Question i7 9700 and Geforce RTX 4070

[Odin1991]

I have just upgraded my system with the RTX 3070 and have only now realized that I could pay about 100 euros more for the newer RTX 4070 that has just been released.

I could still get my 3070 refunded and get the 4070 instead. However, my concern is my CPU which is only the i7 9700 (non k version).

I have monitored my system yesterday while playing in 4k (because I have also purchased a brand new monitor) and the RTX 3070 is always running on 100 percent while the i7-9700 is running at about 70-90 percent most of the time with some short spikes to 100 percent. Again, this is 4k we are talking here.

So, here is my build:

CPU (Prozessor)	Intel Core i7-9700 | 8x 3.00 GHz, 12MB L3-Cache
Mainboard	ASRock B360M-ITX/ac | Intel B360, ITX
GPU	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Zotac
Arbeitsspeicher	32GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4-2666 | 2x 16GB
SSD	1TB Samsung 860 QVO
Netzteil	700W - be quiet! Pure Power 11

I am currently thinking about investing the 100 euros more for the 4070 even if it is going to bottleneck my CPU.

So my concrete question: Will the upgrade to the 4070 still be noticeable? Or in other words: How bad will the bottleneck be?

And my second question: Would I run at risk of damaging my CPU with this combination if it is running at probably 100 percent with the 4070?

I'm not very knowledgeable in this area and would really appreciate your advice on this matter.

 

[dark_globe]

rtx 3070 is not suitable for good 4K experience anymore :
it has very low VRAM for 4K
and it is also lacking raw horsepower to play new AAA titles in 4K .
that´s why your cpu was less of a factor .
9700 is still relatively capable chip ,

even 4070 is only capable of 70-80 FPS at ultra presets on average in 4K resolution ,
so 9700 will still be fine for it -
of course there will be some scenarios where more cpu power would help but overall you should by fine if not multitasking on your pc (while gaming don´t run anything cpu demanding in the background)

don´t worry your cpu will not be damaged even if running at 100% for prolonged period of time
these chips have build in thermal sensors and won´t operate at higher temperatures than they are designed for
(if the temperature is getting too high the chip will underperform at worst
(lower its clock speeds in order to protect itself) ) .
but another factor to consider is your motherboard and its chipset - it has low quality VRM -
but since standard overclocking is not possible and you did not have any issues so far it should be OK
the down side is it only supports 2666MHz memory -
it would help your cpu to perform a little better if you have faster memory .

 

[Odin1991]

Hey, thanks for your reply. That’s great news. So you would also recommend upgrading my GPU and replacing the 3070 with the 4070? I was just a bit worried about the CPU usage when it’s at its max.

 

[dark_globe]

yes it will help (also now you should still be able to sell your 3070 for a decent amount of money) :
4070 is 20% faster than 3070 on average in 4K and you will not run into any problems
regarding memory because 4070 also has much more VRAM compared to 3070 .