Author Topic: Threadripper & Ryzen only builds (3rd Gen starts on page 50)  (Read 519894 times)

2019-06-18, 11:11:57
Reply #420

engiu

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Hi guys,
I'm going to build a new workstation so I started searching some components compatible with my budget. That's what came out:

CPU: Ryzen 2970wx
MB: Asus Prime x399-A
GC: Asus RTX 2060
RAM: 64GB DDR4 3200Mhz
STORAGE: SSD PCE NVME 500GB
COOLING: any liquid cooling system

I have some questions:
1- RTX or GTX, I mean, is there some convenience switching to the new RTX?
2- Ram 3600Mhz, why not? I always saw 3000Mhz RAM in the configurations posted in this thread.
3- In the last posts I only read about air cooling system, what about liquid cooling system?

Thank you guys!
Andrea

2019-06-19, 18:07:30
Reply #421

Charlie Nicols

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I would avoid liquid cooling, use Noctua. Liquid cooling may provide marginally better results but require more maintenance and tend to break sooner.

RTX isn't useful to us bar for gaming and even then not so much. I would consider the 1080 TI.

RAM wise the TR performs better with faster ram however I feel 3600 could decrease stability/ longevity of the build.

2019-06-20, 10:13:35
Reply #422

Namik Pirkic

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Hi guys,
I'm going to build a new workstation so I started searching some components compatible with my budget. That's what came out:

CPU: Ryzen 2970wx
MB: Asus Prime x399-A
GC: Asus RTX 2060
RAM: 64GB DDR4 3200Mhz
STORAGE: SSD PCE NVME 500GB
COOLING: any liquid cooling system

I have some questions:
1- RTX or GTX, I mean, is there some convenience switching to the new RTX?
2- Ram 3600Mhz, why not? I always saw 3000Mhz RAM in the configurations posted in this thread.
3- In the last posts I only read about air cooling system, what about liquid cooling system?

Thank you guys!
Andrea

hi :)

I have the same cpu (went with the asrock taichi mobo instead), and as Charlie stated, better avoid liquid cooling :) I went with the Noctua NH-U14S TR4-SP3, and I can only say that it is perfect. As for the ram, I really dont's see the point of going anything above 3000Mhz as that might be the highest stable frequency.

Good luck and have fun with your build! :D

ps, as you didn't state it, don't cheap out on PSU :) go with something beefy!

2019-06-20, 15:50:56
Reply #423

Jpjapers

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Surprisingly Liquid cooling doesnt always offer better performance OR noise levels. There was a test of a load of cooler master and noctua SKUs and i believe in ALL tests the air coolers performed better and were quieter. There are some exceptions. If you move around alot you wouldnt maybe want the huge heatsink TR4 commands hanging on your MOBO warping the board and breaking solder points during transit. But if it sits quietly under a desk then i would say go Air cooled every time (If your environment allows it)

2019-06-20, 16:27:35
Reply #424

Juraj

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Watercooling vs Air cooling is complex debate depending on many factors:

Cooling capacity is largely defined by surface area of heatsink for air coolers, and radiator for water loops. Both multiplied by airflow of attached fans.

So massive Noctua NH-D15 offers heatsink that's both large and deep providing lot of surface area to dissipate heat and it only needs single 14cm fan to do so.
It easily dwarfs majority of 280mm AIO (All-in-One) Water loops and comes up to about the same with 360mm systems that contain only slim radiator.

Both of these are mostly capable of dissipating up to 250W of heat with full-speed of fans. Some AIO loops like Enermax Liqtech claim up to 500W but this is pure bullshit. They are stronger though.

Threadripper complicates this as there only handful of dedicated coolers for it due to larger TR4 platform, both Air and Water. And the biggest Air Tower (NH-D15) will be coming to TR4 platform somewhere in Q1 2020 according to Noctua.
That leaves us with U14S, which is far from monster, and is just good enough for 2990WX. Enermax Liqtech can achieve 10C better temps under similar noise levels and is absolutely superior...but arguably under considerable risk of faulty model.

So that's basically it, you can go with Noctua U14S, or Enermax Liqtech II, there is nothing else to consider outside of custom loop. Every other cooler needs to be adapted to TR4 and wouldn't cover the heatsink.

If you're not planning on overclocking the system, Noctua U14S is the right choice.
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2019-06-20, 17:21:31
Reply #425

Jpjapers

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Watercooling vs Air cooling is complex debate depending on many factors:

Cooling capacity is largely defined by surface area of heatsink for air coolers, and radiator for water loops. Both multiplied by airflow of attached fans.

So massive Noctua NH-D15 offers heatsink that's both large and deep providing lot of surface area to dissipate heat and it only needs single 14cm fan to do so.
It easily dwarfs majority of 280mm AIO (All-in-One) Water loops and comes up to about the same with 360mm systems that contain only slim radiator.

