Next year will be tough for Intel; and this is because AMD will surely make a good run in the microprocessor market with its next-generation CPU, the AMD Ryzen. Considered as the fastest processor ever built in history, the AMD Ryzen also offers a much lower price than any of the current generation chipsets of Intel.

As AMD slowly unveiled the features of Ryzen, it becomes clear that the next-generation CPUs could easily outclass the Intel Core i7 6900K processor. On a test run, the AMD Ryzen delivered 40 percent improvement in instruction-per-clock (IPS) cycle without a power boost --- outperforming the Intel Core i7.

Ahead of its market debut in January 2017, the AMD Ryzen easily dumped its rival processor in terms of frame rate via a high-graphic PC game showdown. Its 8-core, 16-thread platform is truly a breakthrough when it comes to microprocessor architectures coupled with superb efficiency.

It will hit the road via AM4 motherboard with a Bristol Ridge chipset and a dual-memory channel, DDR4 memory subsystem. Ryzen is the fastest processor as compared to any of Intel's current or on-the-pipeline chipsets. It also includes energy-efficient FinFET process technology, access to 8MB of shared L3 cache, a large amount of extra L2 cache, a micro-op cache, and two AES encryption units for seamless and safe online PC gaming experience.

With AMD SenseMI technology under its hood, other notable add-on features of the AMD Ryzen include pure power, precision boost, extended frequency range, neutral net prediction, and smart prefetch. While it remains to be seen if AMD could entirely topple Intel, it clearly shows that the challenger has armed itself enough to dethrone the reigning leader in microprocessor development.

While the AMD Ryzen's features and specs will surely give a tough competition, AMD could further hurt Intel with Ryzen's more affordable price tag --- set within a $200 to $300 range, way lower than the over $1000 Intel chipset.

Watch a preview of the AMD Ryzen here: