Performance Summary, Who Is Information technology For?

With a ton of benchmarking data and we feel like in some ways we're just starting to scratch the surface. Over the next few weeks we'll be spending more than time looking into new productivity workloads that we can throw at the 2990WX to try and piece of work out if it's good for anything other than just rendering.

For now let'south have a expect at some price vs. performance besprinkle plots before wrapping this review upwards.

Permit's take the POVray data as the 2990WX had its best showing here, information technology's much faster than the 7980XE while costing slightly less. And so for rendering tasks the 2990WX is the bees knees and while it might not offer the best value overall, information technology certainly provides the best value at the top end of the calibration.

The 2950X destroys the Cadre i9-7900X offer significantly more functioning at a reduced price. The only better value option here is the discounted 1950X. Still in POVray both 2d Gen Threadripper CPUs look great.

The 2nd price vs performance scatter plot we're going to look at is for Adobe Premiere as this pretty much sums up the 2990WX when it's handling a non-rendering task.

Hither we see how badly things can become for AMD's new 32-core processor. When encoding with Premiere the 2990WX is considerably worse value than the Core i9-7980XE and therefore every single CPU tested.

You lot're basically looking at Threadripper 1920X performance for 4x the price. Thankfully the 2950X is again solid and offers the nigh bang for your buck of whatever CPU tested.

Who Is Information technology For?

The Threadripper 2990WX certainly is an unusual beast. In short, AMD has made a 32 core CPU that appears quite practiced for rendering. And that was nearly as much equally we can prove from our standard test suite. The memory limitations do seem to make the 2990WX a very focused production and we're non sure how many users are going to observe information technology useful for powering their workstation, given the inconsistent results.

On the other hand, we have zip bad to say nigh the Threadripper 2950X. It does everything well and in our opinion it takes over from the 1950X as the ultimate loftier-end desktop CPU.

We're still in the procedure of conducting extensive multi-tasking benchmarks to understand the 2990WX better. Then far we call up what nosotros're seeing is painting a more positive moving picture. We're following up with additional testing that'due south more than focused on taking advantage of the 2990WX in the next day or so (Update: now live. We're calling that mega-tasking, check out the results here.)

AMD themselves admit this is a focused product and that's why they have branded this bit to include the 'W. They have also shown in their review guide the 2990WX beating the 7980XE in Corona, Blender, Cinebench, POV-Ray, MAYA and Adobe Dimension. What practice all those programs take in common? They're all rendering applications.

Meanwhile the Threadripper 2950X was tested against the Cadre i9-7900X in HandBrake, TrueCrypt, 7-nothing, Premiere and a few rendering applications. Then while the 2950X can clearly practice information technology all, AMD is well aware the 2990WX tin can't, simply they're not going to tell you that. Worse still, rather than give you a adventure to work out the 32 core model might not be all information technology's cracked up to be for your particular workload, they took pre-orders for just that office a calendar week in advance.

We voiced these concerns with our AMD contacts over the weekend and they bodacious us that anyone who is unhappy with how the 2990WX performs can abolish their pre-lodge and if any money has exchanged hands it will be refunded. So we're not set to shut the volume on the 2990WX only nonetheless, only given that there are some obvious shortcomings, we do experience the $1800 asking price is a flake much. The Core i9-7980XE is grossly overpriced as it is, but at to the lowest degree it does everything well and brusk of the insane request cost, has no weakness.

The 2990WX, on the other hand, not only has the same issue all massively cadre heavy CPUs have: utilization. Finding software that can fully apply it, but the kicker is the software also can't be heavy on retention admission, or it will cripple the 2990WX to the point where it'south as slow as a mainstream desktop CPU.

This ultimately is the issue with the 2990WX. Nosotros would be okay with most software like Premiere not using 64 threads, but in that case the 2990WX should human action like a 2950X and as we've seen, it doesn't every bit it'south mostly much slower.

So how do you know if your particular workload will cripple the 2990WX? You don't unless someone tests information technology first. This means y'all need someone to test drive it for you lot, and it's non simply skillful enough that they examination the software you're using, they have to test it in a style that'southward similar to your use case, if not exactly the same.

We'd have been perfectly fine with all this if AMD came out and said, the 2990WX is designed for rendering workloads and due to limited bandwidth, performance might be lower than expected. Information technology's pretty much the Threadripper Pixar edition, no really, they should accept called information technology the 2990CB, that makes more sense.

Simply, nosotros're not fix to telephone call it merely even so. The TR 2990WX nonetheless has more to bear witness although it won't exist the drop in 32-core upgrade replacement I was expecting. Withal I will be getting an upgrade and that upgrade will be the real hero here. It'southward no secret we actually liked the 1950X and the 2950X is merely a more refined version, typically offer five-8% more performance, while coming in $100 less at launch. Right now the TR 1950X is a dandy good buy at $780, but considering the 2950X's introductory price it'south amazing value.

The good news is the more than affordable Threadripper 2950X becomes the ultimate high-terminate desktop CPU. We feel many like united states of america will be scraping their 2990WX plans, and most will exist moving to the 2950X instead. Of grade, if y'all already have a TR 1950X the 2950X is non a worthwhile upgrade, then your processor hasn't been rendered obsolete by any means.

Shopping Shortcuts:
  • AMD Threadripper 1950X on Amazon, Newegg
  • AMD Threadripper 2950X on Amazon, Newegg (bachelor Aug 31)
  • AMD Threadripper 2990WX on Amazon, Newegg

AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2950X Scorecard

Pros: Takes over its predecessor as the ultimate high-cease desktop CPU. The 2950X offers more performance, uses less power and runs cooler than its Core i9 competition. Supports ECC memory, quad-aqueduct memory and more PCIe lanes than regular Ryzen processors.

Cons: Only marginally faster than the TR 1950X. Information technology'due south not a gaming processor, meaning it performs well only you tin can get similar gaming functioning for less.

AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2990WX Scorecard

Pros: The 2990WX is a beastly CPU capable of breaking records on rendering tasks. Other processes that can employ many cores merely are not memory intensive could benefit from the 2990WX.

Cons: Memory bandwidth issues outcome in inconsistent performance on a diversity of tasks. Very expensive. Potentially a one-trick pony that does one affair really, really well, but the others not so much (for the cost).