Both of these are mostly capable of dissipating up to 250W of heat with full-speed of fans. Some AIO loops like Enermax Liqtech claim up to 500W but this is pure bullshit. They are stronger though.

Threadripper complicates this as there only handful of dedicated coolers for it due to larger TR4 platform, both Air and Water. And the biggest Air Tower (NH-D15) will be coming to TR4 platform somewhere in Q1 2020 according to Noctua.
That leaves us with U14S, which is far from monster, and is just good enough for 2990WX. Enermax Liqtech can achieve 10C better temps under similar noise levels and is absolutely superior...but arguably under considerable risk of faulty model.

So that's basically it, you can go with Noctua U14S, or Enermax Liqtech II, there is nothing else to consider outside of custom loop. Every other cooler needs to be adapted to TR4 and wouldn't cover the heatsink.

If you're not planning on overclocking the system, Noctua U14S is the right choice.

Theyre the two coolers i have shortlisted but potentially with a second fan on the noctua. Though i heard there was a few leaky rads from enermax.

2019-06-20, 18:25:42
Reply #426

Juraj

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By now there are four revisions, two revision per each generation. So you want the latest, not something left on some shop from last year :- ). But how do you make sure ? Bit of unnecessary work...

That's the kind of quality you can expect from lot of AIO loops sadly.

The second fan on Noctua UH/14 helps by about 1C, it's not really needed, but doesn't hurt either.
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2019-06-21, 08:38:32
Reply #427

engiu

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Thank you all guys, I really appreciate your help.
Now I have clearer ideas: ok for the Noctua and 3.00Ghz RAM. I think I'll go with the Ryzen 2990WX: it costs more but worth it in my opinion (I use this PC for rendering mostly). So The Noctua U14S is also good for the Ryzen 2990WX? What's a good motherboard for thi CPU? And, last question, if a Quadro P2000 costs as much as a GTX1070, why is preferable the last one?

Thank you, have a nice day!
Andrea

2019-06-21, 09:49:59
Reply #428

Namik Pirkic

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Thank you all guys, I really appreciate your help.
Now I have clearer ideas: ok for the Noctua and 3.00Ghz RAM. I think I'll go with the Ryzen 2990WX: it costs more but worth it in my opinion (I use this PC for rendering mostly). So The Noctua U14S is also good for the Ryzen 2990WX? What's a good motherboard for thi CPU? And, last question, if a Quadro P2000 costs as much as a GTX1070, why is preferable the last one?

Thank you, have a nice day!
Andrea

hi :) well if you don't plan to overclock, u14s is more than enough :) my temps never went above 65-67C when rendering. As for the motherboard, first I wanted to go with the Aorus but re-thinking my choices, went with asrock taichi and everything works fine :)

for the graphics, i dont know :D i'm mister flintstone, still using some old crappy r9 gpu from radeon :D

2019-06-21, 12:39:18
Reply #429

Juraj

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I do not know where is that Roy's thread since I think it was in other section, but to save yourself from troubles, pick only one of these 3 boards:

1) Asus Zenith ALPHA (not just Zenith). Solid VRM, Solid VRM cooling, 10GBit, will not support 4xGPUs because of the layout. Probably the best board right now.
2) MSI MEG. Excellent VRM, Solid VRM cooling (doesn't even need it), lacks 10Gbit support, will not support 4xGPUs because of the layout. Also great board, but I put it now second because it lacks onboard 10Gbit.
3) Gigabyte AORUS XTREME. Good enough VRM (better then every other board outside of these 3, but much worse than the two above), not good VRM cooling (requires good case airflow to keep in check). 10Gbit, AND as the only board supports 4x GPU because the layout isn't pushed down due to VRM mosfets..

If you are building a workstation for 2990WX, do not consider even for briefest moment anything else than these three. In fact, those first two will be even capable of supporting Zen2 Threadrippers when they eventually come because of solid power cascade.

For those building 2950/2970WX, you can go for any board, not just those three, but those three are still better choice, and you will not regret investing into the top two (ALPHA and MEG).

If you don't plan to use more than 64GB of memory, you can also wait little bit more and just buy the 16core Ryzen9 potentially. It's not competitor for 2990WX, but it is good competitor for 2950/2970WX.
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2019-06-21, 15:17:14
Reply #430

engiu

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I do not know where is that Roy's thread since I think it was in other section, but to save yourself from troubles, pick only one of these 3 boards:

1) Asus Zenith ALPHA (not just Zenith). Solid VRM, Solid VRM cooling, 10GBit, will not support 4xGPUs because of the layout. Probably the best board right now.
2) MSI MEG. Excellent VRM, Solid VRM cooling (doesn't even need it), lacks 10Gbit support, will not support 4xGPUs because of the layout. Also great board, but I put it now second because it lacks onboard 10Gbit.
3) Gigabyte AORUS XTREME. Good enough VRM (better then every other board outside of these 3, but much worse than the two above), not good VRM cooling (requires good case airflow to keep in check). 10Gbit, AND as the only board supports 4x GPU because the layout isn't pushed down due to VRM mosfets..

