Third-Gen Threadripper Lands: AMD Threadripper 3970X & 3960X Review

[hahahanoobs]

The big question is, what comes next? AMD has exhausted the more cores approach, so what's next? AMD has struggled with clock speeds for years, so with core count exhaustion and 7nm+ en route, will we finally see AMD pick up the slack where they have been lagging behind for years? TR also has a problem with memory channels not being detected, forcing you to reseat the CPU many times to fix it. Yea, no thanks. Get your crap together AMD!

Will we see a CPU launch that doesn't suffer from memory compatibility, constant BOS updates etc? I hope so for AMD's sake. Buggy games at launch are bad enough, and I'm sure consumers don't want that problem with their hardware. I know I don't.

Don't even get me started on the imminent supply issues. AMD is giving too many reasons to wait on pulling the trigger. AMD was so bad they left the market for 5 years while Intel is nowhere near that scenario. If you think the majority of companies and pros aren't waiting to see what Intel does with 10 and 7nm, you're drunk. These are expensive parts (HEDT and server) and buying decisions are more thought out compared to decisions made by your average consumer.

AMD needs consistency to topple Intel, and that's probably at least three years away. Assuming Intel isn't king again at that time. Another reason I haven't jumped on the hype train.

Time will tell and I'll be watching. If Ryzen 3 doesn't get me to upgrade, I don't think AMD ever will.

 

[pit1209]

The big question is, what comes next? AMD has exhausted the more cores approach, so what's next? AMD has struggled with clock speeds for years, so with core count exhaustion and 7nm+ en route, will we finally see AMD pick up the slack where they have been lagging behind for years? TR also has a problem with memory channels not being detected, forcing you to reseat the CPU many times to fix it. Yea, no thanks. Get your crap together AMD!

Will we see a CPU launch that doesn't suffer from memory compatibility, constant BOS updates etc? I hope so for AMD's sake. Buggy games at launch are bad enough, and I'm sure consumers don't want that problem with their hardware. I know I don't.

Don't even get me started on the imminent supply issues. AMD is giving too many reasons to wait on pulling the trigger. AMD was so bad they left the market for 5 years while Intel is nowhere near that scenario. If you think the majority of companies and pros aren't waiting to see what Intel does with 10 and 7nm, you're drunk. These are expensive parts (HEDT and server) and buying decisions are more thought out compared to decisions made by your average consumer.

AMD needs consistency to topple Intel, and that's probably at least three years away. Assuming Intel isn't king again at that time. Another reason I haven't jumped on the hype train.

Time will tell and I'll be watching. If Ryzen 3 doesn't get me to upgrade, I don't think AMD ever will.

AMD won't change your mind because objectivity is not part of a fan's mind. I won't waste my time in here stating the obvious and the facts that any major and serious hardware reviewer and journalist has written since the arrive of Zen 2 but when the people that uses any Intel CPU say that because they get 5% more fps at 1080p Intel is still king then you know how much the times have changed indeed.

 

[Boshum]

I guess it depends on how you define obsolete. A newly launched CPU doesn't become invalid or "obsoleted" because the companies, competitor has a CPU that's faster in some synthetic benchmarks. [charmsd] - not a member of the superlative tossing team.



There are "benchmarks" all over Ytube showing MARGIN OF ERROR results. I hoped this site had a minimum of 'fan clubbishness' but it turns out, no. At MSRP these CPU's are only marginally affordable.

My response was in the context of the post I replied to. If there was any fanboyism, it was on that posters part. Your notation in this chart from gamers nexus is nonsensical in any context.

 

[OptimumSlinky]

Wondering why you're still running 1080p gaming benchmarks. Would be nice to see how this CPU preforms at 1440p or even 4k

Because at 1440p and 4K you're limited by the GPU.
If anything, CPUs should be tested at 720p.

 

[m3tavision]

For gaming, Intel is still the way to go.
The $450 9900K is beating/matching these $1400 and $2000 CPU's, but for all other intents and purposes, I say again, hard to argue against Ryzen.

Edited:
Sorry didn't see the 18core intel, skipped over the article my bad.
Still not apples to apples by a long shot, but nice to see it there.
Intel need to lower their prices!

Until you do a real-use gaming benchmark, with a few browsers open, and perhaps while streaming...

