I wonder how they will do this in the workstation and server space, I don't really see how they can do away with socketed CPUs.
I wonder if we will go back to slotted CPUs, with a SOM style board with CPU and memory being plugged into a motherboard/chassis that's really just an I/O back plane. How will multi Cpu communication look then?
I guess we already have memory being pinned to a NUMA node and connecting to others via a vendor specific interconnect, so maybe it's not that strange and different from today.
I'm guessing the endgame will be consumer parts all being RAM-on-package with no external memory interface, and workstation/server parts will take a hybrid approach like Intel is already doing with the Xeon Max chips which have 64GB HBM on the package and an external DDR5 interface supporting terabytes of slower bulk memory.
Sockets still make sense because you can choose between 10 or so different CPUs for a particular socket format.
But with just in time manufacturing you can imagine ordering the CPU directly from the motherboard manufacturer which solders it in place.
Given that AMD has been releasing AM4 CPUs since 2016, I think it's reasonable to assume that many of those who know how to build computers in the first place have upgraded their CPU. Why switch the whole motherboard/CPU combination when you can just plug in a better CPU?