The AMD 3rd Gen Ryzen Deep Dive Review: 3700X and 3900X Raising The Bar
by Andrei Frumusanu & Gavin Bonshor on July 7, 2019 9:00 AM ESTSection by Gavin Bonshor
X570 Motherboards: PCIe 4.0 For Everybody
One of the biggest additions to AMD's AM4 socket is the introduction of the PCIe 4.0 interface. The new generation of X570 motherboards marks the first consumer motherboard chipset to feature PCIe 4.0 natively, which looks to offer users looking for even faster storage, and potentially better bandwidth for next-generation graphics cards over previous iterations of the current GPU architecture. We know that the Zen 2 processors have implemented the new TSMC 7nm manufacturing process with double the L3 cache compared with Zen 1. This new centrally focused IO chiplet is there regardless of the core count and uses the Infinity Fabric interconnect; the AMD X570 chipset uses four PCIe 4.0 lanes to uplink and downlink to the CPU IO die.
Looking at a direct comparison between AMD's AM4 X series chipsets, the X570 chipset adds PCIe 4.0 lanes over the previous X470 and X370's reliance on PCIe 3.0. A big plus point to the new X570 chipset is more support for USB 3.1 Gen2 with AMD allowing motherboard manufacturers to play with 12 flexible PCIe 4.0 lanes and implement features how they wish. This includes 8 x PCIe 4.0 lanes, with two blocks of PCIe 4.0 x4 to play with which vendors can add SATA, PCIe 4.0 x1 slots, and even support for 3 x PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 slots.
| AMD X570, X470 and X370 Chipset Comparison | |||
| Feature | X570 | X470 | X370 |
| PCIe Interface (to peripherals) | 4.0 | 2.0 | 2.0 |
| Max PCH PCIe Lanes | 24 | 24 | 24 |
| USB 3.1 Gen2 | 8 | 2 | 2 |
| Max USB 3.1 (Gen2/Gen1) | 8/4 | 2/6 | 2/6 |
| DDR4 Support | 3200 | 2933 | 2667 |
| Max SATA Ports | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| PCIe GPU Config | x16 x8/x8 x8/x8/x8* |
x16 x8/x8 x8/x8/x4 |
x16 x8/x8 x8/x8/x4 |
| Memory Channels (Dual) | 2/2 | 2/2 | 2/2 |
| Integrated 802.11ac WiFi MAC | N | N | N |
| Chipset TDP | 11W | 4.8W | 6.8W |
| Overclocking Support | Y | Y | Y |
| XFR2/PB2 Support | Y | Y | N |
One of the biggest changes in the chipset is within its architecture. The X570 chipset is the first Ryzen chipset to be manufactured and designed in-house by AMD, with some helping ASMedia IP blocks, whereas previously with the X470 and X370 chipsets, ASMedia directly developed and produced it using a 55nm process. While going from X370 at 6.8 W TDP at maximum load, X470 was improved upon in terms of power consumption to a lower TDP of 4.8 W. For X570, this has increased massively to an 11 W TDP which causes most vendors to now require small active cooling of the new chip.
Another major change due to the increased power consumption of the X570 chipset when compared to X470 and X370 is the cooling required. All but one of the launched product stack features an actively cooled chipset heatsink which is needed due to the increased power draw when using PCIe 4.0 due to the more complex implementation requirements over PCIe 3.0. While it is expected AMD will work on improving the TDP on future generations when using PCIe 4.0, it's forced manufacturers to implement more premium and more effective ways of keeping componentry on X570 cooler.
This also stretches to the power delivery, as AMD announced that a 16-core desktop Ryzen 3950X processor is set to launch later on in the year, meaning motherboard manufacturers needed to implement the new power deliveries on the new X570 boards with requirements of the high-end chip in mind, with better heatsinks capable of keeping the 105 W TDP processors efficient.
Memory support has also been improved with a seemingly better IMC on the Ryzen 3000 line-up when compared against the Ryzen 2000 and 1000 series of processors. Some motherboard vendors are advertising speeds of up to DDR4-4400 which until X570, was unheard of. X570 also marks a jump up to DDR4-3200 up from DDR4-2933 on X470, and DDR4-2667 on X370. As we investigated in our Ryzen 7 Memory Scaling piece back in 2017, we found out that the Infinity Fabric Interconnect scales well with frequency, and it is something that we will be analyzing once we get the launch of X570 out of the way, and potentially allow motherboard vendors to work on their infant firmware for AMD's new 7nm silicon.