9900k is a nice chip, but still on an old outdated socket.

 

[CharmsD]

My response was in the context of the post I replied to.

As was mine.

Your notation in this chart from gamers nexus is nonsensical in any context.

No it is not. The existence of thousands of CHARTS Steve spends 30+ minutes of viewers time speed-reading to on YouTube is nonsense. If you don't want to see INTEL mentioned for being at the top, I dunno, maybe complain to Steve.

Now, you're just trying to start a fight, so...goodbye!

 

[Irata]

Until you do a real-use gaming benchmark, with a few browsers open, and perhaps while streaming...

9900k is a nice chip, but still on an old outdated socket.

Adoredtv's review had a nice stress test with impressive results. Sadly, they only tested this on TR3 and the 3900x. I recommend you check this out.

 

[Puiu]

I don't think anyone


10/10 tests
Synthetics
6/1 games
Only six games

Watch Gamers Nexus review to see more real world MT tests and scenarios and games that aren't picked that perform the same on all chips tested.

Some still prefer things like Quicksync and CUDA. It all boils down to what software and workload the user needs. I promise you that anyone considering TR will look well beyond the tests you've seen here if productivity is paramount.

Is TR awesome? Yes. But not in every scenario as the tests shown here would have you believe. These are best case scenarios using synthetic tests.

CUDA results also scale with more cores, you can see this in the Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2020 results here. Very few things rely solely on just the GPU. Blender for example can use both the CPU and GPU at the same time to render.

Quicksync makes a lot more sense in lower end systems with no dedicated GPU or a cheap and/or old one (and some laptops). In general you will see people use NVENC or software encoding for video/streaming.

Besides, depending on the settings, QSV isn't all that great. It falls into the "nice to have sometimes" category. Ignoring the big glitches this guy got, you'll understand a bit more why ppl use software encoding:

This should clarify a few things to you on what people with more serious editing need and what they really use QVS for (if they even use it):

 

[Boshum]

As was mine.



No it is not. The existence of thousands of CHARTS Steve spends 30+ minutes of viewers time speed-reading to on YouTube is nonsense. If you don't want to see INTEL mentioned for being at the top, I dunno, maybe complain to Steve.

Now, you're just trying to start a fight, so...goodbye!

Counting the number of Intels vs AMDs on some particular benchmark chart is meaningless, What are you trying to prove? That Intel makes more CPU's than AMD. It doesn't demonstrate anything. Anyways, the post I responded to was referring to this review, not other reviews.

 

[fadingfool]

I guess it depends on how you define obsolete. A newly launched CPU doesn't become invalid or "obsoleted" because the companies, competitor has a CPU that's faster in some synthetic benchmarks. [charmsd] - not a member of the superlative tossing team.



There are "benchmarks" all over Ytube showing MARGIN OF ERROR results. I hoped this site had a minimum of 'fan clubbishness' but it turns out, no. At MSRP these CPU's are only marginally affordable.

ROFL - erm there are only 4 chips in that list (9980XE = 10980XE = 9980XE OC = 10980XE, 7960X = 7960X OC, 3950X = 3950X OC and 3970X = 3970X OC)

 

[Boshum]

Nice catch. Clearly you were not 'blind' to the details.

 

[Burty117]

Great review as always! The comment section went down hill quite quickly. Interesting to see certain members here think an 8 Core 8 thread Intel CPU is a good buy for gaming.

Guess you haven't played any recently released games, or watched any of Gamers Nexus's latest video's. Or watched any of Digital Foundry's recent videos... Or even Linus's own "We OVERCLOCKED this $5000 PC from 10 years ago!!!" video. It's pretty clear more cores and specifically threads are already the way new games that were built entirely around DX12 and Vulkan have gone.

 

[amstech]

Interesting to see certain members here think an 8 Core 8 thread Intel CPU is a good buy for gaming.

Well, the 9700K is at the top of all the gaming charts and can be had for around $300, It also overclocks really well.

It's pretty clear more cores and specifically threads are already the way new games that were built entirely around DX12 and Vulkan have gone.

