[SOLVED] Best MidRange Build For the Upcoming Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020?

[Regev]

Hi folks

My uncle just asked me to build something that could run the upcoming Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020. He is a pilot and uses the simulator to train, learn flight paths, etc. He doesn't need it all on Max settings 4K, just to run pretty enough on this FHD 24" monitor: ( maybe he'll upgrade to QHD 31.5)

I built this:

1. AMD Ryzen 7 3700X (will the 3600 be enough? Will Flight Simulator work better with Intel or AMD?)
2. Gigabyte B550M S2H (cheap but the VRM is better than others double the price)
3. DDR 4 32G (16GX2) 3200 CL16 Vulcan TUF
4. Palit RTX 2060 StormX OC 6G
5. ANTEC PSU 700W Neo ECO GOLD ZEN (overkill?)
6. Gigabyte Case C200 Glass Mid-tower
7. ViewSonic 23.8" IPS Panel (is on sale right now where we live)
8. SSD he wants to use his older 1TB Intel SATA3 drive. Would an M.2 NVMe make much of a difference for his use case?

What do you guys say?
Thanks!

 

[maxamillionfeettall]

The 700w psu is overkill on wattage but underwhelming on quality. It's a unit built by andyson, which has a pretty poor track record. In tests it performs alright, but the andyson quality will hinder any recommendations. The antec earthwatts gold pro is made by seasonic and is a better unit. A decent 550w is enough. Where in the world are you located?

An 8 core 16 thread chip is better for max settings and is ideal by microsoft, but a 3600 will be fine if it's just 1080p. Intel will be faster, but it's quite a small lead and will require a beefy cooler.

As long as you don't overclock, any b550 board will work.

The sata ssd will be fine, a nvme will not provide any benefit from what I can tell. For max settings, a good internet connection is pretty important with microsoft recommending 50Mbps down for max settings, but only 5Mbps for low settings.

 

[Regev]

The 700w psu is overkill on wattage but underwhelming on quality. It's a unit built by andyson, which has a pretty poor track record. In tests it performs alright, but the andyson quality will hinder any recommendations. The antec earthwatts gold pro is made by seasonic and is a better unit. A decent 550w is enough. Where in the world are you located?

An 8 core 16 thread chip is better for max settings and is ideal by microsoft, but a 3600 will be fine if it's just 1080p. Intel will be faster, but it's quite a small lead and will require a beefy cooler.

As long as you don't overclock, any b550 board will work.

The sata ssd will be fine, a nvme will not provide any benefit from what I can tell. For max settings, a good internet connection is pretty important with microsoft recommending 50Mbps down for max settings, but only 5Mbps for low settings.

PSU: We're from Israel. Here are some other options:

CORSAIR PSU 550W CV550 80+ BRONZE
ANTEC PSU 550W NEO ECO CLASSIC TUF 80+ BRONZE
GIGABYTE PSU 650W PFC BRONZE 80+ P650B
IPPON PSU 550W 80+ GOLD
GIGABYTE PSU 700W PFC BRONZE 80+ MODULAR
CORSAIR 650W CV650 PSU 80+ BRONZE
BE QUIET! PSU 500W PURE POWER 11
CORSAIR CX550M 550W PSU 80+ BRONZE
ANTEC VP-650P
ANTEC PSU 550W EARTHWATTS GOLD PRO

Which one to go for? Price in all is $65 to $90 ~

As for the CPU, will he see any performance difference with the 3700X compared to 3600? Is Flight Simulator heavy on the CPU side? And if not, will he be better substituting to a better graphic card (and is the 2060 enough?)

Thanks!

 

[maxamillionfeettall]

Either the antec earthwatts gold pro or the bequiet purepower 11, the rest are either group regulated or poor quality. I'd get the antec gold pro.

The gpu and cpu are both utilized in FS2020, cpu usage is more prevalent closer to the ground, where as the the gpu works hard when in the clouds. TBH, when I looked at the settings, the difference between medium and high for the clouds were more drastic then for buildings near the ground. I think the ryzen 3600 is more than enough and the rtx 2060 is fine as well, but a rtx 2060S or higher will pair well too.

 

[geofelt]

The requirements for fs2020 are actually quite modest:

Microsoft Flight Simulator system requirements have been released

Here's what you'll need to explore the world on your PC.

www.pcgamer.com

The psu you need is mainly determined by your graphics card.
Here is a chart:
http://www.realhardtechx.com/index_archivos/Page362.htm
The RTX2080 would need about a 550w psu.
I see nothing wrong with a RTX2060, but smooth games at an eventual 4k resolution will want very good graphics.
I think the best psu on your list would be the antec 550w gold pro.
It is tier2 on this list:

PSU Tier List [OLD]

Credit to @Starelementpokeand @Energycore for helping out with this long-awaited refresh of the old PSU tier list by Aniallation (who previously went several months without logging in), leaving the old list in need of help. This is simply an update of the list that was flawed in creation by the P...

linustechtips.com

On the cpu side, the i5-8400 is on the recommended list.
That seems strange to me.
That processor is not as strong as a $130 I3-10100.
I would go stronger.
I like the intel processors for gaming. They clock higher.
From what I have seen with FSX, the multi thread support is mainly used for texture mapping, not for smooth performance. That makes the cheap threads of ryzen not so relevant.
Not really knowing, I would buy a i5-10600K and a Z490 based motherboard.

