The ASUS Pro WS X570-Ace Review: x8x8x8 with No RGB
by Gavin Bonshor on August 12, 2019 9:00 AM ESTCPU Performance, Short Form
For our motherboard reviews, we use our short form testing method. These tests usually focus on if a motherboard is using MultiCore Turbo (the feature used to have maximum turbo on at all times, giving a frequency advantage), or if there are slight gains to be had from tweaking the firmware. We put the memory settings at the CPU manufacturers suggested frequency, making it very easy to see which motherboards have MCT enabled by default.
For X570 we are running using Windows 10 64-bit with the 1903 update as per our Ryzen 3000 CPU review.
Rendering - Blender 2.7b: 3D Creation Suite - link
A high profile rendering tool, Blender is open-source allowing for massive amounts of configurability, and is used by a number of high-profile animation studios worldwide. The organization recently released a Blender benchmark package, a couple of weeks after we had narrowed our Blender test for our new suite, however their test can take over an hour. For our results, we run one of the sub-tests in that suite through the command line - a standard ‘bmw27’ scene in CPU only mode, and measure the time to complete the render.
Streaming and Archival Video Transcoding - Handbrake 1.1.0
A popular open source tool, Handbrake is the anything-to-anything video conversion software that a number of people use as a reference point. The danger is always on version numbers and optimization, for example the latest versions of the software can take advantage of AVX-512 and OpenCL to accelerate certain types of transcoding and algorithms. The version we use here is a pure CPU play, with common transcoding variations.
We have split Handbrake up into several tests, using a Logitech C920 1080p60 native webcam recording (essentially a streamer recording), and convert them into two types of streaming formats and one for archival. The output settings used are:
- 720p60 at 6000 kbps constant bit rate, fast setting, high profile
- 1080p60 at 3500 kbps constant bit rate, faster setting, main profile
- 1080p60 HEVC at 3500 kbps variable bit rate, fast setting, main profile
Rendering – POV-Ray 3.7.1: Ray Tracing - link
The Persistence of Vision Ray Tracer, or POV-Ray, is a freeware package for as the name suggests, ray tracing. It is a pure renderer, rather than modeling software, but the latest beta version contains a handy benchmark for stressing all processing threads on a platform. We have been using this test in motherboard reviews to test memory stability at various CPU speeds to good effect – if it passes the test, the IMC in the CPU is stable for a given CPU speed. As a CPU test, it runs for approximately 1-2 minutes on high-end platforms.
Compression – WinRAR 5.60b3: link
Our WinRAR test from 2013 is updated to the latest version of WinRAR at the start of 2014. We compress a set of 2867 files across 320 folders totaling 1.52 GB in size – 95% of these files are small typical website files, and the rest (90% of the size) are small 30-second 720p videos.
Synthetic – 7-Zip v1805: link
Out of our compression/decompression tool tests, 7-zip is the most requested and comes with a built-in benchmark. For our test suite, we’ve pulled the latest version of the software and we run the benchmark from the command line, reporting the compression, decompression, and a combined score.
It is noted in this benchmark that the latest multi-die processors have very bi-modal performance between compression and decompression, performing well in one and badly in the other. There are also discussions around how the Windows Scheduler is implementing every thread. As we get more results, it will be interesting to see how this plays out.
Point Calculations – 3D Movement Algorithm Test: link
3DPM is a self-penned benchmark, taking basic 3D movement algorithms used in Brownian Motion simulations and testing them for speed. High floating point performance, MHz, and IPC win in the single thread version, whereas the multithread version has to handle the threads and loves more cores. For a brief explanation of the platform agnostic coding behind this benchmark, see my forum post here.
Neuron Simulation - DigiCortex v1.20: link
The newest benchmark in our suite is DigiCortex, a simulation of biologically plausible neural network circuits, and simulates activity of neurons and synapses. DigiCortex relies heavily on a mix of DRAM speed and computational throughput, indicating that systems which apply memory profiles properly should benefit and those that play fast and loose with overclocking settings might get some extra speed up. Results are taken during the steady-state period in a 32k neuron simulation and represented as a function of the ability to simulate in real time (1.000x equals real-time).
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PeachNCream - Tuesday, August 13, 2019 - link
It's a stylistic choice. It's difficult (pointless) to debate the merits of someone's feelings about how something looks since that sort of thing boils down to opinion and taste. No matter which direction you go, those preferences are not rooted so much in attainment of functionality. Where the frustration begins is within a fairly large segment of the potential market for high end consumer and prosumer computing equipment has no desire to purchase gamer-styled products that typically feature RGB lighting. That segmet's demand is unsatisfied because manufacturers are not catering to them for various reasons and therefore there will be some that speak out in the small hope that a company will acknowledge the unmet demand and sell a suitable product. There's nothing childish about what's happening. You're just seeing economic forces and personal tastes at work.Canam Aldrin - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
No thunderbolt 3, no 10GbE. That really holds it back from being a serious workstation board. I couldn’t use it.haukionkannel - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
Then msi creation could be suitable to you. Very well done IO section in that board. It seems to miss the ecc memory though... but if all that is needed the upcoming threatripper solutions could ansver that too!Dug - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
I agree. When looking for a new system board, this wouldn't do.I checked their site and there is no mention of thunderbolt support anywhere.
hubick - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
I agree. And the second M.2 at only x2 is disappointing, as that basically ruins it for RAID 0/1.I like AMD for PCIe 4.0, but I want I/O, not x3 GPU, so I was looking at the Gigabyte X570 Aorus Xtreme, which has x16/x8/x4, ECC, 10GbE (Aquantia boo), triple x4 m.2, and 6 SATA ports (enough for a ZFS raidz2 array). I'll probably wait and go Rome or new Threadripper instead to get more lanes though.
mjz_5 - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
If you use the third m.2 slot it disables two Sata portshubick - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
Uhg, that sucks. Thanks for the tip though. In advance of a new system, I grabbed a couple Corsair MP600 I'm running in RAID 0 for my OS now, on PCIe 3.0 though, which is mainly what I'd want the first two slots for - but I'd really like a third to house a ZFS slog device. All the more reason to wait for Threadripper/Rome I guess.mjz_5 - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
Wonder why they included a U.2 port. Would rather have another M.2 port or at least run the second one at full X4haukionkannel - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
U2 is defacto in workstation environment. M2 is more towards the normal consumers.DanNeely - Monday, August 12, 2019 - link
To an extent I think it's like Sata-Express a few years ago; the multi-year lead time on board design means they need to guess what adoption will look like a few years in advance of selling the product.U.2 does have a presence in the highest end enterprise segment; but I suspect that if they knew it was going to be MIA in the prosumer market they probably would've switched its lanes with an onboard m.2.