£1k upgrade for 1440p/165hz

mattyfez

mattyfez

mattyfez

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Joined
12 Apr 2007
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Hi after a bit of advice, my pc spec is in my sig and I'm already running a Dell 27 Gaming Monitor: S2721DGFA.

Basically I'm going to retire the mobo/cpu/ram/GPU to a secondary PC, with a cheap case and PSU...so I'm looking for basically just a core system - mobo, cpu, GPU and RAM.

I was thinking of building something around an i5 13600k. I'd rather run aircooling rather than liquid, probably a big fat Noctua or Thermalright assasin.

and i'd like the ability to overclock. I'll probably throw in a 1 TB m.2 drive also, WD blue or simmilar? as i'm running a bunch of older SATA SSDs at the moment.

​

Shold I look at an i7? or an AMD ryzen... the i5 seems pretty good for its price point?

GPU wise im looking at the 6700xt but unsure if it's worth spending a bit more.

I don't do much hard core production work, so anything built around gaming will be plenty powerfull enough for any of that stuff I might want to do.
 
* Intel Core i5-12600K 3.70GHz (Alder Lake) Socket LGA1700 Processor - OEM - £259.99 (* swap for i5-13500, review)
Asus Prime B760M-A D4 (LGA 1700) DDR4 Micro-ATX Motherboard - £153.98
Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey - £79.99

PowerColor Radeon RX 6700 XT Fighter 12GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card - £389.99

WD Black SN770 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T3X0E) - £83.00

Grand Total: £978.05 (includes delivery charge)

Leaves just about enough room in budget for the Thermalright cooler. No overclocking of the CPU.
 
Tetras said:
* Intel Core i5-12600K 3.70GHz (Alder Lake) Socket LGA1700 Processor - OEM - £259.99 (* swap for i5-13500, review)
Asus Prime B760M-A D4 (LGA 1700) DDR4 Micro-ATX Motherboard - £153.98
Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 PC4-25600C16 3200MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey - £79.99

PowerColor Radeon RX 6700 XT Fighter 12GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card - £389.99

WD Black SN770 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T3X0E) - £83.00

Grand Total: £978.05 (includes delivery charge)

Leaves just about enough room in budget for the Thermalright cooler. No overclocking of the CPU.
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OK thanks, some food for thought.

I was wondering if overclocking as really worth the effort these days, or if you are better off just running well chosen newer gen/stock speed components? I guess with air cooling and intels running warm it might be why you suggested those CPUs?

Thanks
 
mattyfez said:
I guess with air cooling and intels running warm it might be why you suggested those CPUs?
Click to expand...

I suggested the i5-13500 & B760 combo just because it fits in your budget, whereas the i5-13600K & Z690/Z790 combo wouldn't :)

I'm not actually sure what clock a 13600K is capable of, so I couldn't tell you if it is worth the extra for overclocking.
 
Ok thanks, that makes sense. The budget isnt fixed.
I'm just wondering if its worth going for a 'k' cpu and 'z' board at 1440p, and if true would I be better with a non 'k' i7 (or AMD equivelent) for example.

I'm leaning towards not bothering with overclocking, so there's that too.
 
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mattyfez said:
I'm just wondering if its worth going for a 'k' cpu and 'z' board at 1440p, and if true would I be better with a non 'k' i7 (or AMD equivelent) for example.
Click to expand...

In the video I linked, at stock: the 13600K with DDR5 (6400) had 15% higher FPS on average when paired with a 4090, versus the i5-13500 with DDR4 (3466), but only 7% when the i5-13500 also had DDR5 (6400).

It depends what games you play, but I suspect that unlike a 4090, the 6700 XT will more often be the bottleneck at 1440p than the CPU, which will close the gap between them. For a competitive gamer at high refresh, with a powerful graphics card, I would pick the 13600K, but for all other uses (especially 1440/60 or 4K/60), the i5-13500 is enough.
 
well basically, i'm playing forza horizon 5 at the momemt, and on my ancient rig, it copes pretty well on a combo of medium/high settings at 1440p.. generally about 70fps and looks pretty decent on this dell monitor.

But if i try to play something like cyberpunk on anything higher than minimum graphics, or Plague tale requiem, it's a total slide show. The monitor frequency doenst seem to affect things too much as long as I don't drop it below 120hz... but my current system is starting to creak under the demand! lol

I'll check out the video you posted, thanks
 
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I'd agree with Tetras' suggestions, a nice balanced build. The Ryzen 7000 series would entail DDR5 and a more expensive motherboard which, while adding a better upgrade path, would eat into the budget and compromise the gfx card, resulting in much lower performance.
 
mattyfez said:
well basically, i'm playing forza horizon 5 at the momemt, and on my ancient rig, it copes pretty well on a combo of medium/high settings at 1440p.. generally about 70fps and looks pretty decent on this dell monitor.

But if i try to play something like cyberpunk on anything higher than minimum graphics, or Plague tale requiem, it's a total slide show. The monitor frequency doenst seem to affect things too much as long as I don't drop it below 120hz... but my current system is starting to creak under the demand! lol

I'll check out the video you posted, thanks
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I'm not sure about Forza or Plague requiem, but with Cyberpunk, I think you'll be GPU-limited at 1440p with the i5-13500. From the digital foundry article, it looks like Plague requiem is also very GPU-demanding. Forza might be the exception, depending on the settings you're using.
 
