Tuesday, May 30th 2017

AMD Ryzen Threadripper Detailed - Why Intel HEDT is in Trouble

May 30th, 2017 23:07 Discuss (90 Comments)

AMD today talked a little more about the Ryzen Threadripper, its upcoming line of HEDT (high-end desktop) processors, which will compete with Intel's recently launched Core i7 and Core i9 X-series processors. The chips will still be launched "later this Summer," and AMD hasn't mentioned models, yet. We know of at least two features which will spell trouble for Intel, and it's not the CPU core performance.

The first of two killer Threadripper features is that it has 64 PCI-Express gen 3.0 lanes across all its models - 12-core and 16-core. This is unlike Intel, where you get 44 (not 64) PCIe lanes to begin with, and those start with the $999 Core i9-7900X ten-core processor. Models below this are relegated to 28 lanes, removing the biggest advantage of the HEDT platform - to be able to run more than one graphics card at full x16 PCIe bandwidth. The second killer Threadripper feature is its memory controller. AMD announced that Quad-channel DDR4 memory will be available across the lineup. This again is unlike Intel, where the Core i5-7640X and Core i7-7740X quad-core LGA2066 chips feature just dual-channel memory. All Threadripper chips further feature 32 MB of shared L3 cache. ASUS, ASRock, GIGABYTE, and MSI are said to be developing Ryzen Threadripper motherboards based on the X399 chipset as we speak.

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90 Comments on AMD Ryzen Threadripper Detailed - Why Intel HEDT is in Trouble

#26

ypsylon

I just forfeited X299 in all its ransom glory. I will not pay more to get less than I already have.

Waiting for full range of TR4/X399 offerings and waterblocks. Have to check compatibility of HBAs/RAID controllers too, but first I need some TR hardware on my plate. :cool:

Let Intel choke on X299 platform. Monopoly is over.:peace:

#27

protain

EarthDogActually, this is the first they have used tim on the hedt platform in several generations.

Should have qualified that earlier statement a bit better... I was including the i7's in the "expensive chip" range, so was actually referring to the i7-6700k and i7-7700k SKUs.

EarthDogMemory support is better from both mobo makers and amd with their aegsa or whatever microcode updates in those bios....not that dual to quad matters for 99% of people anyway.. moot point...same with memory speed.

While I agree with that for the most part that memory speed / channels didn't matter for 99% of people it's now vital for Ryzen owners since the Infinity Fabric speed is directly linked to the speed of the RAM - faster RAM, faster interconnect between the CCXs.

#28

Mindweaver

Moderato®™

Warnings have been issued to a few members in this thread. If you can't get your point across without name calling, then move along. If someone starts calling you names then report it. Do not take matters into your own hands.

#29

bug

EarthDogHey look....a 5%er at an enthusiast site... who would have thought?!!

I don't think I'm a 5%er, but this kind of chips is definitely aimed at 5%ers.

#30

EarthDog

Get a pcie sata card for a few dollars... your problem is solved

#31

Gasaraki

bugIf you ever had to disable SATA ports in order to add a M2/U2 SSD, you'll appreciate more PCIe lanes.

You have to realize all cores are fed by the same memory bus. When the core count goes up, so does the need for more bandwidth.

I'm with you in that software will take a while to put all those cores to good use, but Ryzen IPC is good. For all intents and purposes, it's on par with current generation Intel.

Do I plan to switch? Not as long as my system is still snappy no matter what I throw at it. But I can tell a good CPU when I see one (whether I need it or not).

Why would anyone use the 6+ SATA ports on a mobo nowadays when you are using M.2?

#32

nemesis.ie

Live OR DieWhy does AMD have to rip of Intel chipset naming scheme? come on really X399 why not call it something original!

Because an awful lot of the general populus don't even know AMD exists, they still walk into a shop and say "I want that iX thing" (which could include Apple products).

So I can understand why AMD are marketing their names in a similar way. The whole A series was a bit like Audi naming versus the BMW sounding ix, probably for the same reason.

#33

Gasaraki

TheGuruStudIt's much cheaper to make. They're small dies. Intel has a big ass one.

Wow. How in the right mind do you think this is remotely true? The pin count of the Intel cpu is 2066, AMD's is 4096. Intel's has 44 lanes of PCI Express, AMD has 64 lanes. How is AMD's die going to be "smaller" and cheaper to make? Did they suddenly have some magical manufacturing capability better than Intel, who builds their own chips without a middle man?

#34

TheinsanegamerN

I cant wait to build a threadripper rig for a friend of mine that does workstation related work, as opposed to gaming. Dat CPU.....

#35

Gasaraki

Live OR DieWhy does AMD have to rip of Intel chipset naming scheme? come on really X399 why not call it something original!

The chip has 4094 pin vs intels 2066 of cause it has more lans, i would stay away from intels X299 because i see it dieing off and something with more pins coming out.