The ram and 3200 speed is fine. Intel is not dependent on ram speed for performance.
With ryzen you should look for 3600 speed.


Yes, the 1tb sata drive can be used.
But, I would consider a 1tb samsung 970 evo plus.
In anticipation of fs2020, I needed to upgrade my ssd from a 500gb samsung 960 pro.
As fast as the 960 was, I felt that the 970 evo plus was quicker.
I can not recommend it enough.
I would suggest using the 1tb sata drive be repurposed to use as an external usb atached backup device.

 

[Regev]

1. Will he be able to reach 150+ fps on Ultra with a combination of RYZEN 3600+ GeForce 2060 6GB + 16 (or 32?) GB DDR4 ? If not, what will be the minimum spec he'll need for that (150+ fps on Ultra FHD)

2. If he wants to step up to 2K, what will he need to buy (150+ fps on Ultra 2K) ?

 

[maxamillionfeettall]

1. Will he be able to reach 150+ fps on Ultra with a combination of RYZEN 3600+ GeForce 2060 6GB + 16 (or 32?) GB DDR4 ? If not, what will be the minimum spec he'll need for that (150+ fps on Ultra FHD)

2. If he wants to step up to 2K, what will he need to buy (150+ fps on Ultra 2K) ?

You really changed the scope from your original question.

At present, the game is not entirely optimized. At present there is no way a rtx 2060 will run 150+ fps at max settings. For max settings at that kind of frame rate, you will need a 3700x/10900k and a 2080ti. But it's probably best to just wait for the new gpu's to be announced in a few weeks(maybe).

 

[Regev]

You really changed the scope from your original question.

At present, the game is not entirely optimized. At present there is no way a rtx 2060 will run 150+ fps at max settings. For max settings at that kind of frame rate, you will need a 3700x/10900k and a 2080ti. But it's probably best to just wait for the new gpu's to be announced in a few weeks(maybe).

Oh, yeah I did change it (talked to him on the phone, he got more and more interested in running it 'Ultra'). What about High, will it be enough for that ?

And what GPUs? 0_0

 

[maxamillionfeettall]

150+fps is hard to get at any setting for any gpu for fs2020, you might get 100fps.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/Nvidia-rtx-3080-sept-1-announcement

 

[Regev]

150+fps is hard to get at any setting for any gpu for fs2020, you might get 100fps.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/Nvidia-rtx-3080-sept-1-announcement

Thanks man.
100fps on the 2600 on high, or ultra ?

 

[maxamillionfeettall]

High on the 2060, but this is all pretty close to just guesses as the final game will likely be more optimized and may improve fps performance by release.

 

[geofelt]

I think the top processor available today will be the I9-10900K.
On graphics, I suggest buying an EVGA card. The best available for your budget.
EVGA because they have a 90 day trade up option in case you want to buy a stronger card.
Read the caveats.

Perhaps of more importance might be the monitor.
I suspect that a ultrawide 34" or 43" curved monitor would be the most immersive for a flight sim.

 

[geofelt]

Just ran fs2020 on my setup.
At near high settings on a 4k monitor and a GTX1080ti, it runs at 35 fps.
That is really not bad as everything seems smooth.
A better card might result in higher fps, but I don't think that would run the game better.

I run with task manager open on another monitor.
Task manager shows 82 threads but
my observation is that the game can use about 4 of the 6 threads I have.
Only one of which is heavily utilized.
That suggests to me that the many threads of ryzen will not be as helpful to this game as a high single thread performance of the K suffix intel processors.

 

[MadsModsat]

Techspot just did a fairly detailed benchmark test of MS FS 2020, and apparently it shows that the game only utilizes 4 cores maximum of the CPU.

They ran tests at 1080p, 1440p and 4K and different quality settings with a ton of different graphics cards.

It might be helpful to take a look at the results, before finally deciding on a final build for Flightsimulator 2020.

 

[Regev]

That suggests to me that the many threads of ryzen will not be as helpful to this game as a high single thread performance of the K suffix intel processors.

Why the K suffix necessary? Won't a 9900 be as good as a 9900K if no-OC is planned?

 

[geofelt]

Why the K suffix necessary? Won't a 9900 be as good as a 9900K if no-OC is planned?

yes, the stock 9900 and 9900k can turbo up to 5.0
Overclocking is good for raising the performance of all cores, not so much for a single core.

It is hard to do much better.