The launch of AMD's next-generation Zen architecture is set to be one of the most exciting in 2016, with the company focusing on performance in the hopes of once again having a CPU that competes with Intel.

According to the latest report from OC3D, AMD has finished testing their Zen CPU, and are suggesting that the processor has "met all expectations" with "no significant bottlenecks" found in the design. This news allegedly comes from a former AMD employee with remaining ties to the company, although of course any rumor like this should be taken with a grain of salt.

If AMD's Zen processor is meeting internal expectations, there is hope that the chip will provide a significant performance boost over their existing and aging FX-series CPUs and newer Excavator-based APUs.

Zen is expected to be built using a 14 or 16nm FinFET manufacturing process, which will shrink AMD's design down to a node similar to what Intel uses. The cores themselves are designed to provide a significant instructions per clock gain over Excavator – AMD is hoping for a boost around 40% – which will improve integer and floating point performance per core to the point where its competitive.

The new line of CPUs will require a new motherboard socket (AM4), and will support DDR4 memory. Current estimates suggest the processor will launch in the later parts of 2016, but it will certainly be a launch to look out for next year.