Image of Massive Intel LGA7529 Socket Leaks Online

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Intel's socket LGA7259 smiles for the camera once again

Intel
(Image credit: @SprayOnCopper/Twitter)

You thought that Intel's LGA4677 socket for 4th Generation Xeon Scalable 'Sapphire Rapids' processors was massive? A detailed image of Intel's next-generation LGA7259 socket emerges (courtesy of Marvin Sevilla aka @SprayOnCopper) and demonstrates that this future socket is far larger than the current design. In fact, LGA7259 can probably challenge AMD's SP5 socket with 6,096 contacts.

Measuring 61 × 82mm without retention mechanism, Intel's LGA4677 for Xeon Scalable 'Sapphire Rapids' and 'Emerald Rapids' CPUs is already quite a massive socket. Yet, as the image published by Marvin Sevilla shows, it is considerably smaller than the company's upcoming LGA7259 socket for Intel's Granite Rapids and Sierra Forest CPUs that will pack more cores and will consume more power than Intel's previous offerings. 

The actual dimensions of Intel's LGA7259 are not publicly known (they are available to developers, of course), but based on what we know about the dimensions of Intel's current 4th Gen Xeon Scalable CPU, it looks like we are dealing with a socket that measures approximately 66 × 92.5mm including retention mechanism. Yet, AMD's 6,096-pin SP5 socket for EPYC 'Genoa' and 'Bergamo' processors has a footprint of 93.4mm × 120.3mm with retention mechanism so it dwarfs both Intel's LGA4677 and LGA7259. 

(Image credit: @SprayOnCopper/Twitter)

Intel's 4th Generation Xeon Scalable 'Sapphire Rapids' processors have a thermal design power of up to 350W, yet the peak power delivery limit for an LGA4677 socket is 764W, according to media reports. Intel's next generation CPUs in LGA7259 package are said to feature a TDP of around 500W, so their peak consumption will likely top 1 kW.  

If you expand the above tweet, you can see a picture of the gargantuan socket with a consumer processor added to scale. 

In addition to more power, Intel's LGA7259 socket will enable a 12-channel DDR5 and DDR5 MCR memory subsystem and some additional I/O, so far it seems that not all extra lanes are going to be used for power. 

What remains to be seen is how much Intel's LGA7259 socket will cost. Modern sockets with thousands of contacts with tiny pitches (Intel's LGA4677 features a grid spacing of 0.81389 × 0.9398mm) are hard to make and therefore expensive. Depending on where you buy, they cost between $101 and $124 per unit in 10,000-units quantities. Intel's LGA7259 is considerably larger and has more contacts, so it is reasonable to expect that this socket will be even more expensive than its predecessor.  

Socket costs only account for a tiny part of a server bill-of-materials, so the 7259-pin socket itself will hardly have a substantial influence on next-generation server prices. Yet, keeping in mind that CPU power consumption grows with the number of pins, server platform makers have to use not only more expensive sockets, but more advanced voltage regulating modules with more durable components, more capable cooling systems, and higher wattage power supplies, among other things. 

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Anton Shilov
Anton Shilov
Contributing Writer

Anton Shilov is a contributing writer at Tom’s Hardware. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.

18 Comments Comment from the forums
  • bit_user
    With mainstream server sockets getting so large, Intel is really going to have to bring back a mid-sized socket for smaller servers and workstations. Our software is usually deployed on smaller servers, and I worry the platform costs of these monstrosities is getting out of hand for those who don't need quite so many cores or PCIe lanes.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    Distributing uniform contact force across all of those pins is going to be challenging.

    bit_user said:
    With mainstream server sockets getting so large, Intel is really going to have to bring back a mid-sized socket for smaller servers and workstations.
    That socket is for Intel's top-of-the-line XSP stuff. We're talking multi-socket and optionally multi-chassis systems. We're way beyond small servers there. Intel will undoubtedly maintain an intermediate socket size between desktop and high-end server for everything else in-between.

