Intel Xeon Gold 6438N: specs and benchmarks
Aggregate performance score
Xeon Gold 6438N provides good benchmark performance at 33.23% of a leader's which is a 96-core EPYC 9655P.
Summary
Intel started Xeon Gold 6438N sales 10 January 2023 at a recommended price of $3,351. This is a Sapphire Rapids architecture desktop processor primarily aimed at professional systems. It has 32 cores and 64 threads, and is based on Intel 7 manufacturing technology, with a maximum frequency of 3600 MHz and a locked multiplier.
Compatibility-wise, this is FCLGA4677 processor with a TDP of 205 Watt and a maximum temperature of 85 °C. It supports DDR5-4800, DDR5-4400 memory.
Primary details
Xeon Gold 6438N processor market type (desktop or notebook), architecture, sales start time and pricing.
| Place in the ranking | 118 | |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | |
| Cost-effectiveness evaluation | 25.69 | |
| Market segment | Server | |
| Power efficiency | 15.34 | of 100.00 (Ryzen Z1 Extreme) |
| Architecture codename | Sapphire Rapids (2023−2024) | |
| Release date | 10 January 2023 (1 year ago) | |
| Launch price (MSRP) | $3,351 | of 17,906 (Xeon Platinum 8280L) |
Cost-effectiveness evaluation
Performance per price, higher is better.
Detailed specifications
Basic microprocessor parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base frequency and turbo boost clock, lithography, cache size and multiplier lock state. These parameters can generally indicate CPU performance, but to be more precise you have to review its test results.
| Physical cores | 32 (Dotriaconta-Core) | |
| Threads | 64 | |
| Base clock speed | 2 GHz | of 4.7 GHz (FX-9590) |
| Boost clock speed | 3.6 GHz | of 6.2 GHz (Core i9-14900KS) |
| L1 cache | 80K (per core) | of 80 KB (EPYC 9965) |
| L2 cache | 2 MB (per core) | of 2 MB (Xeon 6980P) |
| L3 cache | 60 MB | of 1152 MB (EPYC 9684X) |
| Chip lithography | Intel 7 nm | of 3 nm (Apple M3 Max 16-Core) |
| Maximum case temperature (TCase) | 85 °C | of 105 °C (Core i7-5950HQ) |
| 64 bit support | + |
Compatibility
Information on Xeon Gold 6438N compatibility with other computer components and devices: motherboard (look for socket type), power supply unit (look for power consumption) etc. Useful when planning a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. Note that power consumption of some processors can well exceed their nominal TDP, even without overclocking. Some can even double their declared thermals given that the motherboard allows to tune the CPU power parameters.
| Number of CPUs in a configuration | 2 | of 8 (Opteron 842) |
| Socket | FCLGA4677 | |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 205 Watt | of 500 Watt (Xeon 6960P) |
Technologies and extensions
Technological capabilities and additional instructions supported by Xeon Gold 6438N. You'll probably need this information if you require some particular technology.
| Instruction set extensions | Intel® AMX, Intel® SSE4.2, Intel® AVX, Intel® AVX2, Intel® AVX-512 | |
| AES-NI | + | |
| AVX | + | |
| vPro | + | |
| Enhanced SpeedStep (EIST) | + | |
| Speed Shift | + | |
| Turbo Boost Technology | 2.0 | |
| Hyper-Threading Technology | + | |
| TSX | + | |
| Deep Learning Boost | + |
Security technologies
Processor technologies aimed at improving security, for example, by protecting against hacks.
| TXT | + | |
| EDB | + | |
| SGX | Yes with Intel® SPS | |
| OS Guard | + |
Virtualization technologies
Supported virtual machine optimization technologies. Some are specific to Intel only, some to AMD.
| VT-d | + | |
| VT-x | + | |
| EPT | + |
Memory specs
Types, maximum amount and channel number of RAM supported by Xeon Gold 6438N's memory controller. Depending on the motherboard, higher memory frequency may be supported.
| Supported memory types | DDR5-4800, DDR5-4400 | |
| Maximum memory size | 4 TB | of 6 TiB (EPYC 9124) |
| Max memory channels | 8 | of 12 (Xeon Platinum 9221) |
| ECC memory support | + |
Peripherals
Specifications and connection types of supported peripherals.
| PCIe version | 5 | |
| PCI Express lanes | 80 | of 128 (EPYC 7551P) |
Benchmark performance
Single-core and multi-core benchmark results of Xeon Gold 6438N. Overall benchmark performance is measured in points in 0-100 range, higher is better.
Combined synthetic benchmark score
This is our combined benchmark performance rating. We are regularly improving our combining algorithms, but if you find some perceived inconsistencies, feel free to speak up in comments section, we usually fix problems quickly.
Passmark
Passmark CPU Mark is a widespread benchmark, consisting of 8 different types of workload, including integer and floating point math, extended instructions, compression, encryption and physics calculation. There is also one separate single-threaded scenario measuring single-core performance.
Send your test results of Xeon Gold 6438N.
AMD equivalent
According to our data, the closest AMD alternative to Xeon Gold 6438N is Xeon Platinum 8160M, which is faster by 1% and higher by 1 position in our ranking.
Here are some closest AMD rivals to Xeon Gold 6438N:
Similar processors
Here is our recommendation of several processors that are more or less close in performance to the one reviewed.
