[SOLVED] Is my my CPU bottlenecking my system?

[Jicksi]

Hi!
I recently started playing more hardware intensive video games on my computere, and I have noticed that I tend to get lag spikes. When I look at task manager I can see that my CPU usage is in the 70-100% range while my GPU never surpasses 60%.

I have a i5-6500, RoG strix 1060 6gb and 16gb of rams.

 

[PC Tailor]

Remember that bottlenecks are a bit of a red herring, as there is no "one bottleneck" in a system. The bottleneck changes based on the application. So what's important here, is the actual application you are running that you are experiencing this.

If the CPU is hitting 100% it is by definition, "bottlenecking" - but remember what is a CPU bottleneck in one game, might be the GPU bottlenecking in another.

In one game the CPU might bottleneck heavily, where it is more CPU intensive.
In another, it might completely swap, where it is more GPU intensive.

 

[Jicksi]

OK, so I get that bottlenecks might differ from game to game, but let just say that I want to improve my preformance across the board for AAA gaming. Should I priotitize getting a new GPU or CPU?

 

[PC Tailor]

OK, so I get that bottlenecks might differ from game to game, but let just say that I want to improve my preformance across the board for AAA gaming. Should I priotitize getting a new GPU or CPU?

Well, you need both, especially for AAA.
Best way to identify it for your system would be to play the games you want improvement in, if one of your components is constantly or regularly hitting 100% whilst the other sits at 60%, then the 100% is the one you want to upgrade.

As with any AAA game, it differs between them.

You'll obviously also want to make sure your drivers are all up to date (including MB/Chipset), and potentially BIOS update that may utilise your hardware more effectively.