According to a recent report from Bitcoin Press, the new Raptoreum (RTM) crypto has the potential to create a shortage of AMD Ryzen processors if enough cryptocurrency miners jump on the bandwagon. Unlike other cryptocurrencies that you can mine with graphics cards or ASICs, Raptoreum favors processors, especially those with huge caches, such as Ryzen, Threadripper or Epyc chips from AMD that tend to rank high on our list of CPU benchmarks and best CPUs for gaming.
Having been in testnet for three years, Raptoreum launched earlier this year. It's based on the Proof-Of-Work (PoW) model and the GhostRider algorithm. The latter combines the x16r and CryptoNight algorithms present in Ravencoin and Monero or Bytecoin, respectively. GhostRider likes L3 cache, especially the massive ones, and that's an area in which Ryzen chips excel.
AMD's Zen 3 mainstream processors, such as the Ryzen 9 5950X and Ryzen 9 5900X, feature up to 64MB of L3 cache. Based on information from the Raptoreum Mining Profitability Calculator, the Ryzen 9 5950X and Ryzen 9 5900X offer up to 4,247 h/s and 3,557 h/s, respectively. The first could net you 205 Raptoreum a day, while the latter delivers up to 172. At $0.0220255 per Raptoreum and utilizing an energy cost of $0.12/kWh, a Ryzen 9 5950X makes around $4.16 a day, while a Ryzen 9 5900X puts in a respectable $3.43. That means the Ryzen 9 5950X ($739) practically pays for itself in 178 days and the Ryzen 9 5900X ($524) in about 153 days. While the Ryzen 9 5950X delivers a higher hashrate, the Ryzen 9 5900X takes less time to break even.
The more serious cryptocurrency miners may tap into AMD's core-heavy Ryzen Threadripper or EPYC products. These types of investors are obviously in it for the long game. For example, the Ryzen Threadripper 3970X mines up to 404 Raptoreum per day, while something like the EPYC 7742 gets you 597 Raptoreum. Now, imagine having two of these EPYC bad boys in a dual-socket system or AMD's spick-and-span Milan-X processors with up to 768MB of L3 cache.
Supply for AMD's Zen 3 processors is still very stable, and some of the SKUs, such as the Ryzen 7 5800X have dropped down to $329.99 at Micro Center. There are also some small price cuts with the other Ryzen 5000 chips, but overall, there is ample stock. For the meantime, Raptoreum doesn't seem to have any effect on Ryzen stock, which is a good thing. However, the panorama could change when Ryzen with 3D V-Cache brings chips that can deliver up to 192MB of L3 cache, tripling that of a vanilla Ryzen processor.
