AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X & 7970X Review: Revived HEDT Brings More Cores of Zen 4
by Gavin Bonshor on November 20, 2023 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- AMD
- HEDT
- ThreadRipper
- Zen 4
- Threadripper 7000
- TRX50
TR 7000 vs. Intel: Rendering
Rendering tests, compared to others, are often a little more simple to digest and automate. All the tests put out some sort of score or time, usually in an obtainable way that makes it fairly easy to extract. These tests are some of the most strenuous in our list, due to the highly threaded nature of rendering and ray-tracing, and can draw a lot of power.
If a system is not properly configured to deal with the thermal requirements of the processor, the rendering benchmarks are where it would show most easily as the frequency drops over a sustained period of time. Most benchmarks, in this case, are re-run several times, and the key to this is having an appropriate idle/wait time between benchmarks to allow for temperatures to normalize from the last test.
Some of the notable rendering-focused benchmarks we've included for 2024 include the latest CineBench 2024 benchmark and an update to Blender 3.6 and V-Ray 5.0.2.
We are using DDR5-5200 RDIMM memory on the Ryzen Threadripper 7980X and 7970X as per JEDEC specifications. For Intel's Xeon W9-3495X, we are using DDR5-4800 RDIMM memory as per Intel's JEDEC specifications. It should be noted that both platforms are run with their full allocation of memory channels, eg, TR7000 in 4-channel and Sapphire Rapids in 8-channel.
Below are the settings we have used for each platform:
- DDR5-5200 RDIMM - AMD Threadripper 7000
- DDR5-4800 RDIMM - Intel Xeon Sapphire Rapids WS
- DDR5-5600B CL46 - Intel 14th Gen
- DDR5-5200 CL44 - Ryzen 7000
Now we come to where the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7000 (and Xeon W9-3495X) excel, rendering. In all of the multi-threaded rendering benchmarks, the Threadripper 7980X makes the desktop chips look fairly insignificant in comparison. Interestingly, the Threadripper 7970X ($2499) with 32C/64T performs relatively close to the Xeon W9-3495X ($5889) with 56C/112T. This shows AMD's Zen 4 core not only performs exceptionally well in rendering from a price to performance point of view compared to Intel, but the Threadripper 7980X ($4999) with 64 Zen 4 cores is very well suited to users looking to render videos and other rendering based workloads.
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thestryker - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
Forgot to add: these are just the lower SKU workstation parts not a resurrection of HEDTwujj123456 - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
> the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X ($4999), despite having eight fewer cores than the W9-3495X ($5889), half the memory channels (4 vs. 8) and being ultimately cheaper, it is the better option.Am I reading it wrong? 7980X has eight more cores than W9-3495X not fewer. Don't think it changes the conclusion though.
rUmX - Tuesday, November 21, 2023 - link
You're rightGavin Bonshor - Tuesday, November 21, 2023 - link
Thanks for highlighting that obvious error, edited!bernstein - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
It remains true, what has been true for every threadripper: if your software allows for computing on more than one node, using 5-10 ryzen servers for the same money gives you more performance, redundancy, more io-bandwith & for many usecases even more total ram.vfridman - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
There is a lot of so called "professional" use cases that require a lot of RAM on a single machine. It often possible to split calculations across a cluster of machines, but not so with RAM.quorm - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
A nice increase in performance, but seems like almost everyone would be better off with either desktop ryzen or pro/epyc.Thunder 57 - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
You should either use bar graphs that show the 14900K's performance when limited to 125W, or you should just change the graphs and list the 14900K as 428W.AMD doesn't get a pass either but at least they are more honest. With these new Threadrippers they are actually spot on. Meanwhile the "350W" Xeon uses just over 500W. At the very least maybe include some efficiency charts?
thestryker - Monday, November 20, 2023 - link
Not that the power consumption is good, but these represent the absolute maximum power draw number seen they do not represent workload power draw. If they were to pick "real" power numbers they would have to measure power consumption for every single test and show that.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, November 21, 2023 - link
Deceptive power usage needs to be stopped.