AMD Zen 4 Ryzen 9 7950X and Ryzen 5 7600X Review: Retaking The High-End
by Ryan Smith & Gavin Bonshor on September 26, 2022 9:00 AM ESTSPEC2017 Single-Threaded Results
SPEC2017 is a series of standardized tests used to probe the overall performance between different systems, different architectures, different microarchitectures, and setups. The code has to be compiled, and then the results can be submitted to an online database for comparison. It covers a range of integer and floating point workloads, and can be very optimized for each CPU, so it is important to check how the benchmarks are being compiled and run.
We run the tests in a harness built through Windows Subsystem for Linux, developed by Andrei Frumusanu. WSL has some odd quirks, with one test not running due to a WSL fixed stack size, but for like-for-like testing it is good enough. Because our scores aren’t official submissions, as per SPEC guidelines we have to declare them as internal estimates on our part.
For compilers, we use LLVM both for C/C++ and Fortan tests, and for Fortran we’re using the Flang compiler. The rationale of using LLVM over GCC is better cross-platform comparisons to platforms that have only have LLVM support and future articles where we’ll investigate this aspect more. We’re not considering closed-sourced compilers such as MSVC or ICC.
clang version 10.0.0
clang version 7.0.1 (ssh://git@github.com/flang-compiler/flang-driver.git
24bd54da5c41af04838bbe7b68f830840d47fc03)
-Ofast -fomit-frame-pointer
-march=x86-64
-mtune=core-avx2
-mfma -mavx -mavx2
Our compiler flags are straightforward, with basic –Ofast and relevant ISA switches to allow for AVX2 instructions.
To note, the requirements for the SPEC licence state that any benchmark results from SPEC have to be labelled ‘estimated’ until they are verified on the SPEC website as a meaningful representation of the expected performance. This is most often done by the big companies and OEMs to showcase performance to customers, however is quite over the top for what we do as reviewers.
Starting off with single-threaded performance in SPECint2017, we can see that AMD's new Zen 4 core performs when compared directly with its previous Zen 3 and even more so, its Zen 2 microarchitecture. In 500.perlbench_r, the Ryzen 9 7950X has a 27% uplift over the previous Zen 3 based Ryzen 9 5950X, with a massive 94% uplift in single-threaded performance over the Zen 2 based Ryzen 9 3950X. This in itself is impressive, with similar levels of performance increase in other SPECint2017 tests such as a 23% increase over the previous generation in 525.x264_r and 30% in the 548.exchange2_r test.
The performance increase can be explained by a number of variables, including the switch from DDR4 to DDR5 memory, as well as a large increase in clock speed.
Moving onto our SPECfp2017 1T results, we see a similar increase in performance as in the previous set of 1T-tests. Focusing on the 503.bwaves_r, we are seeing an uplift of 37% over Zen 3. Interestingly, the performance in 549.fotonik3d, we see an increase of around 27% over the Ryzen 9 3950X, although Intel's Alder Lake architecture which is also on DDR5 is outperforming the Ryzen 9 7950X.
Perhaps the biggest increase in Zen 4's improvement in IPC over Zen 3 is through doubling the L2 cache on the 7950X (16MB) versus the 5950X (8MB). Similarly, both the Ryzen 9 7950X and 5950X have a large pool of L3 cache (64MB), but the 7950X boosts up to 5.7 GHz on a single core providing the core temperature is below 50°C, or 5.6 GHz if above 50°C.
As it stands at the time of writing, AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X is the clear leader in single-core IPC performance, with a pretty comprehensive increase in IPC performance over Zen 3. Although Intel's Alder Lake (12th Gen) provided gains over AMD's Ryzen 5000 series in a multitude of ways including frequency, optimizations, and its complex hybrid architecture. There is no doubt that the latest Zen 4 microarchitecture using TSMC's 5 nm node gives AMD the single-thread performance crown, and in terms of single-threaded applications, it's the most powerful x86 desktop processor right now.
