With the Threadripper 1920X and 1950X already added to our recommendations and proving hugely popular with builders, many have wondered: What can do with the 1900X? So, read on to see why many workstation builders are enjoying the cheapest Threadripper CPU
What’s the point of the 1900X?
At a glance, the Threadripper 1900X looks similar to the Ryzen 7 1800X. So you might be wondering what you are paying more for with this CPU?
Well, the 1900X rounds out AMD’s new High End Desktop (HEDT) range, which hammers home the diminishing advantages of Intel. Specifically, the 1900X adds a higher base clock, quad-channel RAM support and a huge 64 PCIe lanes, making it very useful for workstation builds. However, the performance per core is still superior on Intel’s i7-7820X (the nearest competitor), making the 7820X a better choice for a high-core gaming setup. (But if you’re building a hardcore gaming PC, you should be getting the i7-7700K anyway.)
The 1900X truly shines as an upper midrange workstation CPU, so that’s what I’ll be designing in this post!
Threadripper 1900X Workstation Build ($3,310)
CPU: AMD Threadripper 1900X ($550)
- Cores: 8-cores / 16-threads
- Base Clock: 3.8GHz
- Boost Clock: 4.0GHz
- L2/L3 Cache: 4MB/16MB
- PCIe lanes: 64
- Memory: Quad Channel, 2667MHz DDR4
- TDP: 180W
Although it’s a touch lower on its L2/L3 cache compared to the bigger Threadrippers, the 1900X gains that impressive 3.8GHz base clock while still having the 64 PCIe lanes and quad channel memory support. It is designed to be a big multitasking CPU in its own right and is an amazing CPU for the price.
CPU Cooler: Corsair Hydro Series H100i v2 ($110)
Right now this uses the AM4 to TR4 adaptor that comes in the box with Threadripper CPUs. However more coolers with a full custom block are coming. Until then, this is one of the best for the price right now.
GPU: 2x GTX 1080 ($1,080)
When you are looking between the GTX 1080, GTX 1080 Ti or Titan Xp, it all comes down to, “What am I getting for my money?” This is a little less expensive than a single Titan Xp, but we can take advantage of many more PCIe lanes to run the GTX 1080s with 16 PCIe lanes each. If you want to add a 3rd or even 4th GTX 1080, you’d have yourself a mini-render farm. With each GPU having 2560 CUDA cores, being able to unleash 5120, 7680, or even 10240 CUDA cores is a thing of beauty.
RAM: Corsair 32GB DDR4 3000MHz ($300)
This 2-stick set gives us a ton of memory for workstation purposes. Add another set to benefit from quad-channel compatibility.
Motherboard: ASUS ROG ZENITH EXTREME ($550)
Wanting high performance across all of our components, spending the extra onto this top-end motherboard from ASUS really complements the build nicely. With features like ASUS’s Safe Lock giving us extra security for our GPUs, to the suite of built-in overclock profiles, this motherboard has everything we need for a top-end build.
SSD: Samsung 960 PRO 512GB PCIe ($300)
The 960 PRO is a great performer and can be used in either the M.2 port or through a PCIe slot. We need to use those PCIe lanes for something, after all! This is the main storage drive for the build, so it’s used for the OS and key programs, as well as storing files being worked on.
HDD: HGST Ultrastar 2 TB ($50)
Standard 2TB drives are still nice and cheap, while giving good performance at this price point. Provides us with a nice amount of storage for low cost.
PSU: Seasonic SSR-1200GD ($200)
We want to make sure there’s room for lots of GPUs, along with the rest of the system being overclockable. We really do need the 1200W power supplied by this PSU from Seasonic. This gives you enough to handle the 300W max load from each GTX 1080 as well as the rest of the system comfortably. A premium price for a really good piece of hardware.
Case: Cooler Master HAF X ($170)
Although it’s not the most expensive case out there, this beats some more expensive cases when the main consideration is cooling. The interior design of the case is perfect for SLI and has plenty of space for things like the CPU cooler, too. Finishes off the build nicely!
Total Price: $3,310
The one thing I will say is you can go round and round with workstation builds. The price of this puts in the middle of my two previous Threadripper builds. Whereas those builds focused more on the CPU, this is designed to unleash more GPU performance for rendering. Having the full bandwidth of those 64 PCIe is quite compelling when you want to speed up rendering.
Go Forth and Build!
As mentioned at the start of the article, there are extras that you might need to finish off these builds:
- A copy of Windows. If you are a student or work for a big business, you might be able to get a copy for free or at a significantly lower cost. If not, we recommend Windows 10 on DVD ($90) or USB ($120).
- An optical drive – critical if you are wanting to install Windows 10 via DVD. Good thing here is DVD-RW drives are cheap these days (here’s one for $21).
We also have general recommendations for:
If you want to see other builds with even higher performance, check out the main page at Logical Increments.
There you have it, one hugely performing GPU rendering workstation using the power of Threadripper 1900X!
If you have any questions or suggestions about the build, then let us know in the comments.