel Virtualization Technology for Security, Intel Active Management Technology, Unique Platform ID, Platform Service Record, DASH-Compliant for manageability, and Intel Remote Platform Erase, Intel One-Click Recovery for System recovery.

Intel Granite Rapids "Xeon Workstation" CPU Family (Official):

CPU Name	Cores / Threads	Clock (Base / Boost)	L3 Cache	Memory	PCIe Lanes	TDP	Price
Xeon 698X	86 / 172	2.0 / 4.8 GHz	336 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	350W	$7699
Xeon 696X	64 / 128	2.4 / 4.8 GHz	336 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	350W	$5599
Xeon 678X	TBD	2.4 / 4.9 GHz	192 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	300W	$3749
Xeon 676X	TBD	2.8 / 4.9 GHz	144 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	275W	$2499
Xeon 674X	TBD	3.0 / 4.9 GHz	144 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	270W	$2199
Xeon 658X	TBD	3.0 / 4.9 GHz	144 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	250W	$1699
Xeon 656	TBD	2.8 / 4.8 GHz	72 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	210W	$1399
Xeon 654	18 / 36	3.1 / 4.8 GHz	72 MB	8Ch 6400/8000	128 Gen5	200W	$1199
Xeon 638	TBD	3.2 / 4.8 GHz	72 MB	4Ch 6400	80 Gen5	180W	$899
Xeon 636	TBD	3.5 / 4.7 GHz	48 MB	4Ch 6400	80 Gen5	170W	$639
Xeon 634	TBD	2.7 / 4.6 GHz	48 MB	4Ch 6400	80 Gen5	150W	$499

Overclocking Across All Unlocked "X" SKUs

One of the highlights of today's launch is overclocking support across six Intel Xeon 600 CPUs. All of these are the ones with the "X" at the end, and the blue team is not just offering all of its existing suite of overclocking goodies but also adding a few more.

The two new highlights on the overclocking side include telemetry and monitoring add-ons such as Undervolt protection, voltage baseline, and max voltage limit report, alongside per-compute die and per-compute limit reasons reporting. Besides this, you get the following OC features:

• Processor Core Tuning
• AVX, AVX512, and TMUL Negative Ratio Offset Tuning
• Per-Compute Die Mesh Tuning
• Intel Turbo Boost 2.0 Frequency Tuning
• Intel Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0 Tuning

Intel is also announcing that it has partnered with OCBASE to bring CPU tuning support for Xeon 600 CPUs on the OCCT App. The app will now offer users with an unlocked Xeon 600 CPU the following:

• Dynamic Overclocking Controls
• Linux & Windows support
• Enhanced Platform Telemetry
• Trusted Stability Testing
• Configurable Benchmarking

Intel and ASUS have already taken the extra OC horsepower of Xeon 600 CPUs to break 10 world records and achieve 10 global first places. The overclocking session was done on the Xeon 698X CPU running on ASUS's latest W890 motherboard.

Intel stated that there might be some variability or limitations with the top XCC dies in terms of the interconnect fabric speeds, etc, since these utilize two individual compute tiles.

Intel W890 Platform: A New Home For Workstation Chips

Next up, we have to talk about the platform itself. With Xeon 600, Intel is announcing its W890 platform based around the LGA 4710-2 (V2) socket. This new platform summons a range of new motherboards from partners such as ASUS, Gigabyte, and Supermicro.

The Intel W890 chipset replaces the older W790 chipset, offering new feature sets such as Wi-Fi 7, WIFI6E, 1 or 2.5GbE LAN, USB 3.2 (20G/10G/5G), SATA 3.0, PCIe 4.0, HD Audio, eSPI, SPI, and SMBus. The boards will feature support for up to 4 TB of DDR5 memory on 8-channel (2DPC) configurations, and 2 TB of the mainstream 4-channel configurations. There are also 128 PCIe 5.0 lanes per chip, including 8 Gen4 DMI to connect with the PCH.

DDR5 MRDIMMs will provide a solid performance bump with faster bandwidth, up to 8000 MT/s speeds. The MRDIMMs do sacrifice a little bit on the capacity, so users who want more capacity will have to stick with standard 6400 MT/s UDIMMs. All W890 motherboards and systems will be designed with multi-GPU support, readying them for intensive compute and AI workloads.

