Xeon 6960P vs EPYC 9654P

The Xeon 6960P packs 72 cores / 144 threads, while the EPYC 9654P offers 96 cores / 192 threads — the EPYC 9654P has 24 more cores. Boost clocks reach 3.9 GHz on the Xeon 6960P versus 3.7 GHz on the EPYC 9654P — a 5.3% clock advantage for the Xeon 6960P (base: 2.7 GHz vs 2.4 GHz). The Xeon 6960P uses the Granite Rapids (2024−2025) architecture (Intel 3 nm), while the EPYC 9654P uses Genoa (2022−2023) (5 nm, 6 nm). In PassMark, the Xeon 6960P scores 130,659 against the EPYC 9654P's 116,324 — a 11.6% lead for the Xeon 6960P. Geekbench 6 single-core — the metric most relevant to gaming — records 2,100 vs 2,025, a 3.6% lead for the Xeon 6960P that directly translates to higher frame rates. Multi-core Geekbench: 60,000 vs 23,214 (88.4% advantage for the Xeon 6960P). L3 cache: 432 MB (total) on the Xeon 6960P vs 384 MB (total) on the EPYC 9654P.

The Xeon 6960P uses the LGA7529 socket (PCIe 4.0), while the EPYC 9654P uses SP5 (PCIe 5.0) — making them incompatible on the same motherboard. Both support up to DDR5-6400 memory speed. The Xeon 6960P supports up to 3072 GB of RAM compared to 6 TB — 199.2% more capacity for professional workloads. Both feature 12-channel memory with ECC support. PCIe lanes: 96 (Xeon 6960P) vs 128 (EPYC 9654P) — the EPYC 9654P offers 32 more lanes for additional GPUs or NVMe drives. Chipset compatibility: Intel 600 Series (Xeon 6960P) and SP5 (EPYC 9654P).

Virtualization support: VT-x, VT-d (Xeon 6960P) vs AMD-V, SEV-SNP (EPYC 9654P). Primary use case: Xeon 6960P targets Server, EPYC 9654P targets Data Center / Single Socket. Direct competitor: Xeon 6960P rivals EPYC 9654; EPYC 9654P rivals Xeon 8490H.

The Xeon 6960P launched at $9625 MSRP, while the EPYC 9654P debuted at $10625. At current prices ($9625 vs $5345), the EPYC 9654P is $4280 cheaper. In terms of value (PassMark points per dollar), the Xeon 6960P delivers 13.6 pts/$ vs 21.8 pts/$ for the EPYC 9654P — making the EPYC 9654P the 46.3% better value option.