NUMA Nodes
NUMA Nodes
Hi, I see you're curious about NUMA nodes and their effect on gaming performance. Let's break it down simply. Your system uses AMD Threadripper with a high-end motherboard, and you've configured it for all-on-one mode except memory, which is set to 3600MHz. You also have 1800Gb/s infinity fabric speed in a 1:1 ratio. In auto mode, the system doesn't rely on NUMA nodes, but you noticed differences when testing with specific games and BIOS versions.
When NUMA nodes are enabled (as they were in earlier BIOS versions), memory latency drops to around 74ns and copying speeds reach about 110 GB/s. This means data moves faster between the CPU and RAM, which can boost gaming performance—especially for modern titles that demand quick access.
However, with your current setup (2 nodes per socket), the improvement is minimal because the extra nodes don’t significantly change latency or speed in this configuration. The real benefit comes from optimizing other settings like game profiles, texture compression, and driver tuning.
So, NUMA nodes can help when you're using games that heavily utilize memory bandwidth, but in your case, sticking to all-on-one mode with solid configurations usually gives the best results.
It seems my initial assumption might be off. Enabling numa could tie the game's threads to one or a few chiplets, potentially boosting core boost frequency while reducing memory controller usage. This might also limit cache waste since some cache handles data swapping between chiplets—having all threads on the same chiplet could free up more cache.
Marius, your response is appreciated. I initially thought that might be the case, but I’m still puzzled about why Numa nodes are disabled by default—it seems to affect performance negatively. It makes me wonder if more people had noticed this and discussed it earlier. This video did help clarify things a bit.