You can already tell how this launch aligns perfectly with the recent chatter about Intel's bigger Arc Pro GPUs.

Xeon 600 Performance vs Prior Generation

Performance-wise, the Intel Xeon 600 is a decent step up from the older Sapphire Rapids lineup, offering uplifts across various workloads. The breakdown for SPEC Workstation 4.0 is as follows (Xeon 698X vs Xeon W9-3595X):

• 17% Faster AI & Machine Learning
• 22% Faster Energy
• 61% Faster Financial Services
• 19% Faster Life Sciences
• 10% Faster Media & Entertainment
• Similar Product Design
• Similar Productivity & Development

In engineering and design, the new Xeon 698X CPU offers 29% faster virtualization (Dassault Systèmes), 27% faster FEA Solve Times (MFEM), and up to 30% faster CFD Solving (OpenFOAM). For content creation, users can expect up to 74% faster rendering performance (Blender CPU Junkshop) and up to 29% faster AI-powered Video Upscaling using Intel AMX (TopazLabs Video Upscaling).

Intel also adds AMX (FP16) support to its Rendering Toolkit with Intel Open Image Denoise 2.4, which has support for Blender, Chaos Corona, Chaos V-Ray, Maxon, and Dassault Systèmes.

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Finally, in AI Models, Intel is expecting up to a 24% uplift in linear algebra performance, 18% uplift in large data-set analysis, and a 16% uplift in CPU-based AI inferencing testing.

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Intel is also making it simpler to distinguish between the desktop and high-end workstation lineups, with the former offering higher single-threaded and CAD performance, while the workstation lineup is better suited for highly-threaded, high-bandwidth, and memory-intensive workloads.

Great Cores/$ Value Than AMD Threadripper 9000

Besides performance, Intel is also offering some nice value in terms of the number of cores offered per $. While the flagship offers slightly lower cores than AMD's Threadripper flagship, the 9995WX (96-Cores), it does come at a better value with an RCP of $7699. That's a lot cheaper than the $11,699 US pricing of AMD 9995WX.

Similarly, the Intel Xeon 696X with its 64 cores and 128 threads has an RCP of $5599 US while AMD's 64-core Threadripper 9985WX retails for $8000 US. That's a difference of $2400 US. Each SKU with the same amount of cores costs way less on the Xeon side than the Threadripper offering, making them really good value and adding to their competitive nature. The following chart compares Intel's Xeon 600 lineup to the AMD Threadripper 9000 in terms of cores/$.

Intel Xeon 600 vs AMD Threadripper 9000 Price/Core Comparison:

Intel SKU Name	Cores/Threads	Price	AMD SKU Name	Cores/Threads	Price
Xeon 698X	86 / 172	$7699	Threadripper 9995WX	96 / 192	$11699
Xeon 696X	64 / 128	$5599	Threadripper 9985WX	64 / 128	$7999
Xeon 678X	48 / 96	$3749	N/A	N/A	N/A
Xeon 676X	32 / 64	$2499	Threadripper 9975WX	32 / 64	$4099
Xeon 674X	28 / 56	$2199	N/A	N/A	N/A
Xeon 658X	24 / 48	$1699	Threadripper 9965WX	24 / 48	$2899
Xeon 656	20 / 40	$1399	N/A	N/A	N/A
Xeon 654	18 / 36	$1199	N/A	N/A	N/A
Xeon 638	16 / 32	$899	Threadripper 9955WX	16 / 32	$1649
Xeon 636	12 / 24	$639	N/A	N/A	N/A
Xeon 634	12 / 24	$499	N/A	N/A	N/A

AMD does offer HEDT offerings, but those come with 4-channel memory support and 88 usable PCIe 5.0 lanes. Even then, the entry-level 24-core model Threadripper 9960X retails for $1419 US while Intel's chip costs $1699 and offers 8-channel memory support and 128 Gen5 lanes.

Availability

Lastly, we have the availability part. Intel's Xeon 600 platforms and CPUs will be available starting late March.

Five CPUs will be available in boxed flavors, which include the Xeon 696X, 678X, 676X, 658X, and 654.

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