AMD Threadripper 2990wx slower than 2950x ?

[3d-laboratory]

Now I also added the same RAM but with 4000MHz to my workstation. I did some minor changes in the BIOS (D.O.C.P. , Level 2) and have now results of 21882 for the VRay Benchmark. But best of all is, that WIndows now works more fluently. If I have time I will test some overclocking. Now the RAM works at 3600 MHz. Test with 4000Mhz didnt work. What I want is to edit the speed of the so called "infinity fabric". Some peaple say that they run the RAM at 4000MHz (=2000MHz) and the infinity fabric also at 2000MHz. This should give the best results. If I had time...

[Muhammed_Hamed]

I put 4x16=64GB Skill Trident Z Neo with 3600MHz and CL 14-14-14-34 onto the board with the 2990wx. The VRay Bench went up from my initial score (32GB) with 10.490 (13.367 with some overclocking) to now 23.009

It is a great kit you have here, glad this helped with scores. Quad channel seems to have a massive impact on performance like the case here + fast memory kit

Some say that a layout of 4 x16GB RAM modules brings a 5-10% better performance compared to 2 x 32 RAM modules under the same frequency

True, then you add the fact that 32 GB sticks are not as fast(usually use increased latency)
This is not gonna have a big impact like the 2990WX (the 5950X uses dual-channel memory), but will make a difference nonetheless

Good luck on your test Let me know what you find

Best,
Muhammed

[3d-laboratory]

First part of the work is done. I put 4x16=64GB Skill Trident Z Neo with 3600MHz and CL 14-14-14-34 onto the board with the 2990wx. The VRay Bench went up from my initial score (32GB) with 10.490 (13.367 with some overclocking) to now 23.009 (24.557 with overclocking, but it´s to noisy and the VRM is about 120°C). So I made also a Chipset update and was able to run the RAM stable with 3200MHz and with the optimized defaults of the BIOS I have now a score 23.998 VRay samples and 5065 with Cinebench 15. So the installation of the four RAM sticks was a success and I was impresse by the performance. Now I search the same for my 5950x. Some say that a layout of 4 x16GB RAM modules brings a 5-10% better performance compared to 2 x 32 RAM modules under the same frequency. As the motherboard can handle up to 5100MHZ and the processor can handle 4900MHz I now have to decide to take 4x16 modules with 4000MHz (only one kit available with 4266MHz) or 2x32 modules with 4400MHz. As you said: "Fast memory is great for Ryzen architecture, it can improve rendering performance massively" I will investigate it and later I will once more describe my experiences. Have a nice weekend!

[3d-laboratory]

As the 5950x is my workstation I don´t want to overclock much because of the rising fan noise. But the other machine can stand in another room (linked via Remote Desktop). For the 2990wx I wonder if it make sense to put RAM with 3600 MHz (as listed on the Crucial site for this processor) into a board, which has a 3200 MHz specification for the RAM. But I couln´t fiind a source which said that you get some extra Performance out of the 3600 MHz RAM. But there are a lot of people (I gues with newer boards) who suggest to use 3600 MHz RAM ( which is indeed 1800 MHz because of DDR) to be on the same level of 1800 Mhz of the Infinity Fabric inside the processor. Sounds logical to me. Your right, the gamers have great impact on the prices. I wanted to change from my Quadro P5000 to an RTX graphings board but it is not to get to an affordable price just now. The P5000 is surely a good graphics card, but I have, like others this sluggish behaviour of VRay dialog windows, the material editor (both SME and CME) and the start of the Render setup, which lasts about 10 sec. on my machine. See also here https://forums.chaosgroup.com/forum/...eed-of-vraymtl

[Muhammed_Hamed]

over 27000. in 4 entries and one at 26950. So I really interested in how they did it. Sadly VRay bench give not enough information on the configuration

They are probably all mine
I overclocked the 2990wx to 4.1 Ghz ,I used this OC for a long time until I sold mine
I had MSI X399 MAG Creation, it can handle this type of OC. Used 3200 CL16 memory in quad channel

The 5950X can be overclocked as well(although a bit harder to do so) I got mine to 24k
If you are interested I can help you with this

What would you think of Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB 64GB (4x16GB) DDR4 3600 (PC4-28800) C18 1.35V AMD Optimized Memory? Give it a try? Is it better to by AMD optimized RAM or it is rather an advertisement gag?

