Question Threadripper 3960x, 3970x, 3990x and ECC RAM - what performance hit to expect vs non-ECC RAM which is available at. higher speeds?

[corinthos]

For Threadripper 3960x, 3970x, and 3990x on TRX40, if I opt to go with ECC RAM, of which the fastest available seems to be 2666mhz, what kind of performance hit can I expect by going with ECC vs faster and cheaper non-ECC RAM at 3200-3600mhz?

 

[scannall]

For Threadripper 3960x, 3970x, and 3990x on TRX40, if I opt to go with ECC RAM, of which the fastest available seems to be 2666mhz, what kind of performance hit can I expect by going with ECC vs faster and cheaper non-ECC RAM at 3200-3600mhz?

Depending on your use, most likely none to maybe 8 or 9 percent.

 

[corinthos]

Depending on your use, most likely none to maybe 8 or 9 percent.

Thanks! What uses would probably more likely mean a performance hit of 8 or 9%?

 

[scannall]

Thanks! What uses would probably more likely mean a performance hit of 8 or 9%?

Mostly gaming. Other specialized things like high speed trading would take a hit as well. But most workstation type of tasks? Not much if any.

 

[corinthos]

Mostly gaming. Other specialized things like high speed trading would take a hit as well. But most workstation type of tasks? Not much if any.

I wouldn't be doing high speed trading and gaming is secondary to me, so I'm fine with that. As long as for most workstation type tasks and video editing there is little impact, I'd be fine. Still deciding whether to go with the much cheaper Ryzen 3900x and making do. It's about $1000 less for 12 fewer cores than 3960x, but also fewer pic-e lanes. I doubt I'd get over double the performance for dollar from 3960x, so it's harder to justify than previous generations of Threadripper. I have a 1950x right now with x399 mobs that has a sale value of $600 net. About $140 more gets me a 3900x with x570 pro mob. Another $210 added on top of that gets me a 3950x instead. Then it's a big jump of about $1000 additional to get to 3960x with TRX40 motherboard.

 

[scannall]

I wouldn't be doing high speed trading and gaming is secondary to me, so I'm fine with that. As long as for most workstation type tasks and video editing there is little impact, I'd be fine. Still deciding whether to go with the much cheaper Ryzen 3900x and making do. It's about $1000 less for 12 fewer cores than 3960x, but also fewer pic-e lanes. I doubt I'd get over double the performance for dollar from 3960x, so it's harder to justify than previous generations of Threadripper. I have a 1950x right now with x399 mobs that has a sale value of $600 net. About $140 more gets me a 3900x with x570 pro mob. Another $210 added on top of that gets me a 3950x instead. Then it's a big jump of about $1000 additional to get to 3960x with TRX40 motherboard.

While I don't know your specific use case, the 3950X may be your better choice.

 

[thesmokingman]

I wouldn't be doing high speed trading and gaming is secondary to me, so I'm fine with that. As long as for most workstation type tasks and video editing there is little impact, I'd be fine. Still deciding whether to go with the much cheaper Ryzen 3900x and making do. It's about $1000 less for 12 fewer cores than 3960x, but also fewer pic-e lanes. I doubt I'd get over double the performance for dollar from 3960x, so it's harder to justify than previous generations of Threadripper. I have a 1950x right now with x399 mobs that has a sale value of $600 net. About $140 more gets me a 3900x with x570 pro mob. Another $210 added on top of that gets me a 3950x instead. Then it's a big jump of about $1000 additional to get to 3960x with TRX40 motherboard.

With video editing and rendering there is little gained with ECC. A 3960x will walk all over a 3950 in rendering, It's a big gap think roughly 50% faster in multi threaded loads. The evolution to TR3 is huge, no more NUMA for the 60x and 70x and the IF improvement is huge, almost makes that alone worth the cost. Also keep in mind the 60x and 70x have roughly the same single thread performance vs the 3950x.

 

[Trotador22]

You can buy as of now DDR4 3200MHz ECC RDIMMs from Samsung, Kingston, Crucial Hynix, Micron ...

 

[Topweasel]

Needs to be UDimms.

 

[Trotador22]

Understood, thanks, no idea about UDIMMs.

 

[KentState]

Don't waste money on ECC for video editing. That would be like buying a five point racing harness to sit in a spinning chair.

 

[thesmokingman]

Don't waste money on ECC for video editing. That would be like buying a five point racing harness to sit in a spinning chair.

ECC seems really popular these days just for the cache'.

 

[Soulkeeper]

unbuffered ecc has no performance hit at the same clock/timings
I prefer ecc given the massive sizes of ram these days.
I wish all unbuffered dimms were ecc, it should be something consumers are demanding. The cost difference to manufacture with 8 chips versus 9 is minimal. The peace of mind is worth it.

registered dimms aren't supported in desktop ryzen, but the performance of registered dimms is similar to raising all the timings by 1 at the same speed.

 

[eek2121]

Does anyone really need ECC on the desktop? I earn my living from a variety of workloads: development, video editing, graphics editing, etc. I have never had a problem that can be pegged on RAM. I always buy truckloads of RAM for my machines. I had 16gb 8 years ago and the only reason I went with 32 gb instead of 64 gb with my last build was RAM pricing at the time. 64 gb would have been close to a grand.

Also, it seems to me that if data integrity were an issue, AMD systems would be suffering catastrophic failures because the data in memory is encrypted.

 

[Soulkeeper]

I notice a corrected error atleast once a month(it varies). It's nice to be informed about them, instead of having them just silently happen.