Why it matters: With Zen 2 powering AMD's Ryzen 3000 chips and the recently revealed 2nd-gen Epyc CPUs, it appears the next product to use the architecture will be the 3rd-generation of Threadripper CPUs, codenamed Castle Peak. We don't know when these HEDT processors will arrive, but a possible appearance in Geekbench suggests they might only be a few weeks away.
A 32-core, 64-thread processor appeared on the Geekbench database under the name Sharkstooth, which is presumed to be AMD's internal name for 3rd-gen Threadripper. The engineering sample uses the codename AMD 100-000000011-11 and has the same configuration as the Threadripper 2990WX flagship.
The entry states a base frequency of 3.6GHz---no mention of a boost speed---along with 2MB of L1 cache, 16MB of L2 cache and 128MB of L3 cache. Threadripper 2950x, for comparison, has a 3.0GHz base clock, a 4.2GHz boost, and 64MB of L3 cache.
There are two Sharkstooth entries. One has a single-core score of 5932 and a multi-core score of 93344, while the other is 5677 single and 94772 multi. This beats the Threadripper 2990WX by 7-10% in single-core results and up to 35% in multi-core.
As with Ryzen 3000 and Epyc Rome, it's expected that the next Threadripper line will support PCIe 4.0. As Tom's Hardware notes, this will likely see AMD launch a new chipset to support the interface, possibly X599.
There's no 100 percent guarantee that this is 3rd-gen Threadripper, but all the signs point to it being AMD's next HEDT chip. No official word on when it might arrive, but some predict the company will launch it on September 7 alongside Ryzen 9 3950X.