AMD Zen ES Octa and Quad Core CPU Speeds Leaked

When the first Zen Engineering Samples leaked out, many were surprised at the relatively low clock speeds. At stock, the 8 core 16 thread chip managed only 2.8 GHz stock and 3.2 GHz boost. Given the engineering sample nature of the chip, it was reasonable for the lower than usual speeds. Now it seems that AMD has released some new variants of their Zen ES CPUs, this time clocked a bit higher.

At the same A0 and 95W TDP, AMD has improved the base clock to 3.15 GHz, all core boost is up to 3.3 GHz, and single thread boost is all the way up at 3.6 GHz. These speeds are quite respectable given that Broadwell-E i7 6900K peaks out at 3.7 GHz and reports are suggesting a similar IPC. This means AMD may have a real winner on their hands though Intel is moving onto Skylake-E soon.

In addition to the new 8 core information, we’re also getting some more information about the 4 core 8 thread variant engineering sample. Keeping the 65W TDP, the chip manages 2900 GHz with all core turbo at 3.1 GHz and max turbo at 3.4 GHz. While respectable for the mid-range, we will have to see how it fares in overclocking before it is a worthy competitor to Intel’s K series. I suspect we will see higher speeds for launch.

Having said all that, it’s important to note that this is an unconfirmed report at this time. The source is somewhat trustworthy since they were the ones to provide the initial ES specifications that were later confirmed. The source is also reporting that AM4 motherboards have finally hit production so we’ll hopefully see Bristol Ridge soon and Zen shortly after. The expected launch date in February 2017 but I suspect it will be a bit longer before we get real hardware. It will be interesting to see how Kaby Lake and Zen battle it out next year.