AMD's marketing is shit. I HATE how they made everything R3, R5, R7 to copy Intel and now X399 chipset like the Intel X chipsets. Can't they just so something original for once? R4, R6, R8 would have been better. Now there's a X299 chipset and a X399 chipset.

#36

TheinsanegamerN

GasarakiWow. How in the right mind do you think this is remotely true? The pin count of the Intel cpu is 2066, AMD's is 4096. Intel's has 44 lanes of PCI Express, AMD has 64 lanes. How is AMD's die going to be "smaller" and cheaper to make? Did they suddenly have some magical manufacturing capability better than Intel, who builds their own chips without a middle man?

Cool down there bud. He is referring to the CCX cores. Technically, a 16 core threadripper is really 4x4CCX with infinity fabric linking the clusters. By using multiple CCX clusters, the individual dies are smaller and thus easier to make/remove defective ones.

#37

R0H1T

GasarakiAMD's marketing is shit. I HATE how they made everything R3, R5, R7 to copy Intel and now X399 chipset like the Intel X chipsets. Can't they just so something original for once? R4, R6, R8 would have been better. Now there's a X299 chipset and a X399 chipset.

Like the first IMC, dual core, 5GHz consumer CPU, Mantle et al :rolleyes:

#38

bug

GasarakiWhy would anyone use the 6+ SATA ports on a mobo nowadays when you are using M.2?

Gee, I don't know. Maybe because my SATA SSDs are in perfectly good conditions and motherboards don't have that many M.2 ports? Mine has only 3 and it costs an arm and a leg.

#39

EarthDog

bugGee, I don't know. Maybe because my SATA SSDs are in perfectly good conditions and motherboards don't have that many M.2 ports? Mine has only 3 and it costs an arm and a leg.

PCIe sata card... done deal for $25.

Get bigger drives and partition... there are plenty of ways to make that happen. ;)

#40

OSdevr

GasarakiWow. How in the right mind do you think this is remotely true? The pin count of the Intel cpu is 2066, AMD's is 4096. Intel's has 44 lanes of PCI Express, AMD has 64 lanes. How is AMD's die going to be "smaller" and cheaper to make? Did they suddenly have some magical manufacturing capability better than Intel, who builds their own chips without a middle man?

Die size is not the same thing as package size.

#41

bug

EarthDogPCIe sata card... done deal for $25.

Get bigger drives and partition... there are plenty of ways to make that happen. ;)

So first you argue that people don't need that many PCIe lanes and now you tell me I need another PCIe card? I rest my case.

#42

FR@NK

TheGuruStudIt's much cheaper to make. They're small dies. Intel has a big ass one.

GasarakiWow. How in the right mind do you think this is remotely true? The pin count of the Intel cpu is 2066, AMD's is 4096. Intel's has 44 lanes of PCI Express, AMD has 64 lanes. How is AMD's die going to be "smaller" and cheaper to make? Did they suddenly have some magical manufacturing capability better than Intel, who builds their own chips without a middle man?

The main advantage Intel has is all their HEDT chips are binned from dies with disabled cores. The 6, 8, and 10 are from the 12 core die; the 12, 14, and 16 are from the 18 core die; and lastly the 18 core chip is from the 24 core die. This allows the binning process to disable any low clocking cores or cores that have too much leakage.

The 16 core threadripper will be the highest binned dies with no disabled parts. This increases the manufacturing cost depending on how high they need these chips binned.

#43

Daven

This screen grab from the Threadripper powerpoint shows that there is 40 MB of total cache (32 L3 + 8 L2). The author of this article is incorrect when he says that there is just 16 MB of L3 cache.

#44

ERazer

Mark Little
This screen grab from the Threadripper powerpoint shows that there is 40 MB of total cache (32 L3 + 8 L2). The author of this article is incorrect when he says that there is just 16 MB of L3 cache.

Edit: you are correct

#45

EarthDog

bugSo first you argue that people don't need that many PCIe lanes and now you tell me I need another PCIe card? I rest my case.

They dont... you are a one off... that 5% I was talking about. For those few, buy a damn card or use the ASMEDIA controlled ports which, I do not believe, have anything to do with the PCIe lane allocation on teh SB.

Rest this. :p

#46

efikkan

btarunrAMD Ryzen Threadripper Detailed - Why Intel HEDT is in Trouble
…
We know of at least two features which will spell trouble for Intel, and it's not the CPU core performance.

As the editor, shouldn't you be unbiased in your reporting?
Take a look at your own reporting, vs. how you present the competition.
We all know even Broadwell-E has better cores than Ryzen, and considering Skylake-X features up to 18 cores, higher clocks and higher IPC, there is no reasonable argument why Intel HEDT is in trouble. Let's wait for the real benchmarks, OK?

If AMD were expecting the 16-core Threadripper to compete with 10 (or at most 12) cores from Intel, then who is the one shaking in fear?

btarunrThe first of two killer Threadripper features is that it has 64 PCI-Express gen 3.0 lanes across all its models - 12-core and 16-core.

