AMD's Ryzen CPUs (Ryzen/TR/Epyc) & Vega/Polaris/Navi GPUs

LOL. I assure you I don't drink champagne or eat caviar, but all I am missing for my new TR beast is the CPU, Mobo and RAM.



At the very least, AMD is getting $1000 from me personally. I won't include the last two gaming rigs featuring Ryzen over the past month I've built because I believe AMD hit a homerun with Ryzen.

 

What board are you planning to go with? I am thinking of going with Zenith myself.

 

I've narrowed my pick between the Asus Zenith Extreme and Asrock Professional Gaming mobos. I have always used Asus mobos in all of my personal builds but I fell for Asrock when I built a Ryzen 7 rig with their X370 Professional Gaming mobo. I am waiting for reviews (both pro and consumer) for the Asrock X399 boards, but chances are I will pick up the Zenith.

 

Is there an Asrock workstation board coming?

I mean, hardware wise, it should be similar. Especially power delivery wise, likely IR 3555m all around imo.

 

That is the funny (or strange, depending on who you ask) thing. In all of my research on TR4, I have yet to even get a rumor of a workstation focused mobo. If you take away RGB lighting and add in the 10 Gigabit LAN, the Taichi would be the best workstation board.

If we go by Asus's mobo trends, they will likely release an X399 WS board down the road. Asus would be stupid not to release one for X399, as this platform screams for it.

 

A true gamer, trading his Champagne and Caviar for 1080 SLI and 1080ti setups

 

Turn that thread of reasoning around and you can enjoy the AMD RX 64 harvest season, now there are several AMD direct flavors + AIB Partner cards coming soon, just in time to save you from "turning green".

 

The way I see it, Vega 56 is a lot better of a card than Vega 64. Honestly, AMD's flagship card never was the most impressive. The cut down die its always more interesting.This goes for every card since HD 6950.

 

Well, the RX 56 OC out performs a stock 1080 in some things, and close enough in others to be the budget card with legs.

The RX 64 water cooled edition is just right though, well over 1080 performance with just the right twist on the design theme.

Of course the Partner cards will be something to look forward too as well.

Water CLC and water blocks for the RX 56, or RX 64, looking forward to the reviews.

 

Really disappointed in AMD. Even V64 LC is only neck-and-neck with 1080, Nvidia's 3rd best GPU from over a year ago, while consuming way more power and dumping out way more heat. This is like HD 2000/3000 dark years of non-competitiveness all over again.

 

You always seem to be so down on everything.

Have a cookie and some milk, pet a kitty or doggie.

Life's good

 

AMD hyped Vega up too much, with its trickle marketing campaign over 17 months, to have this kind of showing when it mattered. A day late and a buck short.

 

AMD bring's their bucket loads of 1080's and 1070's, but no 1080ti's, so sad for like 5 out of a hundred people. They get to pet the grumpy wumpy puddy tat.

The other 95 people can rejoice with their new RX 56 or RX 64; they get to pet the happy playful kitten

Wouldn't you rather play with the happy kitten than the grumpy wumpy puddy tat?

 

I feel more sad for AMD. Not only was this level of performance available 15 months ago, but the power efficiency gap between Nvidia and AMD has only increased since Fury X. As the competitor to GP104, Vega 10 is a much larger, more complex, more power-hungry, more expensive to make chip. Which was the same scenario seen with Polaris 10 vs. GP106, except this time AMD is trying to compete without being the "bargain option", i.e. significantly undercutting Nvidia on price

 

Given the demand from miners and gaming sales + semi-pro workstation sales scooping up more Vega's, I doubt AMD is going to be able to slow down enough to be sad.

AMD'll sell all they can make, even when Nvidia puts out the Volta's.

 

Vega's hash rate is mediocre considering its power consumption, which should be good news for gamers.

