Intel is gearing up for a return to the high-end desktop (HEDT) workstation market with the launch of the "Granite Rapids-WS" Xeon processors. A well-known hardware leaker, @momomo_us, has provided a list of potential SKUs, detailing their L3 cache capacities and clock speeds. At the top of this preliminary list is a SKU labeled as the "698X," featuring 336 MB of L3 cache and a clock speed of 2.0 GHz across all cores. The lower clock speed combined with naming conventions suggesting it's a top end SKU tier suggests this should be a higher-core SKU, though this is yet to be confirmed. The Granite Rapids-WS design is based on Intel's XCC server compute dies, incorporating two compute tiles that deliver up to 86 cores with two I/O tiles for connectivity, such as PCIe and memory controllers. To exceed 86 cores, Intel would likely need to adopt the larger UCC die and a bigger package.

The specifics of memory support for the workstation SKU are still uncertain. However, the server XCC family supports DDR5-6400 and can achieve higher effective speeds with MR-DIMMs. For workstations, Intel is likely to opt for an eight-channel memory configuration to balance capacity and board complexity, although a 12-channel memory setup is also possible. The Granite Rapids-WS processors are derived from Intel's server XCC dies, allowing for a quicker path to higher core counts in workstations. These "Granite Rapids" server dies are modified with a new socket and package to suit the specific needs of workstations. Intel manufactures the I/O die for Granite Rapids on the Intel 7 node, while the compute tiles are produced using Intel 3.Here are the SKUs listed:
698X: 2.00 GHz, 336 MB
696X: 2.40 GHz, 336 MB
678X: 2.40 GHz, 192 MB
676X: 2.80 GHz, 144 MB
674X: 3.00 GHz, 144 MB
658X: 3.00 GHz, 144 MB
656: 2.90 GHz, 72 MB
654: 3.10 GHz, 72 MB
638: 3.20 GHz, 72 MB
636: 3.50 GHz, 48 MB
634: 2.70 GHz, 48 MB