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tamalero - Monday, July 8, 2019 - link
Because you're testing the CPUs not the video cards you clown.529th - Monday, July 8, 2019 - link
Anyone know how well one chiplet Overclocks VS a 2 chiplet? I'm thinking one chiplet would not be as limited by temps verse a 2 chiplet.acme64 - Monday, July 8, 2019 - link
Is there any word on a performance difference while on x470 vs x570?haukionkannel - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
There is not difference. Even 350 motherboard works with 12 core 3900. There was one test that did that.CaedenV - Monday, July 8, 2019 - link
*Slow clap*Great work AMD!
I have always been a snobbish Intel user. Back in the late '90s and early '00s it was because the audio software I used simply was not stable on AMD (heck, it was barely stable on Intel lol). Then after the Core2 came out Intel was weirdly the best AND the cheapest for a very long time. But now, AMD really has a lot going for itself, and I am truly impressed.
Hoping to rebuild my aging (but still pretty great) i7 2600 this fall... mostly because I need it as a home server, not really because I 'need' an upgrade. But I think I am going AMD this time around. I really can't believe how much they have improved in the last 3 years!
GreenReaper - Monday, July 8, 2019 - link
Guys... I get you might not want to adjust your testing base. But MDS/Zombieload makes a significant difference when it comes to system calls, such as just about any file or network access.https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&...
The reason for this is that the CPU has to perform a crazy sequence of events when accessing privileged data when two threads on a core are involved, essentially yanking the other thread into kernel mode as well, performing the privileged access that the original thread wanted, then flushing all relevant buffers before returning the two threads, so that the other thread can't run a timing attack using data from them.
It's a hack, and the impact is potentially worse the more modern the Intel CPU is, because - aside from the Atom - they have had increasingly bigger output buffers, especially Skylake+.
The OS fixes were out in mid-May when Zombieload was announced, for both Windows and Linux, so I don't know where you're getting "the patches for that have not been released yet".
Maybe you're thinking firmware for your motherboard to load new microcode? This is typically more of an issue for Windows; on Linux you'd just load the appropriate package. But even here, this doesn't make sense, because (for example) your Z370 i7 Gaming (used for the critical Intel 8/9th Gen CPUs) *does* have a newer BIOS:
https://www.asrock.com/MB/Intel/Fatal1ty%20Z370%20...
In fact, much newer. The 4.00 is from May 13, so presumably is relevant to MDS. You seem to be on 1.70, from March 26... 2018. There have been five updates since then. Why was it not updated?
zealvix - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
Yea, saw several articles from other sites that both microcode update from Intel and OS patches from Microsoft have been released.CityBlue - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
I quickly scanned the comments to see if the benchmarks had been performed with all relevant mitigations installed and was not surprised in the least to discover they hadn't, so frankly this entire article is pointless and I won't waste my time reading it. All there is left to say about this article is that whatever difference Anadtech determined between Intel and AMD, it would have been even more in favor of AMD had all Intel mitigations been enabled.Anandtech, Ryan Smith etc., do yourself a favor and re-test your Intel CPUs with *all* mitigations enabled otherwise your Intel benchmarks are just a sham, and you will start to lack credibility. Based on the comments for this article and others your readership are already staying to lose faith in your integrity. Other sites such a phoronix.com are doing a great job detailing the full impact of the mitigations (including Zombieload which you should have tested) so it's hard to take serially your reasons for not testing with a level, real-world playing field (ie. full mitigations). Or maybe you just didn't want to give out a Gold award? :)
TEAMSWITCHER - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
Really getting tired of comments like this. They should just delete them.CityBlue - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
@TEAMSWITCHER For people that aren't Intel apologists, this stuff matters. Not just because we as consumers want to get an honest review of how the latest AMD hardware stacks up against Intel in a real world situation with all mitigations applied, but also because this elephant in the room is a core credibility issue that Anandtech need to deal with.