Has anyone built with AMD Ryzen CPUs or AMD RX500 GPUs yet? (Parting out a new build)

Hello all,

I'm currently parting out a new build, as my current PC is almost 7 years old. I wanted to see if anyone here has built as system around AMD's "Ryzen" CPUs or their "Polaris" RX 500 GPUs yet, and could provide some thoughts on how either performs with Trainz.

Part of my reason in asking is I have a vague recollection from years ago that Trainz was not as well-performing on AMD systems as it was on Intel/Nvidia systems (I cannot recall if that was a CPU or GPU thing), and a search of the forumz provided nothing recent.

My Current Rig:

• Intel i5-2500k @ 3.30GHz
• Gigabyte Z68 Motherboard
• 8GB DDR3-1600 RAM
• Nvidia GTX 560 (2GB)
• 1TB HDD (Primary Drive)
• 1TB HDD (Storage Drive)
• 2 x 1080p 60hz monitors
• Windows 10

Proposed New Rig (AMD CPU):

• AMD Ryzen 5 1600x @ 3.6GHz
• B350 or X370 Motherboard
• 32GB DDR4-3200 RAM
• Nvidia GTX 1070 or AMD RX 580
• 500GB M.2 NVMe SSD
• 500GB to 1TB SSD
• 3TB HDD
• Windows 10

Proposed New Rig (Intel CPU):

• Intel i5-7600k @ 3.8GHz
• Z270 Motherboard
• 32GB DDR4-2400 RAM
• Nvidia GTX 1070 or AMD RX 580
• 500GB M.2 NVMe SSD
• 500GB to 1TB SSD
• 3TB HDD
• Windows 10

The goal for either of these is gameplay at 1440p / 60+ fps.
Both price out to around the $2000 (US) mark, at time of writing.

Some notes:

• From the benchmarks I've looked at, the GTX 1070 seems to be the better GPU over the RX 580, price-performance wise. I'm more than willing to swap out for the AMD card, should feedback here say otherwise.
• Ryzen appears to want higher clocked RAM, so that changes that choice a bit. 32GB is more for my Photoshop/Illustrator/AutoCAD work.
• CPU cooling will probably end up being along the lines of a Hyper 212 Evo or equivalent. I might change that over to a 240mm liquid AIO if the price is right.
• On storage choices: M.2 NVMe SSDs seems to be the future for storage, and I'd like that for a boot drive (plus Adobe Suite & AutoCAD). The SSD would be for Trainz and some frequently played games (like Railworks and Cities Skylines). The HDD is for everything else.

All that said and done, this is all being picked out before the launch of two new CPU platforms by both Intel and AMD ("Skylake-X/Kaby Lake-X" and "Threadripper", respectively), as well as AMD's "Vega" GPUs. I'll be waiting to see how the market responds (plus waiting for GPU prices to come down again after this whole cryptocurrency resurgence), so buying the parts won't happen for another month or two.

Any thoughts or feedback are graciously welcome.

Best,
~James

For pure performance I might just drop a GTX 1080 Ti in the existing system. You may need a new case though.

Cheerio John

Trainz is video hungry so I think with the exception of the video card it comes down more to Intel/AMD preference and bang for bucks than observable performance difference. As for GPU my personal preference would be the GTX 1070, perhaps an Asus Strix, nice and quiet and not to power hungry. I think for most of us we would be hard pushed to justify a 1080 Ti but there is no harm in dreaming. I've often wondered if two GTX 1070's with SLI support would out perform the likes of a 1080 TI and be a cheaper option, just a thought. Peter

Just an observation regarding GPU choice, if you are expecting to crank up the draw distance and quality settings. While a GTX1070 / RX580 is the ideal card for most 1440p gaming, you may find that you will need to dial down some of the quality settings to get some Trainz routes to run at 60 fps at that resolution. It obviously depends on the scenery / route complexity but, for example, on clam1952's excellent Ffestiniog & Welsh Highland route I get frame rates dipping into the 20s on occasion, and that is with a GTX1080. For me, that's not an issue as the eye candy is stunning and the sessions are still eminently playable. However, to get close to 60fps, I'd need to drop some of my settings down from Ultra / High. The same goes for a number of other routes / sessions, by various authors, that I run.

John

Wilts747:

I have two GTX1080's and SLI in my system. Even tho no version of Trainz is written for SLI both TS2012 and TANE do seem to benefit from SLI to some extent. TANE about twice as much as TS2012. The SLI bridge is around $40. Software is free from NVidia. Its the second GPU that hits you in the wallet, lol.

Ben

Ben, I and probably many others hate you a hundred times over and yes we are all green with envy, but I'm sure you must have worked hard to get them and the results I imagine are fantastic. Good luck and enjoy. Peter

Hi Peter:

I hate the guy that owns the rig I saw with 3 Titan X's in it. Talk about overkill. I was just trying to make you aware SLI does seem to work with newer versions of Trainz even though they were not written for it.

If you want to talk more about SLI lets take it to PM's and not clutter up this thread with somewhat off topic stuff.

Ben

johnwhelan said:

For pure performance I might just drop a GTX 1080 Ti in the existing system. You may need a new case though.

Cheerio John

Click to expand...

I've certainly contemplated doing that too. Could always hack out some of the drive cages with a dremel. I'm more concerned in doing so, the current CPU would start to bottleneck it's capability though, even though the 2500k and 2600k overclock very well. Plus, combined with the relative age of the system, it makes me want to replace the entire system.

wilts747 said:

Trainz is video hungry so I think with the exception of the video card it comes down more to Intel/AMD preference and bang for bucks than observable performance difference. As for GPU my personal preference would be the GTX 1070, perhaps an Asus Strix, nice and quiet and not to power hungry. I think for most of us we would be hard pushed to justify a 1080 Ti but there is no harm in dreaming. I've often wondered if two GTX 1070's with SLI support would out perform the likes of a 1080 TI and be a cheaper option, just a thought. Peter

Click to expand...

