Which Ryzen CPU for gaming? ... Or intel?.. Help.

[Just That Dude]

I want to upgrade my processor (and consequently my motherboard and RAM).

Should I go for Ryzen or intel? My main purpose for this upgrade is gaming at max settings with high frame rates (60fps should be the absolute minimum) at 1080p/1440p.

Also, if Ryzen, then which Ryzen CPU should I go for? I plan to overclock the CPU under a well air-cooled system. Would the stock cooler for a ryzen CPU suffice if I do go for ryzen? (I heard theyre pretty good coolers) Which motherboard and RAM would be best?

If intel, should I go for 7700k? I hear its the best on the intel side of things.

I also want my build to be somewhat future proof. ( I don't want to change my CPU for about 5 years )

I want to spend my money wisely; I don't want to blow money to the point of insignificant performance gains for current gen gaming and for the future. i.e if a 200 dollar processor is all I need for future proof upgrade then great.

Thank you for taking the time to help

Current RIG:
fx 8350
gtx 970
990fx saberooth
16gb ddr3 ram
7200rpm hdd
750 watt gold evga g2 super nova psu

 

[Shektron]

I'd say you wait for Coffee Lake, because for your requirements, neither would a Ryzen suffice, nor a 7700K. A Ryzen will get you good FPS, but at high refresh rates it might not perform as well as a 7700K. At the same time, a 7700K probably won't last 5 years. What you need is a mix of the two, which the upcoming Coffee Lake is rumored to be.

If you can't wait that long, better you get Ryzen because you'll still get good FPS(definitely won't be going below 60 FPS if your GPU is capable - Ryzen struggles around the 120-130+ FPS mark. What is the refresh rate of your monitor?), and you can hold on to a Ryzen 5 1600 for 5 years no problems. My recommendation would be Ryzen 5 1600, but you might as well get a good air cooler for overclocking, like the Hyper 212 Evo. The stock cooler struggles to match a voltage of 1.35 V, so there isn't much overclocking headroom. The Hyper 212 Evo will be a better choice.

As for motherboard, go with the MSI B350 Tomahawk, it's a solid board. If you have a brand preference, then the alternatives are Asus Prime B350 Plus, ASRock Pro4 and Gigabyte AB350 Gaming 3. Pick the one you like, they're quite similar.

For RAM, get a 2x8 kit of DDR4-2666 MHz, it will help in games and all motherboards are capable of running 2666 MHz since it isn't an overclocked frequency.

Ryzen does high refresh rate well enough, but it's just not as good as the 7700K. Whether the upcoming 8700K will be as good(or better) than the 7700K, is still not known, though Intel claims the 8700K to be 11% better than the 7700K(11%?! xD). But we don't know for sure yet. Coffee Lake will be announced in a day or two(depends on your time zone I guess - the date is 21 August for the announcement), but the actual launch is still a bit far off.

 

[Just That Dude]

As for motherboard, go with the MSI B350 Tomahawk, it's a solid board. If you have a brand preference, then the alternatives are Asus Prime B350 Plus, ASRock Pro4 and Gigabyte AB350 Gaming 3. Pick the one you like, they're quite similar.

These are 100 dollar motherboards, does this matter considering I want to overclock pretty much everything? Or are AM4 motherboards just cheap relative to intel.

At this point I hate intel for how short lived their products are. After a year or two their cpus are dead.

 

[Shektron]

Well B350 boards support overclocking technically. However, some might say they are not as well-equipped to overclock 'professionally' as X370 boards. In my opinion, unless you are an extreme high-end tweaker who knows each and every BIOS setting related to overclocking like the back of your hand, or you wish to become one, you don't need an X370 board. But if you are an extreme overclocker who likes tweaking for every ounce of sweet, sweet performance, then yes, a high end X370 board will help you better in overclocking.

For a mild to average overclocker, B350 is still pretty good. If you do want the best of B350, consider a B350 Gaming Pro Carbon from MSI. It's a great(some might say even the best) B350 board right now, all things considered. If you want a high-end B350 board, that's definitely a board that qualifies.

Here's a video that find the differences between the two chipsets for overclocking:

https://youtu.be/gkmyKPzCq6k

 

[David119]

at this point you can wait for coffe lake to come out and the reviews from youtubers, but dont forget that intels chips have a higher price and dont expet the 6 core /12thread i7 to be cheaper then 300 bucks plus take into account the the motherboards for overcloking intel chips are not so cheap as for ryzen a 350 board does the job quite well... yes they will performer better then ryzen becouse they are on the same old 14nm .. just with the added ++ 😀 ryzen is relativly new architecture on the market only now the updates are pushing it to the place were intel was dominating and ryzen slowly but surely takes it away.Plus the am4 socket is here to stay till 2020 or so, so if amd lets a better procesor out and you have the cash for it there will be no need to get a new motherboard like with intel every generation... If you want a cpu right now : get a ryzen 5 1600, get a decent aftermarket cooler (like the 212 evo ) get a good ab350 motherboard. oc the shit out of the cpu to 4ghz and youre set and get good ddr4 ram kit something like 3200mhz ( i use corsair vengeance lpx 3200mhz and they work fine). but with the gpu you have dont except decent fps in 1440p even at 1080p... get a decent gpu also (like 1070 or even 1080) and for 1080/1440p you will be set for minimum of 3 years of gaming. I did my self a ryzen build last week with a 1600x and a x370 board paired with a gigabyte g1 1070 from my last fx build and i kinda like it. i game on 1440p all the time with a 144hz monitor and i get good stable fps from most aaa titles on max settings.