CPU
Processor announcements, architecture deep dives, and performance analysis.
AMD Ryzen 7 7700X3D Lands Today at $329 — Budget 3D V-Cache for the RAM Crisis Era
AMD launches the Ryzen 7 7700X3D today at $329, slotting a cheaper 8-core Zen 4 X3D part into a market where DDR5 prices have doubled. Same 96MB L3 3D V-Cache as the 7800X3D, just 500 MHz less boost — and it's aimed straight at gamers priced out by the memory crisis.
AMD Zen 6 EPYC Venice Launches July 22 — 256 Cores on TSMC 2nm, 70% Perf Uplift
AMD CTO Mark Papermaster has confirmed the Zen 6 launch for July 22-23 in San Francisco, kicking off with EPYC Venice — a 256-core monster built on TSMC's 2nm node, packing 16-channel memory, PCIe Gen 6, and a claimed 70% CPU performance uplift over Zen 5 Turin.
AMD Extends AM5 Through 2029, Teases EXPO ULL Memory Boost
AMD has officially extended AM5 socket support through 2029, turning the Ryzen 7000-era platform into a seven-year upgrade path. The company also teased EXPO Ultra Low Latency, a new memory tuning profile promising up to 13% better performance versus JEDEC DDR5.
Apple Signs With Intel Foundry: iPhone Chips on 18A and Foveros Are Real
Apple has struck a preliminary manufacturing deal with Intel Foundry to produce iPhone and iPad chips on Intel's 18A process with Foveros 3D packaging — the most significant external validation that Intel's foundry ambitions are no longer vapor.
ARM Crosses the Rubicon: 136-Core AGI CPU on TSMC 3nm Takes Aim at x86 Data Centers
ARM has launched its first ever production CPU chip — a 136-core Neoverse V3 AGI CPU on TSMC 3nm — with Meta as lead customer and OpenAI, Cerebras, and Cloudflare in line. This isn't a reference design. ARM is now a chip company.
Intel's Nova Lake Breaks Cover at Computex — 52 Cores, LGA 1954, and a TSMC Confession
Intel officially unveiled Nova Lake at Computex 2026 — a 52-core desktop monster on a brand-new LGA 1954 socket targeting late 2026. The bombshell: over 90% of its compute tiles will be fabbed by TSMC on N2, not on Intel's own 18A process.
SPEC CPU 2026 Lands After 9 Years — 52 Benchmarks, 64GB RAM, and the End of CPU 2017
The Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation has released SPEC CPU 2026, the first refresh of the industry's most-cited CPU benchmark suite in nearly a decade. It expands to 52 workloads, quadruples memory pressure to 64GB, and CPU 2017 is officially retired on November 3.
Intel Nova Lake: 288 MB bLLC Cache, 52 Cores, and the Death of AMD's Gaming CPU Monopoly
Intel's upcoming Nova Lake platform packs up to 288 MB of on-die bLLC cache, 52 cores, and DDR5-8000 support — and leaked performance figures suggest it could finally end AMD's X3D V-Cache stranglehold on gaming CPUs.
Intel's 16-Core Nova Lake-S Leak: 12 Xe3P iGPU Cores Aim Straight at AMD's APU Throne
A new leak reveals an Intel Nova Lake-S SKU pairing 16 cores with a 12 Xe3P-core iGPU — six times the graphics resources of the rest of the lineup, and a direct shot at AMD's Ryzen G-series. Every nanometer counts when you're trying to make discrete entry-level GPUs obsolete.
AMD Resurrects the 5800X3D as 'AM4 10th Anniversary Edition' — The Upgrade Cycle Is Officially Broken
AMD is reportedly bringing the legendary Ryzen 7 5800X3D back from retirement as a limited 'AM4 10th Anniversary Edition' in H2 2026. With DDR5 prices spiraling and AM5 motherboards still expensive, a four-year-old 7nm gaming chip has become the most pragmatic CPU upgrade of 2026.
AMD Zen 6 'Medusa Point' Leak: 10 Cores at 2GHz Matching Zen 5 at 5GHz
An engineering sample of AMD's Zen 6 'Medusa Point' APU has surfaced on Geekbench running at barely 2GHz — and it's already matching a 5GHz Ryzen AI 9 365 in multi-thread. If these numbers hold, the IPC uplift is staggering.
Intel Arrow Lake Refresh Launches — 15% Gaming Uplift, More Cores, Lower Prices
Intel's Core Ultra 7 270K Plus and Core Ultra 5 250K Plus bring extra E-cores, higher clocks, DDR5-7200 support, and a claimed 15% gaming performance boost — all while undercutting AMD on price.