 

It'll give time for the gamers to get some cards

 

Manufacturers will probably ship better Vega 56 and 64 silicon with lower voltages (vs reference 1.2V - which is simply too high), but the trade-off will be that they will crank up the core clocks in a misguided attempt to (marginally) improve performance while increasing power consumption and charging more money.
I don't think they necessarily realize that HBM OC-ing might be the better option instead, but I guess we will have to wait and see.
Plus, Vega's architecture works differently in comparison to Polaris and others.

I wonder what might happen if people try to undervolt the core and then overclock HBM frequencies instead, leaving the core clocks alone.

 

Just like with laptops, I think some people here don't realize that other things besides raw performance are important for some users, and some might even come in higher on an individual's list. Cost, form factor, etc. You're correct, in lower price point purchases AMD is looking at least good enough, and I don't really see a downside to the 56 st the moment.

 

I'll give them a chance to work with it, I'm sure at least one manufacturer has considered it.

 

RX Vega 56 Overclocking & Undervolting GUIDE
Tweaking in Wattman - how to increase the performance gap over a 1070, toward 1080.

The RX Vega Liquid Edition Review


RX VEGA 64 VS GTX 1070 BENCHMARKS / 35 Game Tests & Review / 1080p,1440p, 4K

Many more old GPU comparisons in their channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/MultiTechnopark/videos

 

I always try to leave a bit of headroom for the PSU. After all, 750s usually don't cost too much. Not going to comment I card selection.

It is important to note the fins cover the dies completely. If the transfer of heat is efficient enough, you won't get too much heat migration to the areas outside the fin coverage. But I get your point.

At this point, I'm waiting for good reviews and monoblock availability.

Watch the gamers nexus video. Very interesting for what you just said and gives you more data to go off of.

 

The RX 56 is a big jump up from a 1060... it's a nice jump. Why not an RX 580 instead of a 1060? Availability? Driver updates and game updates have taken the RX 580 up to and past 1060 performance in many games now.

I see there is a 650w PSU in the same make / model line:
https://pcpartpicker.com/product/4x...fully-modular-atx-power-supply-220-g3-0650-y3
No price... but one positive comment...

For future expansion, new CPU / GPU down the road I usually build in a big PSU buffer, in this case a 750w/ 850w is about right, but a 650w would cover the RX 56 for now even under high OC.

$1000 as a limit for builds usually stretches up a bit

 

AMD RX Vega 56 Reference Tear-Down: Cooler, PCB, VRM

 

Here's the way I look at it. 3 central pillars (P's) of GPU evaluation: Performance, Price, and Power efficiency.

Performance: Wash, but AMD still has no answer for GP102

Price: Wash

Power efficiency: Big win for Nvidia

The last P is what matters for notebooks. So unless AMD manages to squeeze Vega Nano (speculating V56 performance at ~150W) into notebooks, Nvidia will continue to dominate the high-end mobile dGPU market, maintaining status quo since 2013. While the RX M580 is a match for Nvidia's 3rd best GTX 1060N/Max-P, the same situation Vega 64 finds itself in on desktop.

Looking big picture, it's pretty brilliant what Nvidia has done, saturating the notebook market with 9 (!) mobile Pascal GPUs, resulting in extreme product segmentation and hitting every price point and form factor along the way. 1080/1070/1060 Max-P, 1080/1070/1060 Max-Q, 1050 Ti, 1050, 1030.

 

Here are some RX 56 vs 1060 results:
RX VEGA 56 VS GTX 1060 BENCHMARKS / 35 Game Tests & Performance Review / 1080p,1440p, 4K

 

Finally everything is out. We can now see how the markets fair. I think Ryzen, in its various states, will end up making great budget systems for various needs. AMD CPU market share will make a great comeback. Now GPU wise they have a huge battle with nVidia on their hands. The GPU is not bargain priced, does not match the higher end, and lastly eats power like it is going out of style.

nVidia has Volta coming up and can still yet reduce prices if it wants on the GPUs. If Vega were here like it was promised 17 months ago things may be slightly different.

