R0H1T The biggest downside from this being the insane number of IF links to make Rome o_O

The biggest benefit of moving I/O off to a different die is that it makes the CCXs smaller if you don't make them bigger because all of that logic isn't in the CCX anymore and is instead located in the centralized I/O hub. Smaller dies means better yields, better yields means an opportunity to add more cores.Personally my concern is with latency but, I'm not sure if that's an unfounded issue or not. It's likely the case that it's more beneficial to move the I/O components. It's also possible that the I/O hub might not need to be done on the same process as the CCXs which might further improve yields if the larger die is being done on a more mature process.I'm interested to see how Rome turns out because if it turns out well, it means that AMD is keeping up the pace that started with the first Zen chips which is necessary to keep Intel on the offensive. If AMD can effectively double the number of cores without too much more cost, then Intel is going to remain on the defensive.Intel: We can make mainstream 8c/16t CPUs too.AMD: Hold my beer.