Well a monoblock would normally be the best solution. I have only seen EK coming out with them so far. I do not like EK using an existing fin and flow solution on a much larger socket. My VRM temps are fine so I would focus on a full CPU flow block until a better monoblock comes available.
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Very nice 
twiddles thumbs sheepishly
…
but my dual 8-core xeons were cheaper… >.>
I kid, I kid. That thing will run circles around a couple of slow Sandy Bridge chips.
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Just to be clear - are you saying it’s better to go for this - made for the ROG Zenith Extreme X399 - covers VRMs too…
or the basic TR4 block?
EK-Supremacy EVO Threadripper Edition - Nickel
Which one?
Before I pulled the trigger, I actually went through as many of the Xeon options again (thanks to ARK) - what I saw was
- Typically lower base-clock frequencies for anything over 8-10 core
- Turbo clocks were < 3.8 GHz usually.
- ECC support was a positive
- Unable to overclock
Hmm…
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Seriously? Wow… Do you recall any links to said card? I thought Thunderbolt was Intel only?
lower clockspeeds
low turbos
no overclocking
I cri everytiem… ;.;
I may need to build a 3930K or E5-1650 machine to console myself.
(I have a thing for Sandy Bridge)
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They are great for mission-critical server tasks in say a nice WS board. But for HEDT, personally, I prefer being able to OC things as needed.
In 5-years from now, I would certainly push these boxes much more than right now.
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My approach is usually
- New == shiny, usually expensive; Mmmm got to be careful. So I don’t push OCs to the limit. I did this with my 6850K for about a year, didn’t fix my poor RAM XMP issue.
- About a year later (couple weeks back) I pushed DDR4 channel voltage to 1.5vdc and got 3200 MT/s on the 6850K rig.
After about a year, once it’s no longer “NEW” or the “best”, then I’m like “ohh, it’s old shit, let’s OC the crap out of it…” 
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Hah me too - Sandy Bridge and X99. Stable as well… stable can be. Running an E5-2620 (cheapest at the time!) + Asus X99 WS-E/USB3.1 for my FreeNAS server.
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Nice, I had a 14-core in an X99M-WS until not too long ago. Not as fast as I would have liked but for anything that needs the cores…
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Neither. I would NOT use EK on Threadripper until EK made a true fin/flow solution for a TR4 socket. All EK did was strap a larger cooled plate to their existing block used for all other parts. TR4 is much larger and is a cheap out as far as I am concerned.
I use this:
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That makes sense - you can see the EK ‘block’ / fin stack, still only covers that smaller portion of the plate, since it’s made for i7-sized CPUs. That’s just nasty!! I’m surprised no one has mentioned this more in reviews etc.
Cause they get their shit free from EK. Seeing that I went with Bykski on the TR4, I also tried their Vega blocks (not blue, Gun metal grey). Very happy with both. Also much cheaper than EK, also saved a bunch on shipping. Also the stock back plate is compatible, but they didn’t supply the screws so I had to get separate locally.
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Threadripper for Home Lab???
Literal goals right there! Please keep us updated on the process and use for this amazing build!
P.S. ZFS with 2 TB of Ram?
AMD says there’s nothing preventing a Threadripper from running up to 2TB of RAM.
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Actually, second Threadripper box - I certainly will; got some fun plans…
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My future goal is to have a Threadripper Virtualization server running front-end apps like NextCloud, Transmission, etc. and a have an epyc back-end storage server with 4TB of RAM for all the ZFS needs. I would get this now, but money… Until then, I will be living vicariously through you!
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Yep, welcome to the too-poor-to-afford-socket-tr4 club!
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Here are some pics to compete with @bsodmike Gigabyte glory shots… haha
Still need to do the bottom plate and PSU shroud.
And for you RGB haters:
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Do not get the Noctua and an Asus board! At least not if you ever want to use your top PCIe slot…
To be clear, I’m singling out Asus for a reason. I haven’t seen a single board from anyone besides Asus that has this problem. But Asus put their first PCIe slot closer to the socket than everyone else (in violation of AMD’s guidelines). It’s obvious even just looking at the pics of each TR4 board.
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I think you mean that the other way around, just sayin for fun…
To be honest though, the only Noctua cooler really suited for TR4 is their large model and that screws the top slot on all boards I believe, not 100% on that.
Only the Asus Zenith Extreme as well. Other Asus boards are different.