 

AMD is playing it smart, they aren't leaving any $ on the table, their faithful buyers, hopeful miners, and gadget lovers will buy up all AMD can make at full price +, and that will take some pressure off of the RX580/570's giving gamers waiting for one of those a shot and hopefully reduced / non-inflated prices.

Demand inflation would have brought the prices just as high, now at least AMD is getting part of that pie too by pricing comparatively rather than over discount.

Then after that demand slacks, AMD can drop the prices a little at time to modulate demand, and keep blowing them out the doors as fast as they can make them.

It's the way to maximize return while keeping everyone as happy as possible

 

Live Streaming Now:

GN Live: Undervolting & Overclocking RX Vega 56

 

STOP! Do Not Buy RX Vega For Mining!

RX VEGA 56 Ethereum mining Hashrate with AMD Crimson Blockchain Compute Driver | GPU Power usage

RX VEGA 64 vs RX VEGA 56 BENCHMARKS / 35 Game Tests & Review / 1080p, 1440p, 4K

REMATCH: OC Vega 56 / GTX 1070. Also...New RX Vega Pricing?!?!

 

If they plan to up the MSRP by $100, that would spell doom for the cards. For $400 I would have entertained the idea of a RX 56 in my TR build but no way $500.

Edit; Thinking about it this would be a way to keep demand for the card down. If there still is an issue with HBM2 supply this could alleviate some of the market stress. Not too mention with the price being up there to cover the expensive HBM2 as well.

 

I think Vega was never meant to be a chip designed for "gaming", it is clear that AMD tries to get into the data center / deep learning market which has been dominated by Nvidia over the past years. There they can earn the money they need, not in the highly saturated consumer market. Bu there is clearly a lot of head room for driver improvements. Seems like AMD's resources could not keep up with all the release this year. The current state of Vega optimizations is kind of sad...

I also believe AMD already gave up on the notebook market for dedicated GPUs. Nearly all OEM's do have exclusive contracts with Nvidia now, even if they would offer chips with better perf. / watt, the chance that anyone will actually buy those chips for their notebook designs is extreme low. What they will do however, is offering Raven Ridge APU's with Vega graphics. This time they might combine full chips with the CPU, so manufacturers do not need to buy a dedicated GPU, as they will get everything on one package from AMD. This is the only chance I see to regain GPU market share.

 

What's Up With The Hardware Unboxed RX Vega

 

Radeon RX Vega 56 vs GTX 1070 Review! The Best Vega In The Line-Up?

AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 8GB review
http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/amd-radeon-rx-vega-64-8gb-review,1.html

 

Now for RAM. Great thing I waited for Newegg. Combo discount (-$30) + Promo (-$25) + $200 cash back (from CC).

 

You can screenshot you know...

 

I didn't want to reveal certain information from the invoice but I realize I didn't crop the photo. My bad.

 

Update: Hmmm, Hardware Unboxed just pulled the video...
Vega Pricing $, Did AMD Just Bait-and-Switch?
AMD responds to Early MSRP fake news story going around...

 

Someone needs to run some Crossfire'd RX 64 LC tests in games / benchmarks that support Crossfire scaling, just like the 1080 SLI vs 1080ti, we need to see AMD Crossfire scores topple the 1080ti scores

RX VEGA 64 Liquid Cooled vs GTX 1080 Ti BENCHMARKS / 35 Game Tests & Review / 1080p, 1440p, 4K

 

MB comparison time (remember, these tests involve the skill of the relevant reviewer and can vary significantly, so watch until a consensus arises on best board)
Zenith vs Aorus
http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/gigabyte-x399-aorus-gaming-7-review,32.html
Asrock Taichi vs Zenith (did not change the LLC setting)
http://www.tweaktown.com/news/58519/asus-x399-rog-zenith-extreme-threadripper-beast-board/index.html

Edit: this is a review roundup:
http://wccftech.com/amd-ryzen-threadripper-review-roundup-x399-launch/

 

I am thinking about building a crazy, sacrilegious monstrosity using the Thermaltake Core WP200 case. I will have my Zenith AMD build with a custom water loop on the right side and an X99 server on the other side. When the 7940X drops later this fall, I will have the Intel X299 build on the left side. Red RGB lighting on the right and blue lighting on the left. I'm going to make this happen! True, side by side comparison.

