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Czechia, Cleveland
1 Level
704 Review
26 Karma

Review on πŸ’ͺ AMD Ryzen Threadripper 2970WX 24 Core Processor - Unleash 48 Threads of Power! by Kenneth Mills

Revainrating 5 out of 5

Okay but use 2950 except for niche cases

2970 Threadripper actually has 24 cores producing 48 threads. I switched it to my main PC by moving my old 2950 processor (16 cores, 32 threads) to my media server/NAS. In my experience with the 2970 I haven't found any improvement throughout the 2950 EXCEPT for very specific use cases for practical reasons. The 2970 is clocked the same in the 2950 and in most applications, just doesn't know what to do with 48 threads/24 cores to this day, and the CPU remains underutilized in most applications. Transcoding, games, and standard office words won't increase noticeably at 2970 versus 2950. (However, with 2970 you can run 2-3 instances of CPU intensive encoding/transcoding at the same time and ping the CPU up to 100% (in my experience this is the only way to actually get to 100%)) However, if like me you're running a operate VMS, this processor is gradually becoming more useful. The enormous bandwidth available for the 2970 allows you to run a full-fledged virtual machine of a resource-hungry operating system (Windows 7+, Linux server, databases, etc.) alongside your main PC's operating system without even flickering. This was the main use case I bought the 2970 for and it works flawlessly. If you just need a ripper for faster gaming, encoding, decoding, transcoding, etc., stick with the 2950. You get pretty much the same experience for a LOT less cost. Or save some money and use Threadripper's Gen3 on AMD's new sTRX4 sockets (which is why I've decided to go with Gen2 for now, as I do NOT want to upgrade my MoBo in the current post-COVID component and supply drought). So, 5 stars from me, with the caveats mentioned above ;)

Pros
  • Satisfied so far
Cons
  • Appearance