Introduction
Today brings us to our latest test with Autodesk Inventor. We tested the new 2022 version of Inventor on InventorBench HD. We tested with a full span of latest generation CPUs on both the Intel and the AMD side. Since our last tests, the 11th generation Rocket Lake Intel CPUs have become widely available and we are now able to see how they stack up against the AMD 5000 series. An added benefit is that both processors are now able to make use of full 7000 MB/s read speeds available on PCIe 4.0 M.2 SSDs such as the Samsung 980 Pro.
In our last tests on Inventor, the AMD 5000 series held a solid lead over Intel’s 10th generation Comet Lake CPUs. We predicted that the 11th gen Intel CPUs would greatly catch up if not surpassing the AMD 5000 series CPUs altogether in various areas of performance, and that prediction was largely confirmed through our testing.
Hardware Contenders
| CPU | Physical Cores | Threads | Max Clock Speed (GHz) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intel Core i5-11500 | 6 | 12 | 4.6 |
| Intel Core i7-11700 | 8 | 16 | 4.9 |
| Intel Core i7-11700K | 8 | 16 | 5.0 |
| Intel Core i9-11900KF | 8 | 16 | 5.3 |
| AMD Ryzen 5 5600X | 6 | 12 | 4.6 |
| AMD Ryzen 7 5800X | 8 | 16 | 4.6 |
| AMD Ryzen 9 5900X | 12 | 24 | 4.8 |
| AMD Ryzen 9 5950X | 16 | 32 | 4.9 |
The Test Environment
For our tests, we used the InventorBench HD tool from Micrographics. We ran 10 passes on each hardware configuration and used the results that the tool generated. As of writing this article, InventorBench HD is not yet available to the public but soon you’ll be able to find it on their website. You can still download the classic InventorBench program there now, which also gets the job done nicely. Below, you can also check out our highlight video that includes some footage of the operations InventorBench HD performs during the benchmarking process.
| Intel Test Platform Components | Brand / Model |
|---|---|
| Cooler | Corsair H115i Pro XT |
| GPU | Nvidia Quadro P620 |
| RAM | Corsair Vengeance 32 GB |
| SSD | Samsung 980 Pro |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte Z590 UD AC |
| AMD Test Platform Components | Brand / Model |
|---|---|
| Cooler | Corsair H115i Pro XT |
| GPU | Nvidia Quadro P620 |
| RAM | Corsair Vengeance 32 GB |
| SSD | Samsung 980 Pro |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte X570 UD |
Results
Takeaways
For Autodesk Inventor, we would generally recommend the 11th generation Intel CPUs over the AMD 5000 series CPUs. The results were quite close overall and either set of processors would be well suited for this type of CAD work. However. in key areas, such as single-thread performance (the driving factor behind drawing and modeling as well as file manipulation performance), Intel CPUs edged out their AMD counterparts. AMD did clobber Intel in some areas, such as ray-tracing performance (which is multi-thread oriented) but typical workflows do not rely on ray-tracing to complete work.
For these tests, there was not a plateau in performance going from the Intel i7 models to the i9 model as we have seen in some past generations of CPUs. This means there wasn’t a CPU that stood out especially on price/performance so there is good reason to choose whichever processor is best suited to your budget. Also, if you are configuring a machine that needs to have high multi-thread performance for other applications, you should choose an AMD CPU instead of Intel, as they drastically outperform Intel on multi-threaded tasks and any compromises on Inventor performance will be very minimal, if present at all.
As always, if you would like some help configuring a PC for Autodesk Inventor, you can reach out to us via phone or email and quickly get in touch with an expert. Check out our Contact Page for more details or to book a consultation and get started.