    Back in the good old mainstream vs HEDT days, desktop had ~1100 pins and HEDT had ~2000. Now, desktop sockets are 1700-1800 pins and servers have ~4000 pins. I don't imagine AMD and Intel being particularly eager to produce something that slips between the two if that is what you were wishing for.
    Reply
  • jeremyj_83
    InvalidError said:
    That socket is for Intel's top-of-the-line XSP stuff. We're talking multi-socket and optionally multi-chassis systems. We're way beyond small servers there. Intel will undoubtedly maintain an intermediate socket size between desktop and high-end server for everything else in-between.
    That socket will most likely be used for the entire 6th (?) Gen Xeon Scalable line. I would wager that the smallest core count will now be 16 instead of 8 just due to the physical size. For an intermediate I doubt there will be anything. You will have desktop and server, unless Intel wants to get back into HEDT. For something "smaller" from Intel we might be left with embedded systems based on either Xeon or Atom.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    jeremyj_83 said:
    That socket will most likely be used for the entire 6th (?) Gen Xeon Scalable line. I would wager that the smallest core count will now be 16 instead of 8 just due to the physical size. For an intermediate I doubt there will be anything. You will have desktop and server, unless Intel wants to get back into HEDT. For something "smaller" from Intel we might be left with embedded systems based on either Xeon or Atom.
    Intel also has the Xeon W line, albeit primarily pitched at workstations instead of servers. I expect that sort of "middleground" to stick around for a while.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    InvalidError said:
    Intel also has the Xeon W line, albeit primarily pitched at workstations instead of servers. I expect that sort of "middleground" to stick around for a while.
    What has me worried is how the current generation of Xeon W uses the same socket as the Xeon Scalable server CPUs, even though they disabled & reassigned some of the pins. I hope you're right and they bring back a middle-sized socket, like we last had with LGA2066.

    I truly wonder how many of the pins are active in the Xeon W-2400 series, which supports only quad-channel memory and 64 PCIe lanes.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    bit_user said:
    What has me worried is how the current generation of Xeon W uses the same socket as the Xeon Scalable server CPUs, even though they disabled & reassigned some of the pins. I hope you're right and they bring back a middle-sized socket, like we last had with LGA2066.
    I actually meant what I wrote as LGA4xxx being the new middle-ground between desktop and 7000+ pins servers, not as expecting anything new being introduced between ~1700 pins desktop and 4xxx pins servers.

    The W5-34xx chips support 8-channel memory and 5.0x112 PCIe starting from $1600.
    Reply
  • jeremyj_83
    InvalidError said:
    Intel also has the Xeon W line, albeit primarily pitched at workstations instead of servers. I expect that sort of "middleground" to stick around for a while.
    Currently the W line uses the same socket as the other Xeons though....
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    jeremyj_83 said:
    Currently the W line uses the same socket as the other Xeons though....
    As I wrote in my response to bit, I meant "middleground" as in between desktop and the new LGA7529 socket. LGA4677 is now a middleground platform and the W5-34xx are relatively affordable by server standards.
    Reply
  • ezst036
    bit_user said:
    With mainstream server sockets getting so large, Intel is really going to have to bring back a mid-sized socket for smaller servers and workstations.

    Reply
  • bit_user
    InvalidError said:
    I actually meant what I wrote as LGA4xxx being the new middle-ground between desktop and 7000+ pins servers, not as expecting anything new being introduced between ~1700 pins desktop and 4xxx pins servers.
    And I actually meant what I wrote about that being overkill. For entry-level servers and workstations, 4-channel memory is fine. That's exactly what Intel did, in fact. So, they know this quite well.

    We don't need the other 4 channels' worth of pins, nor do we need pins for the extra 48 PCIe lanes. Or support for 350 W TDP. And that's just the extra baggage in the current gen.

    I expect that their W-3600 workstations will use the monstrosity that is LGA7529. They'll probably need the full 12-channels to counter upcoming ThreadRipper Pro.
    Reply