THE BEST COMPONENTS FOR A
MULTIPURPOSE MONSTER
CPU
AMD Ryzen 9 3900X
£1,350 inc VAT
scan.co.uk
Nothing else in terms
of desktop CPUs
comes close to the
performance 3rd-gen
Threadripper offers, both
in terms of multi-threaded tasks
and bandwidth, with a total of 72 PCI-E
lanes. So, the choice comes down to either the
24-core Threadripper 3960X or the 32-core
Threadripper 3970X. Both sport Simultaneous
Multi-Threading, so they support twice as
many threads as they have cores and both
have the same amount of L3 cache at 128MB.
Crucially, they both boost to the same single-
core frequency of 4.5GHz. Meanwhile, the price
difference between them is significant – more
than £500 – and while professionals may
need all the grunt they can get, for a high-end
multi-purpose system, the benefits of the
extra eight cores and 16 threads are small to
non-existent in a lot of software. You’ll see no
benefits in games and we actually found that
some titles work better with the Threadripper
3960X if they have issues dealing with
high core count CPUs. Similarly, many other
programs have limits as to how well they scale,
with most seeing diminishing returns as you
move past 12 cores. HandBrake, Blender, POV-
Ray, Adobe Premiere Pro – they all see tiny or
non-existent gains moving from 24 to 32 cores.
This means that unless you absolutely need
the best performance possible and are willing
to shell out half a grand extra for your CPU,
the Threadripper 3960X actually represents
a far better proposition than the Threadripper
3970X. Our sample overclocked further too,
produced less heat and drew around 100W
less when overclocked as well. It’s also worth
pointing out just how much faster the new
Threadrippers are than their predecessors.
In many games, they perform similarly to
the class-leading Ryzen 9 3950X and Core
i9-9900K, although Intel often enjoys higher
average frame rates once overclocked. For
a not entirely gaming-focused system,
though, the differences are
often inconsequential.Alternatives
As we’ve already
mentioned, there’s not too
much else to choose from if
you’re seriously keen on multi-
threaded grunt. The Threadripper
3970X is definitely the next step up,
providing more cores and threads that will
certainly benefit multi-threaded workloads,
but will do little elsewhere. Intel’s Cascade
Lake-X has received a bad press, but as we
showed in our review last month, it makes
a case for itself at certain budgets, even if
there’s been no manufacturing process
shrink, major architecture tweak or core count
boost. Its huge price cuts mean that the Core
i9-10980XE retails for less than £1,200, but
while that’s only a £150 saving, you need
to factor in that X299 motherboards cost
less than £150, while the cheapest TRX40
motherboards currently cost over £400.
That’s a £500 saving, which is arguably the
price you pay for dropping down to 18 cores,
but maintaining more PCI-E lanes than
either of the current mainstream desktop
platforms. It’s worth remembering that once
overclocked, the Core i9-10980XE does
outstrip the Threadripper CPUs in games, but
for power efficiency and raw multi-threaded
performance, AMD still has the upper hand.MOTHERBOARD
ASRock TRX40 Taichi
£445 inc VAT
overclockers.co.ukAs the winner of this month’s motherboard
group test, the TRX40 Taichi is the clear
choice for this system. It undercuts thecompetition on price while offering an
envious set of features, solid VRM cooling
and hassle-free overclocking. You even
get an M.2 expansion card that can keep
your M.2 SSDs cool and easily accessible- perfect for the 4TB PCI-E 4.0 NVMe
storage array we’ll be building in this PC. It
doesn’t have many shortcomings, with just
a mediocre number of fan headers being
the only blot on its spec sheet. However,
with hefty cooling for the VRMs and
heatsinks for its on-board M.2 SSDs, it still
has enough for our water-cooling system’s
three fans and PWM-controlled pump.
Alternatives
If you need
the pinnacle
of TRX40
motherboards
then there’s
a few other
options. Our
favourite
is the Asus
ROG Zenith
II Extreme.
It’s actually
not the most
expensive
board out there, but it looks
fantastic, has a ton of features and
on-board cooling, but will set you back a
couple of hundred pounds more. If you’re
keen to keep the number of PCB-mounted
fans to a minimum, MSI’s clever Creator
TRX40 cools everything with a single
quiet chipset fan and also includes an M.2
expansion card. The king of the hill, though,
is Gigabyte’s TRX40 Aorus Extreme. It has
the most M.2 ports, fan headers and SATA
ports of any other TRX40 board we’ve
tested, superb fan control and even its M.2
expansion card looks sleek and menacing.
However, you’ll need to be making use of
those extra ports, as it costs nearly twice
as much as the ASRock TRX40 Taichi.