Question Upgrading from 4670k & GTX 780...

[Raffles9]

So a few months back, I cobbled together a gaming PC from mostly used parts. I'm running a 4670k @ 4.8 ghz, GTX 780, 16gb corsair vengeance ddr3, Z87c asus motherboard, ssd, 650w corsair psu.

I'm now in a position (better job) to begin to gradually upgrade. I mostly game, playing a variety of titles like Football Manager, WoW, RDR2, Witcher 3, modded Skyrim etc. While in older games I can get mostly high settings @ 1080p 60fps, I start to struggle in modern games, reducing the detail to Medium or lower.

My eventual aim is to play on an ultrawide 3440 x 1440 monitor on ultra, preferably with as high framerate as possible.

I'm looking for advice on an upgrade path, most likely beginning with the motherboard, RAM and cpu. My budget isn't crazy high and like all of us would like to spend as little as possible. That said, I'm looking at the higher end of things, perhaps a 3700x or 9700k build, with a 2070 or radeon equivalent.

Is that too little for what I want to achieve? Is it overkill? Will I need to upgrade the PSU? Let me know what you think and if you need any more info below.

Many thanks in advance!

 

[sizzling]

I think that is a good plan and I recently upgraded from a 4670k @ 4.3GHz with a 780 running 1080p to a 3700X and 2080 Super running 1440p and it’s awesome. My only concern is does a 2070 have enough performance for 3440 x 1440, you would definitely have to sacrifice game settings.

 

[Raffles9]

Yeah, I guess the most important part is the GPU, as past a certain point the cpu won't make much difference. I guess the real question is which GPU? Freesync monitors are generally cheaper but are there any Radeon cards that are happy with 3440x1440 ultra @ 100fps or more?

 

[JaAntonio]

I honestly think if you are running 1440p resolution you don't need to upgrade your CPU. Just buy a 2070Super or 2080Super. Spend that extra money you earn to get more ssd storage, better case or better cooling for your OC CPU, or games .

 

[JaAntonio]

I know the CPU is old and those 4 cores will suffer more on CPU depending games, but at 1440p you are making the stress to the GPU, so this will the better upgrade for now. And in one or two years you can upgrade the cpu, mobo, ram with newer hardware.

 

[JaAntonio]

Yeah, I guess the most important part is the GPU, as past a certain point the cpu won't make much difference. I guess the real question is which GPU? Freesync monitors are generally cheaper but are there any Radeon cards that are happy with 3440x1440 ultra @ 100fps or more?

If you had the budget go to 2070-80-80Ti this would work just fine with freesync panels, nvidia make an update to g-sync work on freesync models before.

 

[Raffles9]

Thanks for the feedback folks. I'm not too keen on putting in a high end graphics card into my old mobo/cpu - primarily because I don't have the screen to power it yet. My thinking behind getting the cpu/motherboard first is that there's not a lot of price fluctuation there. I've been looking at a B450 Tomahawk Max paired with a 3700x after Christmas. That should give me a boost in everything but especially CPU intensive games like Football Manager and WoW. I'll follow that up with a graphics card purchase a few months later - most likely a 2070 super or 2080 super, price dependant. Then come summer, hopefully monitor prices have come down a bit more and I can splash out on a 3440x1440 high refresh display!

 

[JaAntonio]

Yep, that sounds good. Great choice about mobo cpu combo, remember 3200-3600Mhz kit of ram to get the maximum of that CPU. Next year when you have everything put together you will be happy remembing about this thread thinking about it. And sure, getting a nice new ultrawide.

 

[geofelt]

My suggestion is to buy your monitor first and see how you do.
You will be in a better position to see how your games run and what you might need.
If necessary, you can always dial back resolution and settings.

I suspect you will be more limited by your graphics card than the cpu.

Try this test:
Run YOUR games, but lower your resolution and eye candy.
If your FPS increases, it indicates that your cpu is strong enough to drive a better graphics configuration.
If your FPS stays the same, you are likely more cpu limited.

If you are graphics limited, 650w will run most any modern graphics card you might want to buy.

If you are cpu limited, an upgrade to a modern ryzen 3000 or intel 9th gen will be appropriate.

You now have 4 threads and a clock of 4.8
If you buy ryzen 3700x , 4.4 on all cores is as good as it is going to get with a good chip.
But you would be getting 16 threads.
Many threads is very good for multiplayer games with many participants.

For single person games, it is hard to effectively use more than 6-8 threads.
The question is, how important is the single thread performance?
Usually that is what is needed for cpu centric games like strategy, sims and mmo.
There is not a lot to be gained in single thread performance. 5.1 may be available with a well binned 9th gen k suffix processor like the 8 core 9700K