Intel or AMD?

[KeelerJ]

Hello!

I'm looking for some advice and thoughts on how Adobe Premiere Pro and After Affects perform with recent AMD processors compared to Intel processors. It was my understanding that in the past, Intel was the way to go -- AMD processors apparently lacked certain instruction sets that were useful in Premiere and After Affects?

However, in reading some recent threads on this hardware forum, I've gotten the impression that the AMD Ryzen processors -- while perhaps not quite as good as the best Intel processors -- are significantly better than previous generation AMD processors. Generally speaking, can the most recent AMD processors now be used with solid results in Premiere and After Affects? Or is Intel still the way to go?

If you have any general guidelines (or thoughts about the latest round of AMD and Intel processors that are in the process of being announced), I would appreciate it! Thanks!

[RoninEdits]

many people are using amd ryzen just fine, so the old "intel only" rule is gone. right now its amd for value, intel for top performance.  amd is still slightly slower at around 10-20% vs its intel counterpart, but often costs much less. off the shelf computers may not reflect those prices as intel plays dirty with pc vendors like hp and dell to undermine amd.

[KeelerJ]

Thanks, RoninEdits! So generally speaking, a higher-end AMD Ryzen can be expected to perform solidly if not pushed with difficult 4K or higher projects? From what I'm reading, I get the impression that if you're working with 1080 HD, probably any decent Ryzen or i7 would handle the job?

[RoninEdits]

So generally speaking, a higher-end AMD Ryzen can be expected to perform solidly if not pushed with difficult 4K or higher projects?

yes. the various acticles on puget's site as trevor pointed out can help show specifics of what ryzen can handle.

I get the impression that if you're working with 1080 HD, probably any decent Ryzen or i7 would handle the job?

HD timelines in premiere and AE typically top out around 4 cpu cores. the amd ryzen 6 core cpu is a good budget and value option that will handle HD and some 4k. the amd ryzen 8 core would be better for 4k and could better handle background rendering. if you wanted an intel i7, you might wait a while till intel releases their 8th gen desktop lineup with 6 core cpu's (which previously topped at 4 core cpu's).

[Bill Gehrke]

I have done a lot of testing and gotten test results from many people.  I would not suggest the i7-7700K as it only has four cores the Ryzen 7 family beats any 4-core Intel product.  Look at my test data from my Premiere Pro BenchMark (PPBM)

[KeelerJ]

Thanks, Bill! Looks like the Ryzen 7 1700 and 1700X perform very well according to your data. Having eight cores and a better ability to work in 4K if needed would be nice for future-proofing a little bit.

[Trevor.Dennis]

Puget Systems is a good place to read Premiere Pro specific hardware articles.  So far they have tested the i9-7900X against Ryzen 7 1700X and 1800X, but I am holding out for some hands on with Threadripper,  and more information on the other i9X chips.  My gut tells me that X299 is still the way to go, but I have not seen a motherboard that really takes my fancy yet.  With X399 ASRock has two boards in the Professional Gaming and TaiChai that have useful storage capabilities.  So I am sitting on the fence with money burning a hole in my pocket, but I want to get this right.

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Premiere-Pro-CC-2017-1-2-CPU-Comparison-Skylake-X-Kaby-La...

[KeelerJ]

Thanks, Trevor Dennis! I appreciate the link to the Puget Systems article. After reading that one, I found a similar article discussing how the different processors perform in After Effects and was impressed by the performance of the i7 7700K and 7740K. I see that these processors only support 64GB of RAM, but then that is also the case with the Ryzen 7s.

It appears that the 7700K and the 7740K fall short of the Ryzens and other processors when it comes to rendering previews and exporting files, though in my case I'm looking for solid performance with playback during editing and am less concerned with export times. Would you recommend a 7700K or a 7740K for someone planning to use Premiere Pro and After Affects primarily with 1080 HD?

[Trevor.Dennis]

KeelerJ  wrote

Thanks, Trevor Dennis! I appreciate the link to the Puget Systems article. After reading that one, I found a similar article discussing how the different processors perform in After Effects and was impressed by the performance of the i7 7700K and 7740K. I see that these processors only support 64GB of RAM, but then that is also the case with the Ryzen 7s.

Good gracious.  I knew the Kaby Lake X CPUs were compromised, but I didn't realise how badly.  With 64Gb maximum memory, 16 PCIe lanes and the resulting restriction on storage options, I am not sure why anyone would pay $350 and upwards for an X299 motherboard?   I've stepped back from reading every last article I can find, and have forgotten some of what I read, but I have a sort of intuitive veer towards X299 from some of the things I have read — I just can't remember what that was though.  It's a bugger getting old.

So I am just going to stay sat on my fence until we have more information.  That looks like it might be a longer wait than I was hoping with some of the i9X chips pushed back to October now.  We should see the more interesting 7920X this month though.  Meanwhile, the tech sites all put up Threadripper unboxing articles yesterday, with full reviews promised not to far away.

We have also heard that X399 can't boot from NVMe raid0, but I can't see that putting people off too much.  Although I have not seen whether you can still boot from a single NVMe drive.  I would certainly hope so.

