Chinese chipmaker teases “world-leading” performance of next-gen 7nm CPU — 3B6600 rocks eight LA864 cores clocked at 3 GHz

A senior Loongson Zhongke Technology exec has boasted about the firm’s 3B6600 CPU in a Q&A session with investors. During Loongon’s 2024 semi-annual results briefing today, Chairman and General Manager Hu Weiwu said the upcoming processor would offer “world-leading” performance. Chinese language tech site ITHome shared a screenshot of the investor Q&A transcript.

Hu was responding to a question about the proposed timing of the Loongson 3B6600 CPU tape out. The lengthy question also addressed the firm’s product cycles and the Loongson CPU family’s performance.

Addressing the first of the multi-shot query’s angles, Hu told investors the Loongson 3B6600 CPU tape out would be sometime in 1H 2025. According to our machine translation, he reassured Q&A listeners that mass-produced chips would roll out in 2H 2025.

Regarding cadence, Hu said that Loongson would aim to launch “at least one server or PC chip every year on average.” Maintaining a regular tempo is a desirable trait for tech companies and has long been a key feature of many of the most successful firms.

Lastly, and probably the most interesting nugget from Hu, was a request for information regarding the architecture and performance of the upcoming Loongson 3B6600 processor. Hu underlined significant architectural changes that have been implemented with the 3B6600. Thanks to these LoongArch changes, and we would presume a range of other optimizations, the new CPU would deliver a single-core performance “expected to be in the world's leading ranks,” asserted Hu.

Previous information from Loongson, such as PR announcements and roadmaps, indicates that the next-gen 3B6600 processor includes eight LA864 cores with a clock frequency of 3.0 GHz alongside LG200 integrated graphics. A faster 3B7000, with a frequency of 3.5 GHz, is also supposed to be in the pipeline.

Earlier this year, we reported on the first independent reviews of the current-gen Loongson 3A6000 CPU. This 12nm 4C/8T chip looked good compared to modern AMD and Intel rivals using benchmarks like SPEC 2017 IPC - and with all platforms locked to the same CPU clock speed. However, the 3A6000 was held back in real-life workloads and benchmarks due to its maximum 2.5 GHz, meaning it trailed even chips like the 2020-era Intel Core i3-10100 in practical scenarios.

Perhaps the rumored new 7nm process has enabled faster clocks, core count boosts, and other improvements, and the latest CPUs could be single-thread champs? It is probably best to wait and see rather than take Hu’s word.