Rumor has it that AMD Ryzen 9000X3D would invert the 3D stack hierarchy – the L3 cache block would be under the CCDs

When you buy from our articles through links, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.

In two weeks AMD will introduce its Ryzen 9000X3D chips, which will rival the best CPUs on the market. Hardware leak HXL on AMD is said to be inverting its 3D die-stacking structure, with the SRAM block now placed beneath the CCDs.

When AMD first launched its Ryzen 5000X3D chips, the concept was to stack a block of L3 cache on top of the CCDs. A major problem with this model was heat dissipation due to the use of additional silicon over the CCDs for structural integrity. This thermal limitation also prevented AMD from increasing the clock speeds of these processors. However, this appears to be resolved with Ryzen 9000X3D as the CCD reportedly sits on top of the cache die. If true, AMD’s new design will truly be an engineering marvel – both from an architectural and packaging perspective.

Currently, we don’t have any diagrams of these CPUs and aren’t sure how AMD will manage the potential bump in the y-axis compared to Ryzen 9000 non-X3D. However, such a change was expected because Zen 5-based CCDs have a significantly smaller internal L3 block size than Zen 4. This meant that any external dies (due to 3D stacking) would overlap with the CCDs and cause heat dissipation issues. High efficiency chip analysis indicated that using 2-Hi stacking of 3D cache was a plausible solution, but AMD surprised us all with a completely different approach.

Image 1 of 2

Image 2 of 2

It’ll be intriguing to see how AMD pulls off such a layout, and we hope Team Red blesses us with an in-depth overview. Based on this leak, Ryzen 9000X3D chips will have the CCD in direct contact with the IHS without additional silicon, for improved thermal performance.

This has been causing problems for Intel ever since Core Ultra 9 285KArrow Lake’s flagship chip, fails to beat even the previous generation’s Ryzen 7 7800X3D. The Ryzen 9000X3D series debuts on November 7 and retailer listings have placed the Ryzen 7 9800X3D in the range of $484-$525.