Intel Xeon "Granite Rapids-W" Mainstream & Expert HEDT CPUs Leaked

[T0@st]

Unannounced Intel processor families have emerged online over the past week—one source, Jaykihn, has unearthed a treasure trove of speculative mobile SKUs. Today's discovery pushes into the enterprise market segment; focusing on Team Blue's "Granite Rapids-W" (GNR-W) platform, likely equipped with Redwood Cove cores. The latest leak suggests an upcoming emergence of "Mainstream" and "Expert" workstation-oriented product tiers, allegedly prepared with the company's rumored W890 motherboard chipset. Past generations of "Xeon W" HEDT processor families have rolled out with entry-level and high-end offerings.

The leaker reckons that the mainstream Intel Granite Rapids-W "Xeon W" lineup will arrive with 4-channel memory support and 80 PCIe Gen 5 Lanes. Team Blue's higher-end "Expert" tier is anticipated with 128 PCIe Gen 5 lanes and 8-channel memory support. In addition to leaking processor information, Jaykihn outlined basic details regarding the W890 chipset—they believe that board designs will have access to 24 PCIe Gen 4 lanes, as well as 8 Gen 4 lanes for Intel's proprietary link (DMI) between northbridge and southbridge. The leaker did not divulge details of upcoming socket types—Team Blue is notorious for its elaborate rollout out of multiple LGA platforms.



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[Contra]

DOA

 

[Assimilator]

That CPU is huge and that means it's gonna cost a billion bucks, so nobody's gonna buy it.

 

[MentalAcetylide]

That CPU is huge and that means it's gonna cost a billion bucks, so nobody's gonna buy it.

Unless I'm mistaken, sounds like they're more for higher end workstations, so not really something you or I would buy unless you have the money & really need it as part of a job.

 

[docnorth]

DOA

Wooowww

 

[Tek-Check]

@Jaykihn, what is DRAM speed, both for 1DPC and 2DPC? What does CXL devices support look like?

 

[efikkan]

Basically no new information here, just pretty much the same as Sapphire Rapids but with two generations newer CPUs.
What about availability? Can we hope for a launch by summer? Or are we looking at late Q3++? (which probably means market availability Q1 2026).

I would assume these will feature DDR5-6400 and DDR5-8800(MRDIMM) memory.

That CPU is huge and that means it's gonna cost a billion bucks, so nobody's gonna buy it.

Well the current gen Sapphire Rapids starts at $359, just a bit shy of a billion…
And it's very competitively priced against Threadripper, especially considering it has higher performance per core than the Threadripper 7000 series.

Unfortunately though, Xeon W is not available in many markets, and has very limited availability overall compared to Threadripper (which isn't widely available either).

But on the positive side, motherboards can be found at times at acceptable prices, like ~$500 (+VAT).

 

[tommo1982]

Am I mistaken, or is Intel releasing Threadripper competition.

 

[Gigaherz]

Am I mistaken, or is Intel releasing Threadripper competition.

They always have. Threadripper was intended as a competition against Intels HEDT Platforms.

 

[unwind-protect]

It all depends on the price.

For some it might be an escape from the low PCIe lane count of the consumer platforms.

 

[Assimilator]

It all depends on the price.

For some it might be an escape from the low PCIe lane count of the consumer platforms.

There's no way it will be consumer-level cheap, given the size of the die.

 

[unwind-protect]

There's no way it will be consumer-level cheap, given the size of the die.

It's like real estate, you pay by square meter;

 

[efikkan]

Am I mistaken, or is Intel releasing Threadripper competition.

More like the other way around.
And AMD is about to launch a new generation of their Threadrippers too, probably before Intel.

The first generation of Threadrippers were selling great thanks to great pricing, but it went downhill with Zen 2 getting incredibly pricey. Zen 3 Threadrippers only had very limited retail availability long after the OEMs.

Both Intel and AMD needs to improve the availability of their workstation platforms in retail channels, and push for more basic motherboards. (AMD also needs to introduce lower CPU models.)

It all depends on the price.

For some it might be an escape from the low PCIe lane count of the consumer platforms.

The need for something beyond what mainstream platforms can offer will only increase with PCIe 5.0 SSDs. If would be nearly pointless to connect several of those through the chipset lanes.

So the question for you should rather be if you need any of the extra features, the larger power headroom, enhanced reliability, or if buying a such system means you will keep the computer for longer. Price alone wouldn't be enough to make an informed decision.

 

[ypsylon]

Nice. I would assume that they'll use 4710 socket, same as 6700 "small chip". About time they released something new for the "masses" in this segment. Sapphire Rapids refresh in 2024 was a mockery.

If true I like it that Intel keeps its x8 DMI link instead what AMD did in TRX50/WRX90 by cutting it in half and then wiring IIRC 3 NVMe devices through the chipset. :facepalm:

 

[efikkan]

If true I like it that Intel keeps its x8 DMI link instead what AMD did in TRX50/WRX90 by cutting it in half and then wiring IIRC 3 NVMe devices through the chipset. :facepalm:

Despite its very limited x4 PCIe 4.0 lanes to the chipset, TRX50/WRX90 at the very least have a decent amount of IO connected directly to the CPU, unlike e.g. the mainstream X870/X870E chipsets where motherboards may offer 5 M.2 slots, but #2 and #3 shared bandwidth with the x16 slot for the GPU, and the rest are through the chipset, meaning you effectively have room for one fast SSD. X870E has way more connected through the chipset than TRX50 does, so there is far more congestion on the mainstream platforms.

When it comes to IO people should primarily look at what is directly connected to the CPU (not chipset or bridged), that's the stuff you can use at full speed. Everything else is for "slow" or "legacy" stuff(like your old SSDs). You have to remember that the bandwidth through the chipset is divided between USB controllers, network controller(s), SATA devices and PCIe/M.2 slots, so if it's well populated, any SSD will approach "SATA speeds", and the SATA devices might not even reach full speed (so forget a massive RAID there).

So I don't consider it a loss that TRX50/WRX90 "only" has 4 lanes to the chipset, as you barely need anything there compared to a mainstream board, but if a motherboard vendor choose to put 3 M.2 slots on that chipset then that's just a pointless gimmick driving up the price of the board.

 

[unwind-protect]

Despite its very limited x4 PCIe 4.0 lanes to the chipset, TRX50/WRX90 at the very least have a decent amount of IO connected directly to the CPU, unlike e.g. the mainstream X870/X870E chipsets where motherboards may offer 5 M.2 slots, but #2 and #3 shared bandwidth with the x16 slot for the GPU, and the rest are through the chipset, meaning you effectively have room for one fast SSD. X870E has way more connected through the chipset than TRX50 does, so there is far more congestion on the mainstream platforms.

When it comes to IO people should primarily look at what is directly connected to the CPU (not chipset or bridged), that's the stuff you can use at full speed. Everything else is for "slow" or "legacy" stuff(like your old SSDs). You have to remember that the bandwidth through the chipset is divided between USB controllers, network controller(s), SATA devices and PCIe/M.2 slots, so if it's well populated, any SSD will approach "SATA speeds", and the SATA devices might not even reach full speed (so forget a massive RAID there).

So I don't consider it a loss that TRX50/WRX90 "only" has 4 lanes to the chipset, as you barely need anything there compared to a mainstream board, but if a motherboard vendor choose to put 3 M.2 slots on that chipset then that's just a pointless gimmick driving up the price of the board.

Through-chipset lanes are reasonably useful for networking, though, at the speeds used in advanced homelabs.