At our supplier $2k would pay for a 1U server with a 16 core 3GHz Epyc 7313P with 32GB RAM, a tiny SSD and non-redundant power.
$3k pays for a 1U server with a 32 core 2.6GHz Epyc 7513 with 128GB RAM and 960GB of non-redundant SSD storage (probably fine for build servers).
All using server CPUs, since that was easier to find. If you want more cores or more than 3GHz things get considerably more expensive.
OP did say "consumer Epyc", so presumably referring to the parts using the AM5 socket. From a quick check on Newegg, it looks like barebones servers for that platform start at under $1000, to which you need to add CPU, RAM, and storage. So a $3000 budget to assemble a low-end Zen4/5 EPYC server is realistic: $570 for the 16-core EPYC 4565P, a few hundred for DDR5 ECC unbuffered modules, a few hundred for an enterprise SSD, and you have a credible current-gen server from readily available parts at retail prices, without any of the enterprise pricing and procurement hassle.
I imagine they would need quite a few servers to replace their current setup.
Then there's also the overhead of setting up and maintaining the hardware in their location. It's not just a "solve this problem for ~$2,000 and be done with it".
I don't know the actual specs or requirements. Maybe 1 build server is sufficient, but from what I know there's nearly 4,000 apps on FDroid. 1 server might be swamped handling that much overhead in a timely manner.
One server with today's tech can easily replace several servers that are 12+ years old. 4000 apps doesn't sound like a lot of work for one machine, unless you assume almost all of them are releasing new builds more than once a week. A 16-core CPU can rebuild a full Gentoo desktop OS multiple times a week.
That's $2k/3k to get a box with fully assembled hardware delivered to your doorstep or to a DC of your choice.
Space in your basement or the colo rack of a datacenter along with power, data and cooling is an expense on top. But whatever old servers they have are going to take up more space and use more power and cooling. Upgrading servers that are 5+ years old frequently pays for itself because of the reduced operating costs (unless you opt for more processing power at equal operating cost instead)
Yes but thoose are Zen 3 Milan cpu released in 2021 I believe.
Not that they are bad and would not be way better than what they have, just that I though the parent was quite the optimist with his Zen4/Zen5 pricing.