Adobe After Effects: AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series vs Intel Xeon W-3300

Introduction

Adobe After Effects has always been a memory-hungry application, which pairs well with workstation-class CPUs like the AMD Threadripper Pro and Intel Xeon W which in some cases can allow for up to 2TB of memory to be installed. But on the performance side, After Effects has for years performed better on lower core count CPUs like the Intel Core and AMD Ryzen line. With the recent addition of "Multi-Frame Rendering", however, there is once again a reason to invest in these high core count monsters for high-end workflows.

With the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series, we not only still have the ability to use huge amounts of RAM with up to 64 CPU cores, but AMD has increased the raw performance of those cores. Not only is the maximum boost frequency increased slightly, but the move to the newer "Zen3" architecture is supposed to bring about a large increase in performance across the board.

In this article, we will be using our PugetBench for After Effects benchmark paired with After Effects 22.4 to examine the performance of the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000WX CPUs. As a comparison, we will be including the previous generation AMD Threadripper PRO 3000 WX-Series, as well as their primary competition – the Intel Xeon W-3300 series. In addition, we will also throw in the Intel Core i9 12900K. This consumer CPU is not at all in the same class as the Threadripper PRO and Xeon W lines, but it is actually among the fastest CPUs currently available for After Effects – even with the advent of multi-frame rendering. Because of this, it will operate as a good comparison point for how well the Threadripper Pro 5000WX line compared in terms of pure performance with the much less expensive consumer lines.

If you want to read more about the new Threadripper PRO 5000-WX series and what sets them apart from the previous generation, we recommend checking out our main AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series Content Creation Review. That article includes testing results for a range of other applications including Premiere Pro, Lightroom Classic, Photoshop, and Unreal Engine; and also has all the test setup details on the hardware and software side if you want more information on the individual specs for each system.

Raw Benchmark Data

While our benchmark presents various scores based on the performance of each test, we also like to provide individual results for you to examine. If there is a specific task that is a hindrance to your workflow, examining the raw results for that task is going to be much more applicable than the scores that our benchmark calculated.

Feel free to skip to the next sections for our analysis of these results to get a wider view of how each configuration performs.

Benchmark Analysis (Balanced Power Profile)

For a number of the applications we are looking at as a part of our greater Threadripper PRO 5000WX testing, we ended up having to test with two Windows power profiles: the default "Balanced" profile, as well as the "High Performance" power profile. Switching between the two profiles most often can give the Intel Xeon W line a solid boost to performance, but in the case of After Effects, it also greatly increases the performance of the Threadripper PRO 5000WX processors in a number of critical areas.

To start off our After Effects performance analysis, we are going to first look at the performance when using the default "Balanced" power profile:

Compared to the previous Threadripper PRO 3000WX processors, the new 5000WX models are around 10% faster overall in After Effects. Interestingly enough, the way the performance gains are spread out ended up making all three of the Threadripper PRO 5000WX CPUs we tested have almost identical overall scores. The major difference between the three models is that the 5965WX 24 core and 5975WX 32 core models did better in most of our tests (especially tracking), but the 5995WX 64 core pulled ahead by a small amount for our "Multi-Core Score", which is intended to push the multi-frame render (MFR) feature as far as is realistically possible.

We should point out that in many ways, this "Multi-Core Score" may be more important than the "Overall Score" for these workstation CPUs. In the past, one of the big reasons to invest in a workstation-class CPU is because you have particularly large and complicated compositions which require a very large amount of system RAM. On the performance side, a consumer-grade Intel Core i9 12900K is often able to keep up with – or beat – workstation-class CPUs, so the higher RAM capacity was the main reason to invest in one of these CPUs. With the new multi-frame rendering feature, however, complex compositions that needed more RAM are now also the ones that tend to benefit the most from CPUs with higher core counts and increased memory bandwidth. In other words, users that would want to invest in a workstation-class CPU are now also those whose main performance bottleneck is likely to be reflected most accurately by the "Multi-Core Score" portion of our After Effects benchmark.

This is good to keep in mind when comparing the Threadripper Pro 5000WX processors to the Intel Xeon W-3300 series. With the 24 core models, the Threadripper PRO 5965WX was a huge 60% faster overall than the Intel Xeon W-3345, but that performance advantage is much smaller for the Multi-Core Score. For that, AMD still has a solid lead, but it is closer to only being about 30% faster.

Looking at the 32 core models, Threadripper Pro 5975WX versus Intel Xeon W-3365 is a bit more even, with AMD only being 15% faster overall. Once again, Intel does better for the multi-core score, and it is enough for these Intel and AMD CPUs to perform about on par for that test. One additional advantage AMD has, however, is that the 5995WX 64 core is able to give a further 10% higher performance for the Multi-Core Score. Intel does technically have a higher core count model available – the Xeon W-3375 38 Core – but that CPU often has significant enough performance issues that we decided to completely keep it out of this set of testing.

What all this means is that with the default Balanced power profile, the AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series shows some solid 10-20% gains over the previous 3000WX generation. They also do fairly well versus the Intel Xeon W-3300 line, although how much faster they highly depend on the specific model you are looking at. However, we found through the course of our testing that performance with these CPUs can change significantly when using the High Performance Windows power profile, so let's see how things shake up if we switch out the power profile.