AMD X399 Supports Bootable SATA RAID, But Not NVMe RAID

[Bill Gehrke]

Trevor.Dennis  wrote

We have also heard that X399 can't boot from NVMe raid0, but I can't see that putting people off too much.  Although I have not seen whether you can still boot from a single NVMe drive.  I would certainly hope so.

AMD X399 Supports Bootable SATA RAID, But Not NVMe RAID

Who, in their right mind would want RAID 0 for a boot drive let alone the M.2 NVMe devices?  It would a total waste of the M.2

[ingeborgdot]

The Ryzen 7 is the best bang for the buck right now.  Why would Puget systems test an over $1000 CPU against a 3 to 4 hundred dollar CPU?  An overclocked Ryzen 7 will really do well against the i7 in it's price range and even better. 

I just built 2 machines.  One is an i7 7700 and the other is the Ryzen 7 1700X.  I'm blown away by the Ryzen.  They have done very well with this build for sure.  The Ryzen will handle 4k very well and even better than a 7700k.  You'll have to go up a step in intel line which will also jump a bunch in price to beat the Ryzen 7.

[KeelerJ]

Thanks, ingeborgdot! The direct comparison of a Ryzen 7 1700x to an i7 7700 is helpful. What clock speed are you running on your Ryzen 7? I'm searching for a stable computer that will work hard for a long time to come, so it's unlikely that I would experiment with overclocking.

[ingeborgdot]

I have a slight OC.  I am running at 3.8 but started with stock which was still almost as good.  I know others have gone higher than 3.8 but I don' need anymore than that right now.

[KeelerJ]

On a different note, does anyone have guidelines for an ideal number of PCIe lanes offered by a processor? Every time I think I have a proper understanding of PCIe lanes, I read something else that confuses me. I'm looking to run a single graphics card (probably a GTX 1060 with 6GB of memory), and possibly/probably a Samsung M.2 drive and a sound card. How many PCIe lanes would I need for this?

Also, am I correct that some motherboards have chipsets that essentially give you extra PCIe lanes? Thanks!

[Bill Gehrke]

You would have 16-lanes for the GPU and 4-lanes for the M.2 card and I do not know about the sound card as most people on the forum do not use one, they just use the motherboard sound.  I never have used one in my almost 20 years at this.

[KeelerJ]

Thanks, Bill! So I would want at least 20 lanes if not more. I've read that the quality of motherboard sound has risen in recent years, so perhaps sound cards aren't really necessary now. However, I did install a modest sound card in a video editing computer several years ago (the motherboard was circa 2008), and the improvement in sound quality was impressive.

[RoninEdits]

amd ryzen on x370 and intel on z270 are able to run 1 video card at x16, or two video cards at x8/x8, or 1 video card and whatever else you may need like a raid card etc. amd will run the m.2 slot from cpu pcie lanes on the motherboard, while intel m.2 slots will use chipset pcie lanes. both mainstream platforms are sufficient for what most people need. amd and intel high end platforms can support 3-4 video cards or a mix of various cards. if you were going to add a sound card or other misc x1-x4 card it should be fine in a slot using chipset pcie lanes, or an external usb audio interface if you are after high quality audio.

[ingeborgdot]

I have a question similar to that above.  I have the Gigabyte AX370 Gaming 5 board.  I have a video card.  I have also installed an M.2 in the one slot on the board.  Would I be able to add another NVME m.2 card to an adapter and put in on the PCIe slot?  and not lose any speed of the NVME m.2 card? 

[RoninEdits]

the second slot should run at x8 and should run a x4 m.2 at full speed. it would force the video card to x8, which might have a performance impact on cards like a gtx 1080 or above.

[ingeborgdot]

I don't have a 1080 card. 

I'm just trying to figure out if I take 2 ssds and Raid 0 them or get another NVME M.2 card and install it on an adapter and put in the PCIe slot.  I have this dilemma out on another forum looking for answers.  As I'm sure with many, seconds make a difference when you work with 2-3 hour videos.  Those seconds actually turn into minutes which after a while turn into hours.  Speed is my friend.

[RjL190365]

It's better to just get a PCIe adapter card. RAID 0 has absolutely zero redundancy – and if even one drive goes bad, everything on all drives in that array will be permanently lost, and extremely difficult and expensive to recover.

[ingeborgdot]

First, it will be a scratch disk/media cache drive so loss doesn't mean much.  When you say zero redundancy can you tell me what that means for sure.  Are you referring to a mirror? 

[Bill Gehrke]

I seriously doubt that you will find any performance improvement for your scratch/media cache on a RAID 0 array or a M.2 SSD over just using a standard single SATA III SSD

[ingeborgdot]

I am not questioning you because you know what you are talking about, but do you really think so?   Not even with the 2 to 3 hour videos that I work with?

[ingeborgdot]

Okay, I have one more question on a different scenario.

What if I put the M.2 slot I have on the board as the scratch disk/media cache and my OS & programs on an SSD?  Does that sound like it would give me the fastest solution?  OS on a fast SSD but the scratch disk which needs more speed on the blazing M.2 slot.