AMD is launching new 12 and 24-core 2nd-gen Threadripper parts known equally the 2920X and 2970WX. Nigh three months have passed since nosotros starting time checked out the flagship TR 2950X and 2990WX, the 16 and 32-core models. Still AMD did warn usa at the time at that residuum of the 2nd-gen Threadripper lineup wouldn't arrive until October, and hither we are at the tail end of the month.

Earlier we become to the testing and criterion results, here'southward a quick refresher covering the design and specs...

There are two models in the WX series, where the 'Westward' signifies that this is a workstation series. The workstation 2990WX and 2970WX models are configured very differently to the 2950X and 2920X processors. Whereas the 12 and 16-core processors pack 2 Zeppelin dies, the 24-cadre and 32-cadre models feature four.

Typically such a configuration would have 4 dual-channel retention controllers for eight-channels, this however isn't possible on the X399 platform, limiting these core heavy parts to quad-channel retentiveness.

Although there are two more Zeppelin dies, the additional dies are compte dies, in AMD's words. This means they have no local PCIe or DRAM access, for that they must travel via the Infinity Material to the IO dies. As there are twice as many dies, the Infinity Fabric bandwidth is also halved, so now the throughput between dies is just 25Gbps, assuming you lot're using DDR4-3200 memory.

Because of this design that sees two of the dies without straight access to the DRAM, information technology ways that unlike the 2920X and 2950X, the 2970WX and 2990WX use NUMA exclusively. AMD claimed that this quad-NUMA configuration allowed them to create the world'southward first 32-cadre consumer processor and just as important it has allowed them to exercise information technology while maintaining backwards compatibility with existing TR4 products.

This shift on how the CPU operates internally caused some compatibility issues, or rather performance issues with games and some applications, namely Windows 10. Windows 10'south scheduler has been proven to be very inefficient at managing these core heavy CPUs and nosotros found significantly better performance when testing the same applications with a Linux based operating organisation.

Unfortunately this remains a huge problem for the 2990WX -- and we suspect the 2970WX -- and while Microsoft hasn't done annihilation to improve the situation yet, AMD has. The latest version of the Ryzen Master software which will be bachelor for download today, introduces a Dynamic Local Fashion and crucially you don't demand to reset the arrangement in social club to enable it.

In AMD'south words, Dynamic Local Mode automatically migrates the system's well-nigh demanding application threads onto the Threadripper 2990WX and 2970WX CPU cores with local retentivity admission. In other words: applications and games that prefer local DRAM admission will automatically receive it, but applications that scale to many cores volition still be gratuitous to do so.

Price Cores / Threads Base / Turbo Clock (MHz) L2 Enshroud (MB) L3 Cache (MB) TDP
TR 2990WX $1720 32/64 3.0 / 4.2 xvi 64 250 Due west
TR 2970WX $1299 24/48 12 64
TR 2950X $900 sixteen/32 3.5 / four.four 8 32 180 W
TR 1950X $680 sixteen/32 3.iv / 4.2 8 32
TR 2920X $649 12/24 3.5 / four.3 vi 32
TR 1920X $390 12/24 3.5 / 4.2 half-dozen 32

It'due south great to see AMD working to improve the user experience with these high-end desktop processors, but ultimately the biggest improvements will come when Microsoft updates the Windows scheduler. For at present the 2990WX and 2970WX will exist safer purchases for those using a Linux based operating system, but for certain tasks such as rendering they're still beasts in Windows.

Spec-wise the 12-cadre function is virtually identical to the sixteen-cadre part, minus the obvious reduction in core count and the same is true when comparing the 24-core and 32-core parts.

For testing all systems were configured with DDR4-3200 CL14 memory. The quad-aqueduct platforms received 32GB and the dual-channel systems 16GB. The Threadripper CPUs were benchmarked with the Enermax Liqtech 360 TR4 while the Skylake-10 CPUs used a 360mm open loop setup, this won't skew stock performance in Intel favor. The Java Lake and 2nd-gen Ryzen parts were both tested with the Corsair H115i Pro and finally the graphics carte du jour of choice is Gigabyte's RTX 2080 Ti Gaming OC.

Benchmarks

Equally expected the 2920X roughly matches the 1920X and 2950X when it comes to sustained retentivity bandwidth functioning. The 2970WX though, it surprised with a throughput of 67 GB/s which is a few Gigabytes per second faster than the 2990WX and 6% more retentivity bandwidth than a typical Threadripper CPU.

Cinebench unmarried thread operation is correct where nosotros expected information technology to exist, the 2920X scored 178 pts placing it on par with the 2950X while the 2970X matched the 2990WX and older 1920X.

Of course, it'southward the multi-threaded performance that's of most importance for these core heavy CPUs and here we see the 2970WX cleaning up, coming 2nd only to it's 32-core version. A score of roughly 4300 pts made information technology just over thirty% faster than Intel Core i9-7980XE. Meanwhile the 2920X just edged ahead of the 1920X making it just 25% slower than Intel xvi-core 7960X.

Once more the 2920X offers a modest functioning improvement over the 1920X, this time in our Blender test. The 2970WX is also a large pace up from the 7980XE, as it was once again a little over thirty% faster. It was likewise 36% faster than the Threadripper 2950X, taking simply 9.5 seconds and that mean it was besides just xiii% slower than the 32-cadre 2990WX.

The 2970WX was still faster than the 7980XE in Corona though unlike previous tests where it won past a 30% margin or greater, hither it's just 8% faster. The 2920X was again a few percent faster than the 1920X and ix% faster than the 9900K running without a TDP limit in place.

The terminal rendering benchmark nosotros're looking at is V-Ray and again the 2970WX makes brusk work of the more expensive 18-core processor from Intel, here it beat the 7980XE past a 22% margin. It was also just 13% slower than the 2990WX, so a solid result for the new 24-core CPU. The 2920X likewise does well despite offer just 5% more performance than the 1920X, hither information technology was 13% faster than the Cadre i9-9900K.

The PCMark x gaming benchmark shows the 2970WX doing much improve than the 2990WX though the 2950X is all the same by far the all-time Threadripper CPU in this test, and well the best CPU overall.