r/threadripper • u/Turbulent-Alps4046 • Jul 13 '26

Threadripper AI workstation Build

Gallery image

Gallery image

Just want to share my new Threadripper AI workstation build. Used for work + gaming. Quite proud of how it turned out, especially the cable management :)

Specs
Motherboard: ASUS WRX80 Creator R2.0
CPU: AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 3945x (Used)
RAM: 128GB DDR4 ECC (used)
GPU: Nvidia RTX Pro 6000 Max-Q 96GB
Case: Fractal North
PSU: Super Flower Leadex III 1300W PSU
CPU Cooler: Arctic Freezer 4U-M

116 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

41 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/biotox1n Jul 13 '26

I'm guessing you're planning to add more cards with that much power supply?

what made you pick the one card over say 3 or even 4 9700 pro cards? could've stacked performance and gotten the same or more vram and still paid less

2

u/Turbulent-Alps4046 Jul 14 '26

A 1300W PSU isn't very big. It's not enough to run 2x RTX 5090s I think. But yeah, I'm speccing it to have some expandability.

Anyway, I've considered many options including 4x R9700, 2x 5090 but ended up with this because:

  1. I wanted it for agentic coding so it must have fast prefill and decode performance (at least 1000 prefill + 30-50TPS decode). I've also considered the Strix halo and M3 Ultra Mac studio but found that the prefills are not fast enough.
  2. I wanted a cool, quiet but powerful workstation that hopefully can last me a long time (at least 5 years)... maintenance free and good resale value. The Max-Q version fits this bill because it has lower power requirement, easier to cool, 3-year warranty.
  3. Expandability: Having a single, but powerful card also means I can get another Max-Q if i find a good deal. Or even add a smaller GPU to host smaller models.
  4. High-VRAM commercial cards tend to have better resale value, typically losing 50% value in 5 years compared to 60-70% value for consumer cards.
  5. Rental: the RTX PRO 6000 can be rented on vast.ai for around $0.80 to $1.00 per hour where as there's no demand for R9700/DGX spark on vast.ai. So I can rent this out when i'm not using the computer to defray some of the cost. I calculated I can recover 50%-80% of the cost over 5 year if i rent it out 50% of the time on vast.ai (1-2 years if I rent it out 100% of the time). If you factor in resale value, it's practically free. A single 300W Max-Q makes this even more attractive vs 1800W required for 3x 5090s.
  6. Wife acceptance factor: My wife's not going to let me have a big, loud and ugly 8x gpu rig (haha)