Try to find 3600 memory at CL16, or 3200 at CL14 .. both are great for this CPU
Fast memory is great for Ryzen architecture, it can improve rendering performance massively
The dominator kit is nice, although will be a bit expensive as the demand from gamers is big on these. And it is CL18, which is not the fastest

Best,
Muhammed

[3d-laboratory]

Thank you very much. There iare 5 results listed in the VRay benchmark, over 27000. in 4 entries and one at 26950. So I really interested in how they did it. Sadly VRay bench give not enought information on the configuration. My 5950x was at 18709.

[GLASS-CANVAS]

I just downloaded the latest V-Ray benchmark app and the 2990wx scored right on where the non-overclocked systems are in the leaderboard i.e. around 22000. Hope this helps!

[3d-laboratory]

I don´t overclock also, I did it only with the 2990wx because I was disappointed. Once I did a test with the 2950x and found, that the default optimized scheme in the UEFI runs better as some mild overclocking. But I didn´t invest much time to it. It is also my basic principle: don´t touch a running system. You see what happens if I leave my principles If I make new experiences with RAM or something else I will post it here. A Vray score on your 2990wx would be very interesting for me!

[GLASS-CANVAS]

It will be excellent RAM, no question, but the performance uplift will be small by comparison to increasing core count or core frequency. If you have money to spend then go for it! But otherwise I'd save it for something else. I actually have a pretty much standard 128gb 2990wx machine here in my office right now I can run the V-Ray benchmark on if you'd like to get a baseline? We don't overclock our CPUs for the sake of longevity so you can expect to score better on yours if you do

[3d-laboratory]

Yes, it was my intention to replace it complete as it is suggested so often to buy these kits together an not to mix it. Regardless of the 2990wx or the 2950x in that machine, Corsair Vengeance should serve well both I think . At the moment I have 32 (2x16) GB RAM G.Skill F4-3000C16 DDR-4, chosen by the professionel system builder / seller in Oct. 2018. What would you think of Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB 64GB (4x16GB) DDR4 3600 (PC4-28800) C18 1.35V AMD Optimized Memory? Give it a try? Is it better to by AMD optimized RAM or it is rather an advertisement gag? I hope I don´t stress you too much

[GLASS-CANVAS]

I suspect that no matter what RAM you buy it will scale down (but not up, sadly) in timings to match what you already have in the machine right now - so just buy more of what you already have. Unless your current RAM is particularly slow I would say don't bother doing a complete replacement, as it's just not good value. Having said that you may find it hard to buy 2 sticks of quad-channel RAM, as it's normally only sold in packs of 4. A quick look at my usual supplier here in the UK shows that they only sell packs of 4 or 8 sticks. For brands I tend to buy Corsair Vengeance series, so far it's always been reliable.

[3d-laboratory]

I think the motherboard is in good condition. As I said, I have at the moment only 2 RAM channels with 16GB each populated. I in every case will go to 64GB. So you can recommend suitable RAM for the 2990wx? So ill give it a try. Thank you for your thoughts!

[GLASS-CANVAS]

Just to say that we've been using Threadripper CPUs since they first apperead on the market a few years back, and the performance always scaled exactly as expected, including the 2990WX. FYI we've found the latest generation 24-core CPU gives roughly the same rendering performance as the old 32-core part. If you're not getting predictable results it sounds to me that you're either having a motherboard issue, or your RAM setup is causing a bottleneck somewhere. With the memory it's important that all the channels are populated to get best performance, you may need to refer to the motherboard manual to check the sticks are in the best slots for this. Also it never hurts to reset the BIOS of your motherboard to defaults before you start. And whilst I would never recommend overclocking on a production PC, at the very least you should enable XMP in the BIOS to gain some easy and free performance.

[3d-laboratory]

It was most frustrting for me that again Windows, and not AMD, seems to be a major cause of these limitations. If you interested in, here is a video which seems to bring evidence for this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2LOMTpCtLA And, as I heard, also the new Windows 11 has issues with Ryzen processors, for which they will provide a fix in the next time. For me is frustrating, that Windows is slower with every new version on the same hardware. It´s a so overloaded OS with so many features which should not be part of an OS in my opinion. If they want they can pack it all in the Home edition. But who needs for example an XBox Console Companion in a professional OS. Thank you very much for your help and I will hold my eyes open for a 3970x for an affordable price.

[Muhammed_Hamed]

I understand the frustration honestly, it is also something about early adopting new technology
The 2990WX has more cores than any other consumer CPUs at the time, it was ahead in every way. And the platform had some issues and limitations as expected
Most of which has been addressed with the following generation of Threadrippers 3970X and later 3995X Pro. These CPUs should be a much better experience today

Best,
Muhammed