If you are building a workstation for 2990WX, do not consider even for briefest moment anything else than these three. In fact, those first two will be even capable of supporting Zen2 Threadrippers when they eventually come because of solid power cascade.

For those building 2950/2970WX, you can go for any board, not just those three, but those three are still better choice, and you will not regret investing into the top two (ALPHA and MEG).

If you don't plan to use more than 64GB of memory, you can also wait little bit more and just buy the 16core Ryzen9 potentially. It's not competitor for 2990WX, but it is good competitor for 2950/2970WX.

Thk,
ok for MSI MEG X399 Creation, I can't find the Alpha version of the Asus. Now the only doubt is about the Graphic Card, I'm not interested in GPU rendering, maybe the right choice for me is the Nvidia Quadro P2000...

2019-06-21, 17:08:59
Reply #431

Juraj

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nVidia Quadro is never the right choice by default unless you specifically need one of the following:

1) 10Bit OpenGL Color output. GTX/RTX can also output 10bit color but only inside full-screen DirectX environment, so not Photoshop. You also need 10Bit monitor (not 8bit + FRC) to benefit from this.
2) You work predominantly in OpenGL Environments like CAD. 3dsMax is running under DirectX, so it has no performance improvement. Even not all OpenGL apps benefit from Quadro driver, for example AutoCad shows little improvement, but Siemens NX shows a lot.
3)ECC memory is not for stability as many people believe. It's mainly to correct mistakes for calculations that depend on it, such as scientific, financial, medical,..
4)You need double float precision. If you are CGI artist, you don't. It's once again important for scientific purpose.

5) You need currently more memory, but this is only if you buy the most expensive models. Quadros currently come up to 24GB of memory (and faster HBM2 type).

CGI artists should always by default go for GTX/RTX, regardless if they use it just for viewports (3dsMax) or CUDA rendering (Vray,Fstorm,Octane,...).
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2019-06-21, 20:42:01
Reply #432

Juraj

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Tiny bit off-topic but I just built another full loop workstation based on my i9 7980XE and now I wish I had used the same case for Veronika's 2990WX. This is  Lian-Li V3000, one of their newest.

The separate tunnel in lower part of case (just like CaseLabs or the old Corsaid 900D, but this one is much better, smaller, lot more elegant) makes sure the hot airflow doesn't heat the interior space, so if you set up only two radiators (without front one), you can have perfect separate airflows for water loop and case. That's very good for motherboard, VRM, m.2 disks, GPUs not in loop, network card,etc..

It's so silent... So if someone wants to build 2990WX with big overclock in mind (4.0-4.1 all-core)  and absolutely 0 decibels ( this i9 draws 300 +/- W now at 500 RPMs, but I could keep the same speed at 500W draw as well, there is massive overhead),
than this is the absolute best case there is, bar none. And it's simple and pretty.

I can't wait when I rip that i9 back into Define R6 with smaller loop and replace it with 48/64core Threadripper when they come ! This PC is ready.


« Last Edit: 2019-06-21, 22:45:50 by Juraj Talcik »
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2019-06-21, 20:43:30
Reply #433

lolec

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Juraj:

For many years I gave the exact same advice you just gave...

I purchased a 2080ti and used it for a couple of months, then a co-worker got the RTX Quadro 5000 and allowed me to try it for a few days. I wanted to see if there was actually any difference, hoping to reinforce my idea that it wasn't worth it.

I immediately noticed a huge change.

3dsmax runs a little smoother and so does illustrator and solid edge.  I had an issue before, where running 3dsmax and Illustrator or Solid at the same time would hurt performance in Max, difficult to measure but very noticeable.

With the Quadro, all of those little issues are gone!

The 5000 is essentially the same as the 2080ti so, I didn't notice any speed improvements, but the platform definitely feels more stable and robust.

It is twice the price, but I think it is worth it based on how it feels. I  know that is incredibly subjective and even though I would like to provide some hard numbers, I can't. My only advice would be, if you have a chance to test a Quadro with your exact setup and workflow, give it a try, you might be surprised.

2019-06-21, 20:50:07
Reply #434

Juraj

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Do you have 3ds Max 2016/17/18/19 with DX11 viewport ? Because I did such comparison with fspec too and didn't see any difference in my scenes.

I compared this back at Maxwell generation though (Titan-X Maxwell and what was it P-series Quadro of similar performance).
You are not the first one to tell me this, Adam Hotovy also swore this to me back in time. But Dionysios from CGArchitect did massive fps comparison and didn't find any difference at all either.

Maybe there is something (after all, Illustrator IS OpenGL, but 3dsMax isn't unless you set it up like that) for it in specific viewport configurations, but in my setup (Shaded with edges) there was nothing. No FPS improvement, no smoothness difference.

Maybe it's time for another test, esp. since nVidia is coming again with specialized driver (but mainly for Arnold inside Max and Maya).
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