AMD Ryzen Threadripper 3970X 32 Core, $1999 US CPU Review With TRX40 AORUS Master Motherboard

The AMD TRX40 HEDT Chipset and sTRX4 Socket - Exclusive For 3rd Gen Threadripper

AMD is pushing the boundaries once again, making sure that the new Threadripper lineup is fully accompanied by an industry-leading platform. The new platform for Threadripper is called TRX40 and it is exclusively designed for 3rd Gen Threadripper processors and beyond.

The TRX40 HEDT platform would feature quad-channel memory, UDIMM memory support with 2 DIMMs per channel and up to 256 GB (EEC) of capacity. There would also be support for 64 Gen 4 PCIe lanes with 16 lanes switchable with the SATA interface. There also seems to be info regarding TDPs and we can also notice the segmentation here too. For the full details on each respective TRX40 motherboard, you can check out our roundup over here!

Once again, AMD's HEDT platform is made in a way that it can cater not only to HEDT consumers but also to the workstation community. In terms of features, the platform now supports up to 64 cores and 128 threads and there's no doubt that we will get more cores and threads on the same socket and platform in the future with future iterations of the Zen core. It can support chips with up to 280W TDP and can deliver full 72 PCIe Gen 4 lanes to users. The CPU itself also features 4x bandwidth versus the 2nd Generation Threadripper processors which had to communicate with the off-chip X399 chip.

AMD Ryzen Threadripper Generation Comparison:

Family Name	AMD Threadripper 9000	AMD Threadripper 7000	AMD Threadripper 5000	AMD Threadripper 3000	AMD Threadripper 2000
	Shimada Peak	Storm Peak	Chagall	Castle Peak	Coflax
CPU Architecture	Zen 5	Zen 4	Zen 2	Zen+	Zen 1
Process Node	4nm	5nm	7nm	12nm	14nm
Max CPU Cores	96?	96	64	32	16
Max CPU Threads	192?	192	128	64	32
PCIe Support	PCIe Gen 5.0	PCIe Gen 5.0	PCIe Gen 4.0	PCIe Gen 3.0	PCIe Gen 3.0
Max PCIe Lanes	128	128	72	64	64
Max L2 Cache	96 MB	96 MB	32 MB	16 MB	8 MB
Max L3 Cache	384 MB	384 MB	256 MB	64 MB	32 MB
Max TDP	350W?	350W	280W	280W	250W
Socket	SP6	SP6	sTRX4	TR4	TR4
Chipset	WRX90, TRX50	WRX90, TRX50	TRX40, TRX80, WRX80	X399	X399
Launch	2025	2023	2022	2019	2018

The HEDT sTRX4 (LGA 4094) Socket - 3rd Gen Ryzen Threadripper Support

With the TRX40 platform, AMD is also slightly revising their socket. The TR4 socket has now been changed to the sTRX4 socket. The packaging of both sockets is the same but there are some major changes made to the pin layout. The pin count is still 4094 for the socket itself for the SP3 socket but the revised naming should be considered here. The sTRX4 SP3 socket has more pins enabled than the TR4 SP3 socket.

In the following pictures, you can see the difference between the TR4 and sTRX4 socket. Do note that AMD has implemented ID pin recognition to match compatible CPUs with their socket and in this case, the sTRX4 socket would only support 3rd Gen Threadrippers. The socket will prevent boot on any older processor by recognizing the pin configuration.

AMD sTRX4 SP3 Socket For 3rd Gen Threadripper:

AMD TR4 SP3 Socket For 1st/2nd Gen Threadripper:

Cooler Compatibility With The sTRX4 Socket

Since the socket hasn't changed, all coolers that were previously compatible with Threadripper CPUs would run fine with the 3rd Generation Threadripper chips. Despite that, new coolers are going to be available by various manufacturers since the new series have TDPs of up to 280W. Those require better heat transfer and cooling solutions and I will be testing my sample chip with a range of air and water cooling solutions.

 

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