It's pretty clear that even with newer games, there is no advantage to having more then 8 cores. If you look back at the past 10-15 years of PC gaming, it takes 5-10 years for developers to program for more cores and threads. The new consoles are 8/16, and if you also look at the gaming results, the best CPU is an 8/16 90% the time. Your not future proofing at all by purchasing a CPU that has more cores/threads then that if you simply care to just game.
By the time you actually need more then 8 cores, another 4-5 years will have passed and the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have released.
Not saying certain architectures are outdated, or that people should buy Intel if just building a gaming rig, but if you ONLY care to game, getting anything more then an 8/16 is waste now, and for the foreseeable future.

 

[Lew Zealand]

I guess it depends on how you define obsolete. A newly launched CPU doesn't become invalid or "obsoleted" because the companies, competitor has a CPU that's faster in some synthetic benchmarks. [charmsd] - not a member of the superlative tossing team.



There are "benchmarks" all over Ytube showing MARGIN OF ERROR results. I hoped this site had a minimum of 'fan clubbishness' but it turns out, no. At MSRP these CPU's are only marginally affordable.

First off the 10980XE is not obsolete, merely an old design which is still competitive for some uses nowadays.

However, the partial chart you posted does not support anything you are arguing for and is a great example of cherrypicked data. It is only a single benchmark, it mixes the same parts at 2 different speeds and is missing the majority of HEDT chips available today. It proves nothing one way or another.

Missing current-gen chips:
Core i9-10900X
Core i9-10920X
Core i9-10940X
TR 3960X

Intel makes more current-gen SKUs. If most of them are slower than AMD chips, that does not make Intel's chips overall faster than AMDs just because they make more SKUs. By that logic a company would only need to make SKUs for every 100MHz or every 20W difference and claim victory by sheer numbers in a chart.

 

[Lew Zealand]

Well, the 9700K is at the top of all the gaming charts and can be had for around $300, It also overclocks really well.


It's pretty clear that even with newer games, there is no advantage to having more then 8 cores. If you look back at the past 10-15 years of PC gaming, it takes 5-10 years for developers to program for more cores and threads. The new consoles are 8/16, and if you also look at the gaming results, the best CPU is an 8/16 90% the time. Your not future proofing at all by purchasing a CPU that has more cores/threads then that if you simply care to just game.
By the time you actually need more then 8 cores, another 4-5 years will have passed and the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have released.
Not saying certain architectures are outdated, or that people should buy Intel if just building a gaming rig, but if you ONLY care to game, getting anything more then an 8/16 is waste now, and for the foreseeable future.

I agree, 8C8T at $340 is a good deal for low rez high refresh gaming. It won't fall behind for a few years and if someone wants to spend the $140 extra over a R5 3600 for 9% more frames at 1080p (https://tpucdn.com/review/amd-ryzen-5-3600/images/relative-performance-games-1920-1080.png), then they are probably happy with spending more money in 2-3 years for a new platform and the second best gaming processor at that time.

 

[Boshum]

Well, the 9700K is at the top of all the gaming charts and can be had for around $300, It also overclocks really well.


It's pretty clear that even with newer games, there is no advantage to having more then 8 cores. If you look back at the past 10-15 years of PC gaming, it takes 5-10 years for developers to program for more cores and threads. The new consoles are 8/16, and if you also look at the gaming results, the best CPU is an 8/16 90% the time. Your not future proofing at all by purchasing a CPU that has more cores/threads then that if you simply care to just game.
By the time you actually need more then 8 cores, another 4-5 years will have passed and the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have released.
Not saying certain architectures are outdated, or that people should buy Intel if just building a gaming rig, but if you ONLY care to game, getting anything more then an 8/16 is waste now, and for the foreseeable future.

It is a gradual shift. Some developers are already there. Some will be there in a year. We aren't starting at day zero for every developer. 6-core i5's are already having frametime issues in some games. I agree though that 8/16 will be good for quite awhile though. I don't see any current chips beating a 9900K in gaming for the next few years (except maybe the 3900X on up in 3 years), even if I suspect the 9700K will go down. Now Zen 3 next year might topple Intel in gaming...I suspect it will be real close.

 

[Burty117]

Well, the 9700K is at the top of all the gaming charts and can be had for around $300, It also overclocks really well.