Benchmark Analysis (High Performance Power Profile)

Using the "High Performance" Windows power profile does some very interesting things for performance with these CPUs in After Effects. Starting with the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series, we saw a small 5% performance increase on average, but the 5975WX 32 core and 5995WX 64 core saw a much larger 20-25% performance increase specifically for the Multi-Core Score. And, as we pointed out in the previous section, is in many ways the most important result for this class of CPU.

The Intel Xeon W-3300 series saw even larger performance gains almost across the board. Interestingly enough, however, the Multi-Core Score only increased by about 5% on the W-3335 16 Core and W-3345 24 Core, and actually was 10% slower on the W-3365 32 Core. While the increase for MFR performance was modest, for the other aspects of our benchmark, the 16 and 24 core CPUs saw anywhere from a 40% to a massive 70% increase in performance.

In terms of relative performance, with the High Performance power profile, the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series are about 20-30% faster overall compared to the previous generation AMD Threadripper Pro 3000 WX-Series. The vast majority of this comes from the Multi-Core Score, where the 32 and 64 core models in particular can be 20-25% faster than the previous generation.

Compared to the Intel Xeon W-3300 line, using the High Performance power profile allows Intel to shorten the gap considerably, but the 5000WX series is still about 20% faster overall, and 30-40% faster for the Multi-Core Score. However, it is worth pointing out that since the Xeon W-3365 saw worse performance with the High Performance profile for the Multi-Core Score, the actual advantage for AMD, if you were to pick and choose the power profile, is closer to 20-30%. That is still a large lead for AMD, but not quite as large as if you only consider using the High Performance profile in a vacuum.

AMD Threadripper PRO 5965WX vs 3955WX vs Intel Xeon W-3345

In most cases, the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5965WX 24 Core is significantly faster than both the previous generation Threadripper PRO 3955WX 16 Core and the Intel Xeon W-3345 24 Core. The 5965WX 24 Core does have more cores than the 3955WX 16 Core, but since the previous generation did not have a 24 core model, this is the closest comparison we are able to make across the two generations. In any case, with both the default "Balanced" Windows power profile and the "High Performance" profile, the 5965WX is overall 20-25% faster than the 3955WX. However, for especially complex compositions where MFR is able to be best utilized, the 5965WX can closer to a massive 75-80% faster than the 3955WX!

Compared to the Intel Xeon W-3345, the Threadripper Pro 5965WX is roughly 20% faster across the board as long as you stick to the "High Performance" Windows power profile, which is essentially a requirement for the W-3345.

AMD Threadripper PRO 5975WX vs 3975WX vs Intel Xeon W-3365

Like the 5965WX, the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5975WX 32 Core is significantly faster than both the previous generation Threadripper PRO 3975WX 32 Core and the Intel Xeon W-3365 32 Core, although to a slightly lesser degree. With both the default "Balanced" Windows power profile and the "High Performance" profile, the 5975WX is roughly 10-15% faster than the 3975WX. The gap is larger for more complex compositions, however, with the 5975WX ending up nearly 45% faster in some cases.

Compared to the Intel Xeon W-3365, the Threadripper Pro 5975WX is between 15% and 20% faster in After Effects. The main benefit to the 5975WX comes into play if you use the "High Performance" power profile, which gives AMD a sizable performance boost for complex projects. In this profile, the 5975WX can be up to 40% faster than the W-3365.

AMD Threadripper PRO 5995WX vs 3995WX

Higher core count CPUs like the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5995WX 64 Core and the previous generation Threadripper PRO 3995WX 64 Core tend to not be quite as fast in moderately threaded applications like After Effects, even with the new multi-frame rendering feature in After Effects, and the increased Boost frequency and IPC gains found on the new Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series.

However, in terms of raw performance, the new 5995WX is around 15-30% faster overall compared to the Threadripper PRO 3995WX depending on the Windows power profile. Intel does not have a Xeon W CPU with a comparable core count, although it is worth pointing out that even though the Threadripper PRO 5995WX is typically slower than the lower core count Threadripper PRO CPUs in After Effects, it is still roughly 10-20% faster than the Intel Xeon W-3365 32 Core.

How well do AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series CPUs perform in After Effects?

The new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series processors do very well in After Effects, particularly for the kind of workflows that typically need this level of workstation-class CPU. Versus the previous generation Threadripper PRO 3000 WX-Series, you can expect anywhere from a 10-30% performance increase overall, and in the cases where the new multi-frame rendering (MFR) feature is able to stretch its legs, this can increase to a huge 20-50% performance gain depending on the specific model and whether you are willing to enable the High Performance Windows power profile.

Compared to their main competition from Intel – the Xeon W-3300 line – the 5000WX series also maintains a strong lead. With the Xeon W-3300 processors you need to be using the High Performance power profile in order to get the best overall performance, but even there, the 5000WX series is about 20% faster overall, and 20-30% faster for the more complex workflows that will benefit most from the raw power and RAM capacity of these workstation CPUs.

Overall, the new AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-series processors are a great option for high-end After Effects users. Consumer CPUs like the Intel Core i9 12900K are likely to be a more cost-effective choice for most users, but if your workflow needs more than 128GB of RAM and includes very complex compositions, these new Threadripper PRO CPUs can be up to 60% faster than even the fastest consumer-grade processor currently on the market.

Keep in mind that the benchmark results in this article are strictly for After Effects and that performance will vary widely in different applications. If your workflow includes other software packages, we highly recommend checking out our AMD Threadripper PRO 5000 WX-Series Content Creation Review article which includes results and links to in-depth testing for a range of other applications including Premiere Pro, Photoshop, Lightroom Classic, and DaVinci Resolve.