AMD 3rd gen vs 2nd gen for "Corona Interactive Rendering"

[Elias2019]

Hi guys,
I would like to make my new custom PC. Corona Interactive Rendering is my main priority as I wanna see the result and play with lights of heavy scenes in real-time, I have patience for final render-time but not for IPR. This way, which one is better to go? A mid-range 3rd gen 3950x/3960x or a 2nd gen 2990WX, etc...?
I especially ask Jurai as he's expert in this subject but all are welcome and appreciated, I wish I can get his help as well. Thanks in advance.

[Nejc Kilar]

I know you are probably going to wait for Juraj's reply but to me it is a bit of a no brainer - of the above I'd go with the 3960x. It is faster for final frame rendering which means it is equally faster for IR as well. Even better, its single thread performance (and all core boost) is higher than that of the 2990wx and so as far as the actual "UI slugginesh" goes you'll be better off in that department as well. Given the improved Zen 2 architecture you'll also probably have a better time with other software as well which was a bit of a sore point for the 2990wx.

The 2990wx was great for rendering imho but with Zen 2 out I think it is surpassed by the 3xx0 series in almost every regard. If you can get it used or with a discount it might actually be a cheaper investment (platform costs) and a solid perf / $ option but that really depends on the price you get it for.

Just my 5 cents :)

[Elias2019]

Special thanks Nejc for the reply, I really appreciate it. You know, the main reason I'm a bit worried about new gens is that I made a mistake of buying a 8700K Clevo PC Laptop because of its strong single-core and new architecture, but the low amount of cores really made me crazy up to the point that I cannot practically benefit it. Of course it's a laptop, and I even had an idea of extracting cpu and putting it in a case to see how it responds in desktop. Even the CPU benchmark shows that 3950x is only 1% stronger than 8700K but I cannot believe it honestly speaking.

As you mentioned since the priority is with the 3rd gen, I can say that my main challenge is between 3950x and 3960x as many people offer the 3950x that's a bit unclear to me honestly speaking. 2990WX is still in my mind as you mentioned if I could get a used one. I would like to get to the point to know which one performs better and fater in practice.

[Nejc Kilar]

Totally, you are welcome! It'd be nice to hear what other people have to say as well :)

So the 8700k used to be the top of the line for single threaded performance but not a strong performer for rendering at all - We are talking way slower than even a 2920x from last gen AMD. The 8700k is essentially a consumer chip so anything from the HEDT line (Threadrippers + i9s) will trounce all over it in rendering speed. If I recall correctly the more fair comparison between the chips would be the 2700x / 2600x Ryzen against the 8700k.

The 3950x is an amazing chip in my opinion for the perf / $ minded folks. It offers fairly close to 2990wx performance (roughly speaking - 54s to 45s) but it costs way less plus the platform as a whole is cheaper.

For comparison, the 3950x should be a bit more than twice as fast as the 8700k. In terms of render times (both final frame and IR) you are looking at the rendering times going from 1 minute to about 30ish seconds if you upgrade from the 8700k to the 3950x.

Considering that your 8700k is in a laptop it is also probably thermally constrained (its a desktop chip in a laptop) so the difference is probably even more than that.

I think going with the 3950x or the 3960x is a good choice and depending on how much you can spend as both are imho great options for what you pay in that particular price bracket. They both offer top notch single threaded performance too, not just the all core extravaganza.

2990wx, great for rendering, less great for some other stuff due to its architecture and memory related drawbacks. Still, I know a lot of people who use it and are super happy with it. Still, I'd personally only go with the 2990wx if I can get it cheaper than the 3960x which I don't think you can at the moment - at least not from any sellers that I know (including Ebay).

[Elias2019]

Thanks Nejc, very informative. I guess in this situation the final challenge would be between 3950x and 3960x.