It's pretty clear that even with newer games, there is no advantage to having more then 8 cores. If you look back at the past 10-15 years of PC gaming, it takes 5-10 years for developers to program for more cores and threads. The new consoles are 8/16, and if you also look at the gaming results, the best CPU is an 8/16 90% the time. Your not future proofing at all by purchasing a CPU that has more cores/threads then that if you simply care to just game.
By the time you actually need more then 8 cores, another 4-5 years will have passed and the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett will have released.
Not saying certain architectures are outdated, or that people should buy Intel if just building a gaming rig, but if you ONLY care to game, getting anything more then an 8/16 is waste now, and for the foreseeable future.

I'm sorry, but you are living under a rock. I cba to go grab all the links for you but just have a look at the latest Call of Duty and RDR2 and you'll see what I mean. RDR2 has micro suttering in anything with a low core count or doesn't have Multi-Threading and I have a group of 8 friends who all play CoD on PC and everyone with an i3 or i5 has had issues with Stuttering or other apps freezing (discord) due to CPU at 100% but anyone who's got 4 cores and 8 threads or more has been fine, so i7 and onwards or the one person who has a Ryzen in the group, the 3600 doesn't seem to struggle at all.

On top of all of this, Linus did a video of what a $5k PC from 10 years ago runs like today and Vulkan basically made it from unplayable to running like a normal modern PC.

If Rockstar and Infinity Ward have gone completely DX12/Vulkan and we're now seeing decent thread usage in games today, we're only a couple of years away before most other developers tune their engines to run on these API's and utilise more threads. If we're already seeing micro stuttering on 8C/8T and maxed out CPU usage on 6C/6T today, on popular games, it's only going to get more intense from here.

I bet anyone who buys the 3950X ends up using it for years to come, probably a similiar life span like the 2600k enjoyed and if you look at Gamers Nexus RDR2 benchmarks, it still kicks *** thanks to the extra threads.

 

[Squid Surprise]

I'm sorry, but you are living under a rock. I cba to go grab all the links for you but just have a look at the latest Call of Duty and RDR2 and you'll see what I mean. RDR2 has micro suttering in anything with a low core count or doesn't have Multi-Threading and I have a group of 8 friends who all play CoD on PC and everyone with an i3 or i5 has had issues with Stuttering or other apps freezing (discord) due to CPU at 100% but anyone who's got 4 cores and 8 threads or more has been fine, so i7 and onwards or the one person who has a Ryzen in the group, the 3600 doesn't seem to struggle at all.

On top of all of this, Linus did a video of what a $5k PC from 10 years ago runs like today and Vulkan basically made it from unplayable to running like a normal modern PC.

If Rockstar and Infinity Ward have gone completely DX12/Vulkan and we're now seeing decent thread usage in games today, we're only a couple of years away before most other developers tune their engines to run on these API's and utilise more threads. If we're already seeing micro stuttering on 8C/8T and maxed out CPU usage on 6C/6T today, on popular games, it's only going to get more intense from here.

I bet anyone who buys the 3950X ends up using it for years to come, probably a similiar life span like the 2600k enjoyed and if you look at Gamers Nexus RDR2 benchmarks, it still kicks *** thanks to the extra threads.

Um... I think you just made his point for him... he's talking about the 9700 being fine for the foreseeable future, NOT i3 or i5 processors with 4 cores...

If all you want your PC for is gaming, you'd be pretty foolish to purchase the threadrippers here... Yes, they game just about as well - but they cost WAY more!

By the time the 3970 is clearly superior to the 9700/9900 (in gaming only), many years will have gone by and you'd be buying a new PC, regardless of your original choice.

What IS completely crazy, would be buying a 10980 (or worse, the 9980), as it costs almost as much as a threadripper and gets destroyed by them. The 9980 is simply stupid, as it costs $2000 and can't even beat the 10980 which is $1000!

It's pretty clear for the high end computer market now:
If you want serious gaming, and that's it, then you buy the Intel 9700 / 9900..
If you want serious application use (see workstation) AND gaming too, you buy the Threadripper
If you want a slightly more affordable PC that does it all, you go 3900

Once Intel goes 7nm, we'll see if they can retake the workstation crown - but for now, AMD has them beat.

 

[amstech]

Um... I think you just made his point for him... he's talking about the 9700 being fine for the foreseeable future, NOT i3 or i5 processors with 4 cores...
If all you want your PC for is gaming, you'd be pretty foolish to purchase the threadrippers here... Yes, they game just about as well - but they cost WAY more!
By the time the 3970 is clearly superior to the 9700/9900 (in gaming only), many years will have gone by and you'd be buying a new PC, regardless of your original choice.