Thanks all, I'm now eyeing up ab 13600K, with a b-grade ASUS Prime Z690-P WiFi D4 I found.

The Mobo has PCIe® 5.0, three M.2 slots

But, on a review for the 13600K it says: Only PCIe x8 graphics when Gen 5 M.2 slot in-use
Click to expand...

Its that something to worry about? I was thinking of having certainly one, maybe two WD Black SN750 SE 1TB, plus maybe a 3,5 sata SSD drive too, that I already have
 
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mattyfez said:
Thanks all, I'm now eyeing up ab 13600K, with a b-grade ASUS Prime Z690-P WiFi D4 I found.

The Mobo has PCIe® 5.0, three M.2 slots



Its that something to worry about? I was thinking of having certainly one, maybe two WD Black SN750 SE 1TB, plus maybe a 3,5 sata SSD drive too, that I already have
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It only applies to boards that have a PCI-E 5.0 M.2 slot, that board doesn't, so it doesn't steal any lanes from the graphics card.

I'm not sure that board has bios flashback (can't see any mention of it in the spec, or on the rear I/O), which is more of a problem than the above because it is unlikely to be compatible on a stock bios.
 
Tetras said:
It only applies to boards that have a PCI-E 5.0 M.2 slot, that board doesn't, so it doesn't steal any lanes from the graphics card.

I'm not sure that board has bios flashback (can't see any mention of it in the spec, or on the rear I/O), which is more of a problem than the above because it is unlikely to be compatible on a stock bios.
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Ah yes.. ive not built a pc in a while, I forgot the joys of intel not nessesarily being compatible just because the sockets the same :rolleyes:
 
SO i've increaced my budget... any critique of this please?

For 1440p gaming, I guess I dont need 64gb, or that fast?
It that GPU overkill for 1440p?

My basket at OcUK:

Total: £1,513.04 (includes delivery: £11.10)​

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mattyfez said:
Would I be better off with 32gb of c16 rather than 64gb of c18?
Also looking at this: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team...00c16-3600mhz-dual-channel-kit-my-002-8p.html
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At this point, I think you'd be better off switching to a DDR5 board and buying 32GB of DDR5 5600 than buying high-end DDR4. I doubt 64GB will get much use before this system is obsolete and you're forced to dump it for DDR5, but I guess it depends how often you upgrade.

mattyfez said:
It that GPU overkill for 1440p?
Click to expand...

Yes, but that's not a bad thing :D
 
Tetras said:
At this point, I think you'd be better off switching to a DDR5 board and buying 32GB of DDR5 5600 than buying high-end DDR4. I doubt 64GB will get much use before this system is obsolete and you're forced to dump it for DDR5, but I guess it depends how often you upgrade.



Yes, but that's not a bad thing :D
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ok thanks, I'm about to press the buy button, so same CPU but with a ddr5 board and ddr 5 ram??

Or should I look at AMD CPUs in this case/ arrg!

edit..it like to keep the cost around £1500, because much more would be a bit silly as im not intersted in 4k gaming, more top quality 1440p.
:D

EDIT 2 , I like to keep my system for 10 years or more, I find that's a good way of doing things for good performance gains... my 6600k and rx480 have served me very well indeed, but are deffinatley creeking under the strain of higher resolutions and newer games.
 
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mattyfez said:
so same CPU but with a ddr5 board and ddr 5 ram??
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I think it is a better investment than a lot of and/or high-end DDR4, yes (since later benches that use a 4090 are showing that there is an advantage to DDR5). You may also be able to re-use it in the future, which you definitely won't with DDR4.

If you do choose to buy DDR4, I don't think there's any point in 1. buying an expensive board, 2. buying expensive RAM. I'd just get the £80 32GB Vulcans & a midrange (£150ish) B760 board.

AMD: for me it just comes down to the question: how often do you upgrade? If the answer is not often then it really doesn't matter either way. If on the other hand, you want to get a new CPU in a year or two, then AM5 makes sense, especially if you're spending £200-£250+ on the board. FYI: everything under the 7900 is generally inferior to the 13th gen CPUs in heavy multi-tasking, but for gaming the 7600/7700(X) still perform well.

Ultimately, you're going to notice the 6800 XT far more than you'll notice DDR4/DDR5 13500/13600K/7600(X)/7700(X) or whatever...
 
I dont really upgrade between builds, I bought the corsair rm750 for future proofing as my old PSU got noisy, and I have a lian-li case, so I try to do a big upgrade once every 10 years rather than constantly swapping parts all the time.
 
mattyfez said:
I dont really upgrade between builds, I bought the corsair rm750 for future proofing as my old PSU got noisy, and I have a lian-li case, so I try to do a big upgrade once every 10 years rather than constantly swapping parts all the time.
Click to expand...

I think 13600K + 32GB DDR5 makes sense, in that case. The 6800 XT will give you plenty of power in reserve for 1440p and the 13600K (perhaps with some overclocking) should take at least one GPU upgrade. By the time the CPU/RAM is too slow, it'll be due a complete overhaul anyway.
 
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