AMD announced the expansion of its x86 embedded processor portfolio with the introduction of 5th Gen AMD EPYC Embedded processors.
AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series CPUs are optimized for embedded markets, balancing cutting-edge compute capabilities with purpose-built embedded features that enhance product longevity, reliability, system resiliency and ease of embedded application development. Powered by the proven “Zen 5” architecture, these processors deliver leadership performance and energy efficiency that enable networking, storage and industrial edge systems to process more data, faster and with greater efficiency.
“AI-driven network traffic, exploding data storage requirements and the expansion of industrial edge computing are driving the demand for higher compute performance in embedded platforms,” said Salil Raje, senior vice president and general manager, Adaptive and Embedded Computing, AMD. “5th Gen AMD EPYC Embedded processors bring leadership performance and efficiency to embedded customers, together with the long product lifecycles and enhanced system resiliency they rely on to design confidently and ensure continuous operations in demanding “always-on” environments.”
Leadership Core Density, Performance, and Energy Efficiency
AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series processors are designed to power compute-intensive embedded systems with support for core counts from 8 to 192 in a single socket. Industry-leading core density delivers up to a 1.3X and 1.6X increase in data processing throughput for networking and storage workloads, respectively,1,2 making the devices ideal for network and security firewall platforms, storage systems and industrial control applications.
Using the new “Zen 5c” core architecture offers higher throughput with greater energy efficiency, delivering up to an estimated 1.3X increase in socket throughput3 and an estimated 1.3X better performance/Watt4 compared to the competition. Capacity of up to 6TB of DDR5 memory per socket and expanded I/O connectivity, supporting up to 160 PCIe® Gen5 lanes with CXL® 2.0, enables storage capacity expansion and high-speed data transfers for networking and storage applications.
Purpose-Built, Application-Specific Features
AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series processors include a suite of advanced embedded features designed to provide a robust, secure, and long-lasting platform.
- Extended Longevity: To meet the longer product lifecycle and operational requirements of embedded markets, AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series CPUs provide extended 7-year product manufacturing support, helping system designers ensure long-term product availability, reducing redesign and qualification efforts. Additionally, AMD plans to extend design lifetime operation targets from 5 years on currently sampling AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series CPUs, to 7 years for production SKUs, ensuring long-term product stability for embedded systems. These extended design lifetime operation targets are critical for embedded systems running mission-critical applications in harsh conditions, minimizing unplanned downtime, repairs, and costly system replacements.
- System Resiliency and Security: Features include NTB (Non-Transparent Bridging) for increased high availability in fault tolerant multi-host configurations. NTB enhances system redundancy and failover capabilities for networking and storage systems by enabling data exchange between two CPUs in active-active configurations via PCI Express (PCIe®) to allow continued operation in case of a failure. DRAM Flush enhances reliability in mission-critical storage deployments by helping to prevent data loss in the event of a power failure by flushing it from DRAM to non-volatile memory.
Dual SPI (serial peripheral interface) enables customers to load a secure and proprietary bootloader to authenticate the platform, ensuring a trusted execution environment.
- Ease of application development: Built in Yocto framework support simplifies embedded system deployments by enabling the creation of custom Linux distributions that are tailored for the customer’s system. SPDK (Storage Performance Development Kit) and DPDK (Data Plane Development Kit) enhance system performance by handling data processing for network and storage workloads in user space drivers.
Industry Support and Availability
AMD is working closely with ecosystem partners and leading ODMs and OEMs, including Cisco and IBM, to bring the benefits of these next-generation embedded processors to market.
“We chose AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series processor for one of our high-end firewall products because it delivers the high compute performance that we need, from its scalability—up to 192 cores—to its high memory and I/O bandwidth,” said Lukasz Bromirski, Director of Product Management at Cisco. “We know we can count on AMD, not only for great performance, but also cutting-edge quality and support and consistent roadmap execution.”
“IBM Storage Scale System 6000 is designed to deliver speed, performance, and reliability for demanding enterprise AI workloads,” said Matthew Geiser, Product Management, IBM Storage for Data, AI and HPC. “One of the main benefits of the AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 processors is the introduction of redundant paths for high data availability and robust connectivity options, which will pair nicely with performance intensive applications running on IBM Storage Scale System.”
AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series processors are currently sampling with early access customers, with production shipments expected to begin in the second quarter of 2025. The AMD EPYC Embedded 9005 Series processors come in the SP5 socket form factor, which is compatible with the prior generation AMD EPYC Embedded 9004 Series, to provide a simple upgrade path for customers.