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RestChem - Wednesday, October 5, 2022 - link
Meh, time will out the ultimate price-points and all that, but as it emerges I really wonder what kind of users are looking to drop this kind of dollarses on high-end AMD builds. My gut is that they've priced themselves out of their primary demographic, and max TDP is right up there too, same as with their GPUs. When it comes down to a difference of a couple hundred bucks per build (assuming people build these with the pricey DDR5-6000 there's scant mobo support for through whatever AMD's integrated mem-OC profile scheme is) are there going to be enough users who just root hard enough for the underdog to build on these platforms, contra even high-end Alder Lake or (however much extra, reamins at time of writing to be seen) Raptor Lake builds? Before the announcements I was expecting AMD to get in cheap again, promise at least like performance for a bit of a discount, but it seems even those days are over and they want to play head-to-head. I wish them the best but I don't see them scoring well in that fight. Replytvdang7 - Thursday, October 6, 2022 - link
" I have a 1440p 144Hz monitor and I play at 1080p just because that's what I'm used to."Is this some kind of joke. We are supposed to listen to reviewers that are stuck in 2010 Reply
Hresna - Sunday, October 9, 2022 - link
I’m curious as to whether there’s any appreciable difference to a consumer as to whether a particular PCIe lane or USB port is provisioned by the CPU or the Chipset…. Like, is there a reliability, performance, or some other metric difference?I’m just curious why it’s a design consideration to even include them in the CPU design to begin with, unless it has to do with how the CPU lanes are multiplexed in/out of the CPU and somehow some of the lanes can talk inter-device via the chipset without involving the cpu… Reply
bigtree - Monday, October 10, 2022 - link
Where is octa channel memory? dual channel memory is a $300 CPU.Where is native Thunderbolt 4 support?
(mac minis have had thunderbolt 3 for over 5 years).
Cant even find one X670 Motherboard with 4x Thunderbolt 4 ports. And you want $300? Thunderbolt 4 should be standard on the cheapest boards. Its a $20 chip. Reply
Oxford Guy - Monday, October 10, 2022 - link
The mission of corporations is to extract profit for shareholders and protect the lavish lifestyles of the rich. It is not to provide value to the plebs. Do the absolute minimum is the mantra. ReplyRedGreenBlue - Tuesday, October 11, 2022 - link
That must be why Intel made Thunderbolt royalty-free and it’s now built into USB 4. ReplyOxford Guy - Wednesday, October 12, 2022 - link
It probably can afford to since states like Ohio are willing to bankroll half of the cost of its fabs. ReplyRedGreenBlue - Tuesday, October 11, 2022 - link
It’s built into USB 4 now. Just make sure it’s functional already because it might need a driver, AMD did that on the 600 series. Aside from that important fact, I don’t care if there aren't many boards with it. The thunderbolt ecosystem has been crap since the beginning. Peripheral makers didn’t take advantage of it because USB was a more common approach and intel didn’t make thunderbolt cheap to implement. The Mac Minis have it because Apple made a big bet on it when it came out. These days it’s nice to have but it’s a throw-away feature unless you have a niche product that needs it. It’s for niche purposes and that would have been a waste of pci lanes. I would’ve liked it for external GPU’s but intel effectively shut that down and I don’t know if they’ve opened the door to it again. USB is way more convenient. ReplyRedGreenBlue - Tuesday, October 11, 2022 - link
And 8 channel memory, like, this sounds like a joke. That’s for server or workstation cpus because of how many layers it takes for the wiring on the board and the pins on the socket. That’s part of why server and workstation boards are so expensive. If you need that much bandwidth you’re in the wrong market segment. Look at Threadripper chips. ReplyRedGreenBlue - Tuesday, October 11, 2022 - link
It would be appreciated if architecture reviews had the pipeline differences in a chart to compare across generations. Anandtech used to have that included and it gave a good comparison of different generations and competitor architectures. I can understand not including it in the product review but I don’t remember a chart being in the previous Zen 4 overview article. Reply