 

So, news on the monoblocks: Asus and MSI get it from EK, Giga and Asrock do not. So, time to look into compatible vrm water coolers or see how Asus and MSI boards stack up. Also, in the comments on a post from EKWB, they said coming this fall (so no ETA on delivery).

 

Another reason why I went with the Asus (even though I recently shouted at several of their agents, they claimed I had bent pins on my Asus Rampage V E10 and that's why it had trouble...) is due to better support of outside vendors for custom water solutions, RGB lighting (if you are into that) and more.

Based off the articles you posted earlier, it seems all the X399 boards are great at OC'ing. Although, Gigabyte is getting poor customer reviews in a few places.

 

Amd screwed their customers? Aka Scam? Use Google translate.
http://m.sweclockers.com/nyhet/24297-amd-kor-fult-spel-med-prissattningen-av-radeon-rx-vega-64

Free translated

"However, now it is increasingly apparent that the first prices were no more than a way to get attention and good reviews in tests. The AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 in practice costs thousand Swedish kronor (+ $ 120) more and this seems to have been the plan from the start"

 

But is it AMD? You have to prove AMD suggested retailers sell at the inflated price, not just that the price is higher.

 

All Business is dirty!! We will never know what happened.

 

The last paragraph or two said a lot. They mentioned the games included with the higher price. The non-nefarious reason would be they had limited supplies at launch. This may be bolstered by the fact AIB partners are releasing their cards at the beginning of next month (edit: such a short window from Nvidia usually taking 2-4 weeks, then making the reference design last for months with the partners, then, finally, getting custom cards). As such, they created more package deals with games and discounts than with the stand alone card. They said they would make sure gamers would get the cards and this plan of packaging, which also bolsters game sales that are bundled, allowed them to say they focused on gamers. Kind of a cop out, sure. But it seems that is likely what happened.

 

As to the "AMD Pricing Scam", the Hardware Unboxed guys called AMD and AMD said "the pricing is the same and there is no plan to raise the pricing after release"

IDK why Hardware Unboxed pulled their video but it might be due to all the pressure from the rumorsphere - and nothing in writing from AMD about this shocking claim - why do companies need to respond to BS like this?

AMD already announced the RX Vega release pricing officially, and it would be ludicrous for AMD to change the pricing so quickly after release, so I think this rumor is false.

It makes me sick to think of the stress that kind of irresponsible rumor is causing people. What in the world makes people think it's funny messing with people like that?

 

They don't. It is simple. You release and because of card numbers (couple months ago that said 16,000 at launch, although they also said they delayed release to shore up numbers) you do primarily bundles. The cards by themselves ran out, so you get the higher prices black package. Retailers put the price of the black and the limited at the same price.

Now, because it ran out so fast, people thought the articles (in lesser rated tech mags, mostly) saying that it was marked for sell at higher amounts the weeks before launch were true and AMD is the cause. AND made an official statement that Newegg and Amazon would have them at MSRP. The single cards sold out in minutes, even with limits of one to two cards per person, with the packages selling out shortly after.

But something tells me this bug in people's ears doesn't sound right. It started before launch, then when what was expected to happen happened (largely attributed to miners before launch), they now blame AMD. Cui bono? I'm thinking Nvidia to the largest amount, but Intel to a degree by tarnishing the brand.

Considering the article even noted to higher prices came with bundled games, it says cards separate to bundles were in low supply, nothing more. To go beyond that it's to accuse AMD of something without proof, contrary to their statements, and applicable and widely spread as a miner tax prior to release, which means retailer gouging unless bundled with the games, most of which did occur.

 

This is the internet, there are people who derive much kek from ruining someone else's day without any risk to themselves.