On October 19th, 2023, AMD announced new processors for the workstation and high-end desktop (HEDT) markets. The processors are based on 5nm Zen 4 architecture and offer up to 96 cores and 192 threads of performance.
The Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7000WX series of processors, which are designed for professionals and businesses that demand top-tier performance, reliability, expandability, and security, feature AMD PRO technologies and eight channels of DDR5 memory.
Meanwhile, the Ryzen Threadripper 7000 series signals AMD’s return to the HEDT market, offering overclocking capabilities and the maximum clock rates possible on a Threadripper-based CPU. Power, performance, and efficiency are all made possible by 5nm technology and Zen 4 architecture. The Threadripper 7000 series provides ample I/O channels for desktop users, with up to 48 PCIe Gen 5.0 lanes for graphics, storage, and more.
The new processors were available from OEM and system integrator (SI) partners, including Dell Technologies, HP, and Lenovo, as well as do-it-yourself (DIY) retailers, from November 21st, 2023.
On November 13th, 2023, AMD announced the Radeon PRO W7700, a new workstation graphics card that offers high performance, reliability, and top-notch price/performance ratios for professional applications. The new card bridges the gap between the high-end Radeon PRO W7800 (32GB GDDR6) and the entry-level Radeon PRO W7600 (8GB GDDR6). The 16GB VRAM graphics card supports DisplayPort 2.1, AI acceleration, and hardware-based codecs for video editing and production.
This review will focus on the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X processor, with additional coverage of the AMD Radeon PRO W7700 professional graphics card.
Test System Details
AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X Processor
The AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X processor (non-pro) signals AMD’s return to the HEDT market, offering overclocking capabilities and the maximum clock rates possible on a Threadripper series CPU.
Power, performance, and efficiency are all made possible by 5nm technology and Zen 4 architecture, which are available for the DIY market and SI partners. The Threadripper 7000 series provides ample I/O channels for desktop users, with up to 48 PCIe Gen 5.0 lanes for graphics, storage, and more.
AMD Radeon PRO W7700
With 16GB of Error Correction code (ECC) memory, the AMD Radeon PRO W7700 easily handles data-intensive operations. In terms of visual fidelity, the card features the New Radiance Display Engine, which supports 12-bit high dynamic range (HDR) color and recreates over 68 billion unique colors with high precision.
The Radeon PRO W7700 GPU’s major feature is its 48 unified RDNA 3 compute units, 48 second-generation ray accelerators, and 96 Al accelerators. The card has 16GB of GDDR6 ECC memory and four DisplayPort 2.1 (UHBR 13.5) connectors. The connectors, which provide up to 52.2 Gbit/s total bandwidth, are designed for 10K displays with 60Hz refresh rates, 2x8K displays, or 4x4K displays with Display Stream Compression technology.
AMD’s new dual media engine offers hardware-accelerated support for AV1 encoding, with the Radeon PRO W7700 capable of delivering 7680×4320 video at 60fps (8K60). The media engine supports two AVC and HEVC streams that can be encoded or decoded simultaneously. For live broadcasters, AMD has included many capabilities that increase both performance and quality.
Memory and Motherboard
We installed the Ryzen Threadripper 7980X processor on a Gigabyte TRX50 AERO D motherboard, alongside the G.SKILL Zeta R5 Neo DDR5-6400, CL32-39-39-102, 1.40V, 128GB (4x32GB) kit with AMD EXPO memory overclocking and ECC support enabled.
AMD Ryzen Threadripper CPUs only support DDR5, LRDIMM, and 3DS RDIMMs. Threadripper 7000 processors can handle up to 8 channels/2TB on PRO motherboards (based on 8x256GB DIMMs) and up to 4 channels/1TB on HEDT motherboards (based on 4x256GB DIMMs), with support for both single-rank and dual-rank at 5200Mhz and a single DIMM per channel. ECC is enabled, although its functioning varies depending on the motherboard. The maximum official transfer rate varies by DIMM configuration, like with other AMD Ryzen CPUs.
