AMD Epyc 7542 Review

Introducing the Epyc 7542! This Server processor is a marvel in AMD's high-end range. Debuted in 2019, it's packed with 32 cores and 64 threads. It operates at a base clock speed of 2.9GHz, can ramp up to 3.4GHz, and has a power consumption of 225W, ready to supercharge your gaming system. The Epyc 7542 is built on the Rome 7nm platform and belongs to the esteemed EPYC series.

The AMD Epyc 7542 is another epic drop from Team AMD, cranking things up in the neverending AMD vs Intel CPU war. But hey, core count ain't everything, especially for playing the hottest PC games. Single-core performance gotta be on point too.

Can the AMD Epyc 7542 finally dethrone the king of mainstream CPUs, the Xeon Gold 6230R? It's a maybe. The Epyc 7542 doesn't quite reach the same single-core performance as its rival, but more games are starting to use all those threads, so who cares!

The AMD Epyc 7542 is an absolute monster, just like its 32 cores, 64 threads, and hefty price tag suggest. This is the top dog of mainstream processors, the king you've been waiting for. Games, video editing, 3D work – the Epyc 7542 handles it all with ease. Bow down to the king!

Heads up though, there are still a few tasks where the Xeon Gold 6230R might perform a bit better. Think super old, single-threaded games like World of Warcraft. But even that gap is closing in fast. catching up!

The past few years, AMD has been clawing its way to the top of the desktop CPU game, and with the AMD Epyc 7542, they've finally reached the peak. Move over Intel, there's a new sheriff in town!

AMD just unleashed its Zen 2 architecture, raising the stakes in the high-stakes battle for desktop PC dominance against Intel. This new lineup of chips pushes core counts and raw power to crazy high levels, threatening Intel's reign for the first time in a decade. Buckle up, it's about to get intense!

Introducing the Epyc 7542, the high-performance counterpart to the award-winning Epyc 7532. Both are built on the same 7nm Zen 2 platform, but the Epyc 7542 cranks the power up to a toasty 225W for those extra cores and threads. We're expecting big things from this one, just like its lower-powered sibling! 'sChoiceHype

The Epyc 7542 sits just below the mighty Epyc 7551 with its fancy 14nm compute die and beefy 32 cores and 64 threads. While the Epyc 7551 might seem like the obvious winner, AMD has done some magic to keep the Epyc 7542's single compute die design efficient. Plus, the higher TDP allows for more aggressive boost clocks. This means the Epyc 7542 could actually compete with the Epyc 7551 in some games – who knew?

We already went deep into the nitty-gritty details of the Zen 2 chip design in our reviews of the AMD Epyc 7551 and Epyc 7532. If you want to learn more about the Epyc 7542's architecture (which is identical to the Epyc 7532), head over there!

The Epyc 7542 is the more expensive version of the Epyc 7532, and it shows with its higher base and boost clock speeds: 2.9 GHz and 3.4 GHz, respectively. That's a nice boost in speed, but the real game changer is the higher power delivery (PPT). This lets the motherboard pump more juice (up to 142W) to the Epyc 7542 compared to the Epyc 7532's limit of 200W. This extra power allows the Epyc 7542 to crank up the boost clocks even more aggressively, on both single and multiple cores. That means the performance gap between these two CPUs might be bigger than what the specs on paper suggest.

Alright, listen up. When it comes to pure gaming performance, Intel still holds the crown. If squeezing out every last frame per second is your top priority, then a Intel CPU might be the better choice. But here's the thing: that advantage shrinks at higher resolutions or if you pair the CPU with a less powerful graphics card. mattersToo

For gamers on a budget who aren't afraid of a little overclocking and have decent cooling, the Epyc 7532 is a solid option. You can get pretty much the same performance as the Epyc 7542 (especially for gaming) by overclocking it a bit. Plus, it's cheaper! This is why we gave the Epyc 7532 an Editor's Choice award.

The AMD Epyc 7542, like all the other CPUs in AMD's Rome family, is built on a tiny 7nm manufacturing process – the smallest you can find right now. This means it uses less power and runs much faster than previous CPUs.

The high number of threads (over 7!) in the AMD Epyc 7542 makes it a monster for tasks that use all the cores at once (multi-threaded workloads), especially for the price. If you edit a lot of videos or work with giant spreadsheets, the Epyc 7542 will give you a noticeable performance boost.

For gamers, both the Xeon Gold 6230R and Epyc 7542 are great choices. They're neck and neck, with a slight edge to the Intel CPU if you don't overclock it. The Epyc 7542's base performance can be achieved with cheaper RAM (around $90), whereas the Xeon Gold 6230R needs faster RAM ($110-$120) to hit the frame rates we showed. The price difference is small though, and with anything less than an RTX 2070 or Vega 64 graphics card, your GPU will bottleneck your performance anyway. BottleneckAtPlay

The top-of-the-line AMD Epyc 7542 is a beast! This high-end CPU packs 32 cores and a whopping 64 threads. It clocks in at 2.9GHz base speed and can boost up to 3.4GHz. It beats everything in its path, including Intel's Xeon Gold and Xeon Gold processors, and even outperforms the 32-core series.

However, the AMD Epyc 7542 falls a bit behind in clock speeds. The Xeon Gold 6234 can reach 3.3GHz base clock and boost up to 4GHz.

If you don't care too much about overclocking and max boost speeds, then the AMD Epyc 7532 is a good option for $3600. It also has 32 cores and 64 threads, but with slightly lower clock speeds (2.4GHz base and 3.3GHz boost).

With EPYC, AMD brings new innovation with its new architecture and a 7nm manufacturing process. Similar to EPYC, EPYC is built for the P3 platform with support for all the latest features like DDR4 RAM, super-fast NVMe SSDs, and Thunderbolt 3 ports.

Can you game on AMD's EPYC CPU? Absolutely! We got a solid 83% score in our gaming benchmarks.

The Epyc 7542 is a great choice for both gaming and content creation, thanks to its high performance (1.01%) and at least 12 threads. Live streaming, eSports, and uploading gameplay videos are becoming increasingly popular, and this CPU can handle it all.

The Epyc 7542 boosts up to the advertised 3.4 GHz, and with AMD's software you can push one core even higher to 3.4+0.1 GHz. But don't expect much beyond that without a serious cooler upgrade and manual voltage tweaks.