Surely it's a nice feature, but it only matters to people running multiple GPUs for extreme compute workloads, which will require one of the higher CPUs anyway.
You know very well that the extra lanes doesn't matter for gaming.

btarunrThe second killer Threadripper feature is its memory controller. AMD announced that Quad-channel DDR4 memory will be available across the lineup. This again is unlike Intel, where the Core i5-7640X and Core i7-7740X quad-core LGA2066 chips feature just dual-channel memory. All Threadripper chips further feature 16 MB of shared L3 cache.

That's nitpicking. The pointless quadcores doesn't define the validity of the platform as a whole.
Skylake-X will on the other hand provide a redesigned cache hierarchy, lower cache latency, etc.

FrickRyzen IPC is not crap, it's the clock speed that doesn't keep up. Which is about the only unfortunate thing about those CPUs.

Ryzen have a poor prefetcher. Ryzen is actually running higher clocks than current Intel HEDT.

#47

FR@NK

efikkanAs the editor, shouldn't you be unbiased in your reporting?

Clicks are more important then facts. Been this way on TPU for awhile now.

#48

TheGuruStud

GasarakiWow. How in the right mind do you think this is remotely true? The pin count of the Intel cpu is 2066, AMD's is 4096. Intel's has 44 lanes of PCI Express, AMD has 64 lanes. How is AMD's die going to be "smaller" and cheaper to make? Did they suddenly have some magical manufacturing capability better than Intel, who builds their own chips without a middle man?

The same way ryzen 7 is cheaper to make. It's MCM'd together. Even Intel can't have great yields with a die so large (and much more complicated design).

Sure, they're wasting half the cores from Naples, but these are nice salvages. You can still do the math, though. I can buy a ryzen 7 1700 for nearly 300 bucks or a salvaged 1600 for 200.

Can Intel sell an 8 and 6 core for those prices? Not even if they wanted to price war, I wager.

#49

HopelesslyFaithful

TheGuruStudIt's much cheaper to make. They're small dies. Intel has a big ass one.

100% true and it comes at a cost. Having tasks switch from one cluster to the next results is a large penalty, which intel does not have.

AMDs method is for tasks that scale well and don't suffer from penalties with being on different clusters. Intels CPU is by far better but very expensive.

Which is why AMDs method is nice to have an alternative. Intels may be better but AMDs is bar far more cost effective and helps the average joe.

Any news on if these support ECC/RDDIMMs? I would love to ditch my 1650v3 for a 16 core AMD CPU if i can afford it.

TheGuruStudThe same way ryzen 7 is cheaper to make. It's MCM'd together. Even Intel can't have great yields with a die so large.

Sure, they're wasting half the cores from Naples, but these are nice salvages. You can still do the math, though. I can buy a ryzen 7 1700 for nearly 300 bucks or a salvaged 1600 for 200.

Can Intel sell an 8 and 6 core for those prices? Not even if they wanted to price war, I wager.

they aren't wasting anything. It was reported that AMD has some crazy 80% yield.

EarthDogHey look....a 5%er at an enthusiast site... who would have thought?!! To be more clear, im thinking about all users. Clearly there is a use case for so many lanes... just not many come close to using it. :)

Here is your actual lane breakdown...

Why not move the hard drives/optical to the unaffected asmedia sata ports?? Wouldnt that free up ports attached to the chipset?

Ps- threadripper isnt going to be cheap either.. i mean, the octo is 500... that 12 core is going to sniff 800+... so, surely it will be cheaper, but not cheap. ;)

ASmedia is a terrible controller for HDDs and should always be avoided.

EarthDoglet me know how many home users actually have that, would ya?

In a sense, i agree with kurt. 95% of users are fine with skylake's 20... with sli and an m.2. If you want that and multiple m.2 or dvr card or 10gb ethernet, budget wouldnt seem to be as much of a concern...(specifically with multiple gpus and m.2 nvme drives).

Single thread is most important for my main rig. Main rig needs, GPU (16), 10GbE (4/8), M.2 (4), and TB (?) would be nice but thats already way way way past 16 lanes. Thats what 24-32 lanes?

I'll need more when Optane because sanely priced in a couple years.

Also 10GbE isn't expensive. I did it for 500 bucks or something.

200 for swtich, 100 for 2 NIC, cables and other stuff IIRC.

bugI don't think I'm a 5%er, but this kind of chips is definitely aimed at 5%ers.

He means the 5% of people who actually use computers?

bugSo first you argue that people don't need that many PCIe lanes and now you tell me I need another PCIe card? I rest my case.

This made my day!

Someone asking why you need more than 6 SATA ports....and need lots of PCIe Lanes....does this answer it?

Still work in progress
yea...this is why you need PCIe Lanes :D

#50

Blueberries

[sarcasm]Damn I was just thinking how useful it would be to have 18 cores and 64 PCI-e lanes.[/sarcasm]

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AMD Ryzen Threadripper Detailed - Why Intel HEDT is in Trouble

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