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The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

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Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#41

Post by zanny »

At the end of the day we still have the third party me_cleaner to disable the proprietary secret coprocessor on Intel chips while AMD chips still have their equivalent PSP With no first or third party means to disable it.

Until such a time I can get the equivalent tool to stop the hardware spyware built into the CPU I can have no enthusiasm or motivation to buy AMD chips. Not to say I want to buy Intel parts - they have nothing to do with third party efforts to nullify their backdoor - but if I were buying a chip tomorrow it would be a begrudging Intel purchase just for me_cleaner.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#42

Post by stingraycharles »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #32
whatever1 wrote: post #17

Bloody hell, this processor has more cores than the dual socket Xeon HPCs that my lab bought 2 years ago. Amazing. Honest question: Isn't the memory throughput an issue when you try to feed 32 hungry processors?

Threadripper uses quad-channel DDR4-2666 memory. That gets you 80 GB/s memory bandwidth, which is possible because the processor sits in an enormous 4094-pin TR4 socket. Your Xeons were probably in 2011 pin sockets with DDR3-1866 resulting in 70 GB/s memory bandwidth. One Threadripper has more than double the pin count and slightly more total memory bandwidth than your dual Xeon machine. Also, your the Intel setup ha…

Do you know whether Threadripper is affected by NUMA issues? Otherwise this could be an additional selling point for applications that need a lot of memory (e.g. databases, where you do not want the memory latency to be unpredictable depending upon which socket you are running on)

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#43

Post by dev_dull »

zanny wrote: post #41

At the end of the day we still have the third party me_cleaner to disable the proprietary secret coprocessor on Intel chips while AMD chips still have their equivalent PSP With no first or third party means to disable it. Until such a time I can get the equivalent tool to stop the hardware spyware built into the CPU I can have no enthusiasm or motivation to buy AMD chips. Not to say I want to buy Intel parts - they h…

What percentage of Intel owners have run the ME-cleaner software? Probably infinitesimally small.

If AMD wants to dominate they don’t need to care about your particular use-case at all in fact. They just need to produce the fastest x86 chips at the cheapest price.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#44

Post by montalbano »

DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #40
mizzack wrote: post #19

Roughly linear pricing per core? What is this wizardry?

> Roughly linear pricing per core? What is this wizardry? It's called "marketing", and it's definitely not limited by the laws of physics as we know them. You too can learn the ways of marketing, but it comes at a very steep price: your eternal soul. (JK, that's sales.)

I think the modularity of the manufacturing process helps too.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#45

Post by dev_dull »

vbezhenar wrote: post #36

While I can see Intel's leadership in single-core performance with 6 cores (overclocked 8700K can have 5+ GHz and future flagships probably will be even faster with 8 cores), at high-core workstation AMD is a winner, hands down. Competition is good.

AMD has always had great OC performance but my impression is that they have been power hogs. Is that incorrect or has it changed?

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#46

Post by sigi45 »

sandworm101 wrote: post #37
mbell wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is time to give AMD a chance. Intel is plagued by problems with the 10nm process technology resulting in no significant innovation on their CPUs' performance or power consumption for over two years now. The difference between 14nm and 14nm+++ is pretty close to a full node step... > And just recently they pushed their 10nm products even further back to the second half of 2019. AMD might have the first 7nm CPUs o…

If they arent behind on process tech, then they arent using it properly. The numbers are there. All techs aside, AMD is building competative chips at lower pricepoints. Intel has to pull the rabbit from the hat if it wants to stay in the spotlight.

Yes but only because Intel hit the wall first.

The still have tons of money and spend more time breaking that wall.

Good for us anyway. Don't mind getting my Intel CPUs cheaper.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#47

Post by nimish »

stingraycharles wrote: post #42
LeifCarrotson wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Threadripper uses quad-channel DDR4-2666 memory. That gets you 80 GB/s memory bandwidth, which is possible because the processor sits in an enormous 4094-pin TR4 socket. Your Xeons were probably in 2011 pin sockets with DDR3-1866 resulting in 70 GB/s memory bandwidth. One Threadripper has more than double the pin count and slightly more total memory bandwidth than your dual Xeon machine. Also, your the Intel setup ha…

Do you know whether Threadripper is affected by NUMA issues? Otherwise this could be an additional selling point for applications that need a lot of memory (e.g. databases, where you do not want the memory latency to be unpredictable depending upon which socket you are running on)

It is. Only 1/2 of the dies are connected directly to memory controllers.

For actual production workloads you want EPYC which has a memory controller for each die, meaning it's 8 channel.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#48

Post by sigi45 »

dev_dull wrote: post #45
vbezhenar wrote: post #36

While I can see Intel's leadership in single-core performance with 6 cores (overclocked 8700K can have 5+ GHz and future flagships probably will be even faster with 8 cores), at high-core workstation AMD is a winner, hands down. Competition is good.

AMD has always had great OC performance but my impression is that they have been power hogs. Is that incorrect or has it changed?

CPU wise they are holy shit close. GPU wise not that much.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#49

Post by dragontamer »

_2d30 wrote: post #34
eloff wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just abusive pricing. If you're stuck with Apple software then I guess you have no choice. I have a 10-core 128GB ram workstation that's two years old now, it cost me half as much as a MacBook Pro. I need a new laptop soon, but the difference between the i9 Dell and the i9 MacBook is $800 CAD. Plus the Dell is for sure going to work better with a Linux install, in terms of drivers, which is better for me for w…

He made that number up. The most expensive possible iMac Pro is ~$13.5K (see here: https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/imac-pro/3.2ghz-1tb ). Note that most price comparisons show that the iMac Pro is actually quite the deal.

iMac Pro is cost-effective on the Intel platform. But AMD's Threadripper is the topic of discussion here, and I think for most people... those 32-cores for $1799 is just a way better deal.

Do remember that this 32-core Threadripper offers quad-channel memory, 64x PCIe lanes, and ECC support (!!). So the Threadripper offers pretty much everything a professional wants.

The only downside to Threadripper is that its multi-threaded performance is similar to a quad-socket / quad-CPU design (~200ns to ~300ns latencies to memory, depending on how many "hops" and NUMA nodes and stuff...). So audio professionals and gamers who are IIRC latency bound may want to stick to Intel.

But almost everyone else is bandwidth bound (video editing, 3d rendering, compilers, web servers, LT Spice...). So most professionals would probably prefer a Threadripper.

Re: The AMD Threadripper 2 Teaser: Pre-Orders Start Today, Up to 32 Cores

#50

Post by geezerjay »

dbatten wrote: post #16
jaxtellerSoA wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It doesn't talk about sockets but for sake of preorderers I hope it's compatible with original threadripper boards. AMD has already committed to using the same socket until 2020.

This alone is a great reason to run AMD...

2020 is currently just 18 months ahead. In the consumer's pov that means close to nothing. Heck, I assume they would not be able to change within that time frame even if they wanted to.
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