Squid! Where have you been dude?
We missed ya!

If we're already seeing micro stuttering on 8C/8T and maxed out CPU usage on 6C/6T today, on popular games, it's only going to get more intense from here.

If you buy more then an 8/16 CPU to game, your wasting your money. Saying you will need more then 8/16 is absolutely biased nonsense, I don't care what CPU you buy. It will be 2022-2024 before the 9900K shows any age in gaming results.
This is not going to change anytime soon, and please enlighten me on the stuttering issue. This I have not heard.

 

[dualkelly]

AMD won 10 out of 10 of the non-gaming benchmarks by a significant amount in most, and the gaming benchmarks vs the 10980XE by 6 to 1. Are all Intel fanboys this clueless?

Simple math man. most of the test expt the 7zip stuff you see the AMD only able to pull ahead of the intel chip by a little over 50% and only on the multicore programs. The AMD chip almost has twice as many cores so it should be pulling ahead over 100% on most of these test and yet it falls behind. While its an impressive chip its still lagging behind a year old chip from intel.

 

[Irata]

Simple math man. most of the test expt the 7zip stuff you see the AMD only able to pull ahead of the intel chip by a little over 50% and only on the multicore programs. The AMD chip almost has twice as many cores so it should be pulling ahead over 100% on most of these test and yet it falls behind. While its an impressive chip its still lagging behind a year old chip from intel.

Well, Cascade Lake X was released on the same day as TR3, so it's hardly a "year old chip".

Next, yes, TR3 sees the biggest advantage in applications that scale very well with more treads - 7 Zip' VRay and Cinebench are good examples were TR3 scores twice as high as Cascade X.

In other benchmarks this is not the case as you correctly state, however this may be due to that particular application not scaling linearly or not scaling that well at all.

A good way to check this would be comparing Ryzen 3800x to 3950x results. In 7 Zip and Cinebench you do see good scaling (I.e. what you would expect going from 8C to 16C on the same architecture), but on others you do not.

So if on the same architecture you do not see a 100% gain for 100% more cores but instead ≤ 50%, why would you reasonably expect this to be different for the TR3 - Cascade X comparison?

 

[Boshum]

Simple math man. most of the test expt the 7zip stuff you see the AMD only able to pull ahead of the intel chip by a little over 50% and only on the multicore programs. The AMD chip almost has twice as many cores so it should be pulling ahead over 100% on most of these test and yet it falls behind. While its an impressive chip its still lagging behind a year old chip from intel.

Different applications scale more or less well to different levels of threads. No great mystery here. So if you don't get a reasonable advantage with 24 to 36 cores for your particular workload, you can always go with a 16-core 3950X which still frequently outperforms the 18-core Intel with less threads and a lower cost.

 

[Irata]

Different applications scale more or less well to different levels of threads. No great mystery here. So if you don't get a reasonable advantage with 24 to 36 cores for your particular workload, you can always go with a 16-core 3950X which still frequently outperforms the 18-core Intel with less threads and a lower cost.

Or you could run several things at once

 

[hahahanoobs]

AMD won't change your mind because objectivity is not part of a fan's mind. I won't waste my time in here stating the obvious and the facts that any major and serious hardware reviewer and journalist has written since the arrive of Zen 2 but when the people that uses any Intel CPU say that because they get 5% more fps at 1080p Intel is still king then you know how much the times have changed indeed.

Gamers play certain games. They don't play every game. Generalizing isn't productive. My main game is Battlefield, so if CPU A is 20fps faster for roughly the same price as CPU B, guess what CPU I'm gonna care about? CPU matters far more at 1080p, so AMD doesn't have the advantage there, other than a cheap price and hoping their higher core count will sway the noobs looking for a new gaming platform.

For ~80% of consumers, Intel is faster for what they do on a computer. If I had to buy a gaming CPU right now to play at 1080p, and I do play at 1080p/144Hz, I'd settle for a 9600K, but I'd want a 9700K. The main roadblocks are my countries' weak dollar, and I'm not completely satisfied with BFV to justify a full platform upgrade yet.

 

[Boshum]

For ~80% of consumers, Intel is faster for what they do on a computer.

That's BS.