Alright, so theoretically there should be no major performance difference between Intel and AMD CPUs in Trainz. That's comforting to hear.

That's my take on the GPU market right now. If I had money to burn, I'd love to put in a 1080ti, or 1070 SLI arrangement,or even better yet a 1080ti SLI setup, but that's a dream build.

An Asus Strix (or a GPU from any major manufacturer) is more for the glorious RGB factor!

Vostrail said:

Just an observation regarding GPU choice, if you are expecting to crank up the draw distance and quality settings. While a GTX1070 / RX580 is the ideal card for most 1440p gaming, you may find that you will need to dial down some of the quality settings to get some Trainz routes to run at 60 fps at that resolution. It obviously depends on the scenery / route complexity but, for example, on clam1952's excellent Ffestiniog & Welsh Highland route I get frame rates dipping into the 20s on occasion, and that is with a GTX1080. For me, that's not an issue as the eye candy is stunning and the sessions are still eminently playable. However, to get close to 60fps, I'd need to drop some of my settings down from Ultra / High. The same goes for a number of other routes / sessions, by various authors, that I run.

John

Click to expand...

Not opposed to doing that, as that's what I do currently. IIRC, in TANE I have shadows on low, draw distance dialed back to around 1km, water quality on low, and so on.

With 1440p, it's probably more for useful later on, as I'd need to buy new monitors to do that. Initially, I'd like to get 1080p performance running well (even if that means 30fps), and dial up from there. Clam's F&WH route is the one I'm dying to run, as my GTX560 will not handle it at all.

bendorsey said:

Wilts747: I have two GTX1080's and SLI in my system. Even tho no version of Trainz is written for SLI both TS2012 and TANE do seem to benefit from SLI to some extent. TANE about twice as much as TS2012. The SLI bridge is around $40. Software is free from NVidia. Its the second GPU that hits you in the wallet, lol.

Ben

Click to expand...

wilts747 said:

Ben, I and probably many others hate you a hundred times over and yes we are all green with envy, but I'm sure you must have worked hard to get them and the results I imagine are fantastic. Good luck and enjoy. Peter

Click to expand...

bendorsey said:

Hi Peter:

I hate the guy that owns the rig I saw with 3 Titan X's in it. Talk about overkill. I was just trying to make you aware SLI does seem to work with newer versions of Trainz even though they were not written for it.

If you want to talk more about SLI lets take it to PM's and not clutter up this thread with somewhat off topic stuff.

Ben

Click to expand...

No plans for SLI for me, or at least for this stage of the build. Perhaps down the road.

Glad to hear that SLI seems to work with TANE though. Hopefully we'll get more support for it in future versions...

---

Thanks,
~James

Hi James:

I strongly suspect SLI will never be a big deal for Trainz. As I understand it when N3V was discussing what to put into TANE SLI was mentioned but rejected (which is quite reasonable). AFAIK SLI only works on desktops and far too many Trainzers run Trainz on Laptops. Plus the newer GPU technology seems quite capable of running TANE using a single GPU. On the other hand TANE puts a heavy load on the GPU so as time goes by and N3V adds more and more capabilities to TANE there may come a time when SLI might get a bit more attractive but I can't see that happening anytime soon (if ever).

When I set my SLI system up NVidia was pushing it with a pair of GTX 1080's. No mention was made of the 1070, 1060, etc. derivatives as they hadn't come out yet. Would SLI work with them? Probably as they are not much different from the 1080 other then a lesser amount of Gram. The SLI bridge would probably work with them as well (tho I'd sure check with NVidia first). On the other end of the $$$ spectrum I can't imagine SLI wouldn't work with the 1080Ti and even TitanX's.

Bottom line is very few Trainzers will build SLI equipped systems unless they are also serious gamers in other venues. As I understand it many of the serious boom, bang, crash, kill everything games seriously benefit from SLI because they not only need it - they are written for it.

Ben

At 1080p, an Asus Strix OC GTX 1070 coupled with a fast modern i7 delivers excellent performance in T:ANE SP2 with all the shadows and wicks turned up and a draw distance of 15000m. Framerates are often in triple digits on modestly detailed routes and still above 60FPS most of the time. Any 1080 or GTX 1080Ti would be even better, but somewhat wasted at 1080p resolution.

There are still a few busy places and badly-designed high-poly assets around where I have observed framerates drop below 30 on occasion, but that is comparatively rare now as I weed them out if they have too much impact on the steady performance of a session or route.
There's still a gaming edge to the Intel CPUs over AMD Ryzen, especially in IPC and ability to drive highest-end GPUs, but Threadripper may give AMD a real fight-back chance in the next few weeks. Stay tuned!
Certainly, the memory handling of the Ryzen CPUs has greatly improved since their original release and, as long as they're well-cooled, they'll give most i7s a run for their money at perhaps two thirds of the cost when properly configured and performance-tuned.
Then again, now there's the latest i9 series, Skylake-X CPUs for AMD to contend with. Early reviews of the i9-7900X are ominous and the pricing and performance of the upcoming 8-core/16 thread i7-7820X and even 6-core/ 12 thread i7-7800X will be a real test for the Ryzen 1800X.
I'm waiting for the dust to settle before I make my platform and system upgrade choices.
There's never been a better time for crafting your own gaming machines!