[SOLVED] Is it time to upgrade my coffee lake i7-9700k

[Samduhman]

I've been running a MSI Z370 motherboard for roughly 5 years. It's seen a processor, gpu and memory upgrade. It's still a solid gaming system and handles everything I throw at it. I'm just feeling that its been a while and it may be time to upgrade before parts start to fail. Is there a solid best bang for the buck upgrade to replace my setup that's also somewhat future proof, aka latest chipset? I generally like to keep a new CPU purchase around $250, but willing to go up to $300 if it's that good.

 

[punkncat]

There are newer components you "could" buy, but its effectiveness in performance would be quite dependent on what use/games/programs you are using it for and the balance of the system components.

Would help us a lot to give full systems specs, budget, and what your plan to use the system for is going to be.

Right this particular moment the 7xxx Ryzen series from AMD is promising future support just the same as they did for AM4. From where you are right this moment it would be the costly alternative, as you could go with the Intel flavors on DDR4 and cut some cost corners for the update.

 

[himedavito]

I've been running a MSI Z370 motherboard for roughly 5 years. It's seen a processor, gpu and memory upgrade. It's still a solid gaming system and handles everything I throw at it. I'm just feeling that its been a while and it may be time to upgrade before parts start to fail. Is there a solid best bang for the buck upgrade to replace my setup that's also somewhat future proof, aka latest chipset? I generally like to keep a new CPU purchase around $250, but willing to go up to $300 if it's that good.

I m not a fan of intel or amd but i always choose amd cpu since it’s better price per performance. If you want good advices as pal stated before you should put full PC parts list(without CPU) to know wich CPU would suit best for the build.

 

[Samduhman]

Here is my current build. If you think it's not time to upgrade I'm ok with that. I just "assumed" after 4 or 5 years it must be time.

Motherboard: MSI Z370 SLI PLUS Socket LGA 1151
CPU: i7 9700k
Memory: 32GB DDR4 2133 Gskill RIPJAW (thought I was still running DDR3)
EVGA Geforce RTX 3070
EVGA PS 750W
Arctic Freezer 34 eSports DOU CPU heat sink
Alienware 34" AW3423DWF monitor


I have no favorite brand. I've used both AMD and Intel. I always go with the best bang for the buck for gaming performance.

The only game that seems to have made my system struggle are two games I've recently installed. CyberPunk 2077 and the Witcher 3 with the Next-Gen update released in December but I haven't played around with the video setting yet.

 

[geofelt]

There is no "future proofing"
Whatever you buy today can be bought a year later as a new product at a better price/performance.
The usual upgrade for a gamer will be the gpu or perhaps the monitor.

If you are struggling in a few games, perhaps it is a time to upgrade.
Today, a $200 processor like the I5-13400 is about 2x as strong as your 9700K.
Here is a review:
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-core-i5-13400-core-i5-13400f-cpu-review

You could reuse your ddr4 ram and a B660/B760 motherboard might be $150.

 

[Viking2121]

Depends on the games or what you do with the system, the 9700k is still quite a good CPU and it can overclock pretty well.

For strictly gaming, I would just play around with overclocking, 5ghz all cores, probably get a little more, not too sure what the cooler is capable of though. That would help somewhat, get a little more life out of it.

Good Luck!

 

[SkyNetRising]

It's still a solid gaming system and handles everything I throw at it.
I'm just feeling that its been a while and it may be time to upgrade before parts start to fail.

If your system is capable of doing everything you need from it, then I see no reason to upgrade.
Upgrade, when performance is not satisfactory anymore.

 

[--SID--]

You could reuse your ddr4 ram

Yes he can but 2133 is terribly slow. Even for his current setup it's slow.

 

[SkyNetRising]

Yes he can but 2133 is terribly slow. Even for his current setup it's slow.

Intel systems doesn't get impacted as much from ram performance as AMD systems.
So - it's not such a big deal.

 

[TechyInAZ]

Intel systems doesn't get impacted as much from ram performance as AMD systems.
So - it's not such a big deal.

While true, this can be considered an exception in my opinion. the difference between 2133Mhz and say 3200MHz which is the norm these days, is a huge difference.

 

[geofelt]

Testing with 2400 speed ram is a freebie; the OP already has sufficient ram.
If it is later determined that faster ram is worthwhile, that option is not precluded.
Yes, the upgrade would be to DDR4 which is usually cheaper than similar performing DDR5.

 

[Samduhman]

I appreciate all the advice. I think I'll keep what I have for now and just tweek the settings on those two games. From what I've been researching it looks like both of them aren't very optimized very well and causing heartburn with a lot of capable gaming systems.

 

[Viking2121]

I appreciate all the advice. I think I'll keep what I have for now and just tweek the settings on those two games. From what I've been researching it looks like both of them aren't very optimized very well and causing heartburn with a lot of capable gaming systems.

Yeah even if you can find a good deal on a 9900K, I've seen some go for around $100 bucks, it will be somewhat faster than the 9700k but it wont be a huge difference unless your playing games like Battlefield 2042 which can hit a 8 core CPU kinda hard, but in lightly threaded games, a 9900k wouldn't be much faster, I'd stick with the 9700k if it still serves you well and hold out until DDR5 stuff becomes more common and affordable, and then make your jump to a new build.