Hardware

The problem with this line of reasoning is that we don't buy CPUs in datacenter - we buy full servers from 3rd party suppliers. Look at a company such as CDW.

Most server customers aren't massive hyperscalers that need to maximize computer per rack-U. Xeon servers are plentiful, can be found for cheaper than their CPU MSRP's would suggest, and if we're looking for a 16 - 24 core model to spin up a branch office, a lot of times we don't even really care whether it's SPR or Epyc. There're other factors like "Is my LOB app certified by the vendor to run on Epyc"? etc.

A lot of times, when I need to order, a lot of the Epyc servers may be on backorder, or may be comparable pricing, or maybe I specifically need Xeon because I already have a Xeon Hyper-V server and want this server to be able to work in the event of a failover (best to keep your VMs on the same platform).

Hell, in Windows Server, Epyc only got support for nested virtualization with Server 2022, so it wasn't even a consideration when we did a big refresh a few years back.