In brief: It's no secret that crypto miners have played a big part in the graphics card shortage. Now, it appears that a new cryptocurrency mined using CPUs could have a similar effect on processors, especially those from AMD with large L3 caches.

Bitcoin Press reports that Raptoreum (RTM), which launched earlier this year following three years in testnet, could potentially worsen shortages of AMD CPUs with massive L3 caches, such as Ryzen, Threadripper, and Epyc processors.

Proof-of-work (PoW) coin Raptoreum is based on the GhostRider mining algorithm to keep the Raptoreum blockchain network clean from ASICs. Combining modified Cryptonite and x16r algorithms, GhostRider utilizes the L3 cache for mining, meaning miners are scrambling to grab AMD CPUs such as the Ryzen 9 3000/5000 series (up to 64MB of L3), Threadripper (up to 128MB), and EPYC (up to 256MB).

Profitability tables show that the AMD Ryzen 9 3900 can bring 4600 H/s in Raptoreum without optimizations, while the Ryzen 9 5950X can reach up to 6800 H/s, though the latter chip's higher price needs to be taken into account when looking at profitability. For comparison, Intel's new Core i9-12900K with its 30MB of cache offers 3700 H/s.

This Raptoreum calculator shows that using a Ryzen 9 3900X can net users 101 Raptoreum per day. With an energy cost of $0.12, that works out at an average profit of $2.98 per day. Based on the CPU's $469 Amazon price, miners will be in profit by around 157 days. As with all crypto, the price of Raptoreum does fluctuate wildly, so these figures can change.

Some people are already snapping up Ryzen CPUs in huge quantities to create Raptoreum mining farms such as the one above that was published by El Chapuzas Informatico (via VideoCardz). It uses 28 ASUS Prime X570P motherboards and 28 Ryzen 9 CPUs.

With the run-up to the holidays and the chip crisis, some CPUs are in short supply. Moreover, AMD recently reduced the price of certain Ryzen 5000-series processors as a response to Alder Lake, making team red's chips even more appealing to Raptoreum miners.

Center image credit: El Chapuzas Informatico