The AMD Ryzen 9 3950X Review: 16 Cores on 7nm with PCIe 4.0
by Dr. Ian Cutress on November 14, 2019 9:00 AM ESTCPU Performance: Encoding Tests
With the rise of streaming, vlogs, and video content as a whole, encoding and transcoding tests are becoming ever more important. Not only are more home users and gamers needing to convert video files into something more manageable, for streaming or archival purposes, but the servers that manage the output also manage around data and log files with compression and decompression. Our encoding tasks are focused around these important scenarios, with input from the community for the best implementation of real-world testing.
All of our benchmark results can also be found in our benchmark engine, Bench.
Handbrake 1.1.0: Streaming and Archival Video Transcoding
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
7-zip v1805: Popular Open-Source Encoding Engine
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.
Please note, if you plan to share out the Compression graph, please include the Decompression one. Otherwise you’re only presenting half a picture.
Again, AMD's 16-core Zen 2 hardware is breezing past Intel's 18-core Skylake-Refresh family. Even with the added frequency that Cascade Lake will bring, it would be hard to see it able to topple AMD here.
WinRAR 5.60b3: Archiving Tool
My compression tool of choice is often WinRAR, having been one of the first tools a number of my generation used over two decades ago. The interface has not changed much, although the integration with Windows right click commands is always a plus. It has no in-built test, so we run a compression over a set directory containing over thirty 60-second video files and 2000 small web-based files at a normal compression rate.
WinRAR is variable threaded but also susceptible to caching, so in our test we run it 10 times and take the average of the last five, leaving the test purely for raw CPU compute performance.
As a variable threaded workload, WinRAR also probes memory performance. Both the 3700X and 3800X beat the 3950X here.
AES Encryption: File Security
A number of platforms, particularly mobile devices, are now offering encryption by default with file systems in order to protect the contents. Windows based devices have these options as well, often applied by BitLocker or third-party software. In our AES encryption test, we used the discontinued TrueCrypt for its built-in benchmark, which tests several encryption algorithms directly in memory.
The data we take for this test is the combined AES encrypt/decrypt performance, measured in gigabytes per second. The software does use AES commands for processors that offer hardware selection, however not AVX-512.
Our AES benchmark seemed a bit off - I would suggest we're being memory limited here but the Ryzen 9 3900X scores a lot higher over the 3950X. More investigation needed.
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drunkenmaster - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
That's not really how it works. 10nm for Intel is struggling for clock speed and yields but more importantly the architecture remains fairly close to the same overall. What architecture gains they made they appear to be losing in clock speed.The only really big advantage AMD has from 7nm TSMC, aside from also lower clocks, is die size. They can fit 16 cores into a die size that Intel can, but can't easily. Frankly the only direct benefit Intel will get from 10nm is the fact that a similar 16 core chip would hopefully use the same power as AMDs, though with the way their 10nm is working due to poor yields and lacking clock speeds they would likely up the voltage to push clock speeds as high as possible and well, there is a reason their 10/12 core stuff isn't coming out on 10nm any time soon.
AMD gained performance on architecture but they were already close to this competitive with their 8 core 14nm chip (a worse than Intel 14nm node). As with what Intel would gain, AMD gained in performance/watt and die size, the actual competitiveness of their chips is purely due to being a competitive architecture. Intel won't magically destroy them, they'll be in the same ballpark.
This is the thing people have been kind of weird about, a year ago Zen 1 wasn't far behind Intel on a significantly worse '14nm' node that was more like a lets say 18nm node and Intel had the best 14nm node by a mile. While AMD have a headstart on better nodes when Intel gets to 10nm it's only in the same ballpark as TSMC 7nm. Even when Intel finally make the leap they are only gaining parity with TSMC, not an advantage and their architectural advantage is not really there. With Icelake the only 'win' is AVX512, which is basically unused for the home market.
10nm won't enable Intel to destroy anyone, if their 10nm started working well it would enable them to drop to similar power usage as AMD and offer similar core counts in the same die sizes, the architectures are close enough that the chips would be pretty damn close in overall performance.
Though that's assuming Intel managed a 16 core with a ringbus which is one of the major reasons for it's competitiveness in areas like gaming. If they have to go to a mesh for 16 core then they lose that advantage.
Spunjji - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Solid assessment. Thanks for the post :)lobz - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
My dear friend, intel's 10nm chips will not be superior in performance, because they can't hit either the same core count or the frequency needed to let the high IPC matter. Also, by the time intel's 7nm comes out, AMD will have a better than the current process and an even faster architecture. We're speaking at least 2 years from now. Destroy AMD's chips? Good luck.drothgery - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Except at the highest core counts (on the desktop, HEDT, and server), Intel has much more of a pricing problem with Ryzen than a performance problem.Phynaz - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
I would say AMD has the pricing problem, as Intel sets their own price, where AMD has to react to intel.Death666Angel - Friday, November 15, 2019 - link
Intel: "We just decided to drop the 10xxx HEDT pricing by 50% or so. No reaction to any of our competitors. Totally our own decision. Move along, nothing to see here." I get that.Qasar - Saturday, November 16, 2019 - link
intel sets its own price, maybe before, but not now. as Death666Angel said, intel didn't drop the price of its 10xx series cpus cause they were being nice, it was because they can't charge that much any more.John_M - Monday, November 25, 2019 - link
That's such a dumb argument. If course they'll be competitive on price if they are priced to compete! You can say that about anything. The sentence reduces to nothing.AIV - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
Market pricing for intel HEDT processors have already halved. eg. i9-9980XE is now available for ~1050EUR. See https://geizhals.eu/intel-core-i9-9980xe-extreme-e... .Jorgp2 - Thursday, November 14, 2019 - link
That's retailers lowering prices to clear stock, has nothing to do with Intel