Other Components
The Windows 11 main storage device was a 1TB GIGABYTE AORUS NVMe Gen4 solid-state drive. AMD provided a 360 all-in-one water cooler; however, it did not completely cover the CPU surface. Instead, we used the Arctic Freezer 4U-M, an 8x6mm direct contact heatpipe tower cooler with 2x120mm fans in push/pull mode. This cooler is intended for the most powerful server and workstation CPUs with up to 96 cores and a thermal design power of up to 350W.
The be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER 11 Platinum 850W power supply powered the system. A 34″ Dell Gaming S3422DWG monitor — a Quad-HD 3440×1440 display with a 144Hz refresh rate, FreeSync, 10-bit colors, and HDR support — was also utilized.
Benchmarks
Blender Benchmark
Blender Benchmark version 4.0.0 was used to assess the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X processor’s rendering performance. With a score of 1708.66, the processor’s performance ranked among the top 28% of benchmarks running the same workloads. Given the inclusion of GPU results, the CPU performed brilliantly.
In terms of GPU results, the AMD Radeon PRO W7700 ranked in the top 27% of benchmarks, with a slightly elevated score of 1883.80. This reflects how strong the processor is at GPU-level rendering, which is fantastic news for studios that rely on CPUs for production.
IndigoBench
IndigoBench v4.4.15 is another standalone benchmark based on Indigo 4’s rendering engine and the industry-standard OpenCL.
With a total score of 47.54 million samples per second, the Threadripper 7980X ranks fourth among the top CPU performances when using normal settings and no overclocking. The processor also outperforms the Threadripper 3990X and Pro 5995WX by 30% and 33%, respectively, demonstrating a significant generational jump.
PCMark 10
PCMark 10 is a comprehensive benchmarking tool that covers the wide variety of tasks performed in the modern workplace. Web browsing, videoconferencing, spreadsheet and word processing, photo and video editing, and rendering and visualization are some of the tasks tested by the tool.
The 8,772 score the test platform achieved was better than 98% of all results produced by PCMark 10.
CINEBENCH
The 2024 edition of Cinebench now includes a GPU benchmark that takes advantage of Redshift, Cinema 4D’s default rendering engine. The Radeon PRO W7700 scored 9,504, nearly matching the Radeon Pro W6800, which scored 9,643 (according to the test database). This result demonstrates the level of sophistication of RDNA 3 computation, given the Radeon Pro W7700 has half the infinity cache and dedicated graphics RAM of the W6800.
Based on the 92,817 Cinebench R23 result, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X CPU is nearly three times faster than the Ryzen 9 7950X. This result demonstrates that the Threadripper is in a class of its own and is a much-needed high-performance solution.
3DMark CPU Profile
This test stresses the CPU at various levels of threading while reducing the GPU burden, ensuring that GPU performance is not a limiting factor. It takes advantage of sophisticated CPU instructions sets supported by different processors, including Advanced Vector Extensions 2 (AVX2). It also leverages the straightforward, highly efficient simulations provided by the SSSE3 code path.
With standard settings and no overclocking, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X CPU score of 25,374 qualifies for 3DMARK’s MAX Threads Hall of Fame. It ranks among the top 100 benchmark scores ever recorded, and holds 25th place among the world’s most skilled overclockers.
V-Ray 6 Benchmark
The V-Ray Benchmark, which uses the V-Ray 6 render engines, was used to gauge the system’s rendering speed.
With a vsamples score of 120,247, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X CPU is nearly twice as fast as the Threadripper Pro 599XWX and 3990X, representing a considerable generational leap.
SPECworkstation
The SPECworkstation 3.1 Benchmark fully assesses workstation performance across a variety of professional applications.
The AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X CPU scores are higher across all application groups, except for apps that rely more on the processor (such as financial services). This exception is due to the use of the Radeon PRO W7700, a midrange professional graphics card. Higher results across all application groups could be achieved with the use of the Radeon Pro W7800 or W7900.
Gaming
Since many professional gamers and streamers utilized HEDTs in the past to support multitasking — playing games, encoding and recording gameplay, and streaming to several web platforms — the Threadripper’s gaming performance was evaluated on this professional test platform. Professionals that enjoy playing games would undoubtedly prefer not to invest in another gaming PC after paying a premium for this test platform.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider ran at an average 61 frames per second (fps) at 1440p, with a minimum of 42fps. The highest graphical settings, as well as AMD’s FidelityFX CAS package, were enabled. Surprisingly, the use of XeSS for upscaling while running the game test boosted performance by 10% at the same settings, achieving a minimum of 50fps and an average of 66fps. This might be a demonstration of the RDNA3 architecture’s AI acceleration capabilities and the Radeon Pro W7700’s AI accelerators.
Far Cry 6 ran at an average 104fps at 1440p, registering a minimum of 92fps. All DirectX Raytracing (DXR) and FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR) features were enabled during testing.
Cyberpunk 2077 ran at an average 36fps at 1440p, registering a minimum of 28fps. Ultra-ray tracing presets and FSR 2.1 features were automatically enabled.
The fact that the gaming results were 100% GPU bound indicates that the CPU was never a bottleneck and that employing top-tier gaming cards can improve gaming performance.
IDC Opinion and Conclusion
When AMD announced the Threadripper 5000 series in the Pro-only category, primarily for OEMs, the enthusiast community was left feeling let down. However, we are pleased that AMD did not abandon those customers for too long. AMD brought this category back to life after realizing — as its competitor had already done — that this is a prestigious and necessary niche market that cannot be satisfied by high-end consumer CPUs.
We are also pleased to see that the HEDT refreshment with the Ryzen 7000 platform supports the newest and greatest in networking and connectivity with excellent I/O support, including PCIe5 and DDR5 ECC registered memory modules (RDIMM/RDIMM-3DS), in addition to USB4 Type-C, 10 gigabit ethernet (10GbE), and Wi-Fi 7.
In the past, it was impossible to reach extremely high speeds while remaining stable and controlling voltage and temperature. However, this CPU is so quick, snappy, and opportunistic as it can surge up to 5.1 GHz when just a few cores are on demand, and 4.1 to 4.7 GHz when all cores are stressed, which is incredible.
Furthermore, attaining rates of up to 6400MHz is another productivity breakthrough as it was previously difficult to overclock ECC RAM above the norm.
Aside from its intense performance, efficiency is the most striking aspect of the processor. Under full load, the Threadripper 7980X’s power consumption did not go over 340W. High-end consumer CPUs with fewer cores use the same amount of energy.
Although the Radeon Pro W7700’s power output stayed under 140W, we were not as satisfied with its clock speed, and thought there was potential for a higher frequency that was purposefully regulated. With our 850W platinum power supply, we had no trouble operating the system overall, and were even able to install it in a midi tower case.
We would love to see more partner solutions for cooling to fully cover the processor’s integrated heat spreader as well as motherboard support for extreme high-end use cases that require up to seven or eight graphics cards. The Threadripper 7000 series is more than capable of handling booming AI, machine learning, and training solutions — as well as media production and automotive rendering workloads — when needed on desktop platforms.
AMD should consider a SI certification scheme, similar to AMD Advantage in gaming. By doing so, it can provide customers with reliable and better experiences on an all-AMD platform that features the Threadripper and the Radeon PRO. This strategy will strengthen trust in the AMD brand and help SIs compete against OEMs with ISV-approved devices.
In conclusion, the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X reigns supreme among HEDT CPUs. It delivers great performance straight out of the box, with most cores running at the highest clock speeds in a very energy efficient manner.