Help me upgrade my 10 year old PC!

[Robbo]

Hi all,

This is long overdue! I somehow still have my i7 4790k system, which I built around a decade ago. 16GB RAM and a GTX 770.

In fairness, it's done very well. It still performs reasonably well but certain games are struggling now and Windows 10 support is an issue too.

My current screens are 1920x1200 24" IPS Dell's, which I really like. As part of the upgrade I'll probably get two 27" 1440p screens, I'd love OLED but text clarity is important and I fear IPS may still have the edge, but that can be sorted later.

I'm being lazy so ideally want one of the OCUK prebuilt systems, budget is anywhere from £1000-2500 depending on what's needed. My use is generally browsing/watching things like Twitch, and games I play tend to be on the less demanding side, like WoW: Midnight more recently.

What's the best option here? I've been looking at the Mach systems, the 5R looks good value at £1,849.99 and I don't think the Mach 5G with the 5070Ti is really necessary? 2TB NVME storage is preferable, although I suppose it's easy enough to add more and that hopefully wouldn't impact the warranty...

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk-gaming-mach-5r-ryzen-7500x3d-radeon-rx-9070-xt-pre-built-gaming-pc-fs-pb12-ep.html

I'd like it to last a good 5-6 years and be capable of playing most games at a reasonable level at 1440p 180hz. I see OCUK have opted to fit the 7500X3D in these systems over the 7800, but is there really that big of a difference? I see that a BIOS flash would enable a future upgrade to a 9800X3D, should that ever be necessary.

I'm open to any and all suggestions, thanks!

 

[Tetras]

I've been looking at the Mach systems, the 5R looks good value at £1,849.99 and I don't think the Mach 5G with the 5070Ti is really necessary?

The main concern I'd have is reports of issues with AMD and WoW, the last time I remember someone buying a PC specifically for WoW on here, they ended up returning the AMD card.

 

[Robbo]

The main concern I'd have is reports of issues with AMD and WoW, the last time I remember someone buying a PC specifically for WoW on here, they ended up returning the AMD card.

I have seen this mentioned before, I do wonder if it could be an issue... seems better optimised for Nvidia.

 

[iamgigglz]

Is a 5070Ti necessary? No. With the kind of gaming you do you won't see any difference between those cards for a long time; I guess it comes down to how long you want to wait before having the itch to upgrade.

Edit - I wasn't aware of the AMD-WoW issue.

 

[Tetras]

I have seen this mentioned before, I do wonder if it could be an issue... seems better optimised for Nvidia.

Yeah, I mean.., there's some users who are perfectly happy with their cards, but then for every 2 of those, there's someone complaining about it.

Afaik, most of the issues reported stem from the DirectX12 mode.

What's the best option here? I've been looking at the Mach systems, the 5R looks good value at £1,849.99 and I don't think the Mach 5G with the 5070Ti is really necessary? 2TB NVME storage is preferable, although I suppose it's easy enough to add more and that hopefully wouldn't impact the warranty...

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk-gaming-mach-5r-ryzen-7500x3d-radeon-rx-9070-xt-pre-built-gaming-pc-fs-pb12-ep.html

Hmm, 1TB storage is worth a lot now, even not very good drives are some ~£150.

If you stepped down to the Mach 3.2 for the 5070, you'd lose 1TB of storage, which really renders the downgrade pointless from a value perspective.

The 5G with the 5070 Ti is an extra £250 which you wouldn't normally pay for the Ti on performance alone.

I see OCUK have opted to fit the 7500X3D in these systems over the 7800, but is there really that big of a difference?

The majority of games at 1440p should be margin of error over the 7800X3D, but you are 2 cores down, which could be noticeable in the smoothness/1% lows in very CPU heavy games.

I can understand why OCUK spec the 7500X3D, because an extra £140 for 2 cores isn't worth it, but the longer-term impact of being 2 down is hard to predict. There should be at least one more gen after the 9000 series, so you could always switch to a 10800X3D (or whatever is called) by then and rumours say it will have 12 cores per CCD, which would double the 7500X3D's core count.

 

[Robbo]

I was even looking lower at the Mach 2 earlier.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk-gaming-mach-2-ryzen-7500f-rtx-5060-ti-pre-built-gaming-pc-fs-pb15-ep.html

Retains a decent 16GB 5060Ti, and 32GB RAM, but you lose the X3D element on the CPU. 1TB storage would be manageable and I'd add my existing SSD's just for general storage.

Plus it can still be upgraded in future... I do think the £2k~ systems will be wasted on what I'm using them for, but I know they could make sense long term.

 

[Tetras]

I was even looking lower at the Mach 2 earlier.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk-gaming-mach-2-ryzen-7500f-rtx-5060-ti-pre-built-gaming-pc-fs-pb15-ep.html

Retains a decent 16GB 5060Ti, and 32GB RAM, but you lose the X3D element on the CPU. 1TB storage would be manageable and I'd add my existing SSD's just for general storage.

Plus it can still be upgraded in future... I do think the £2k~ systems will be wasted on what I'm using them for, but I know they could make sense long term.

I can see the attraction, it would be a £700 saving on the Mach 5G. I'd guess around £150 on the SSD, £100 on CPU and £400 on GPU.

A 5070 Ti is 65% faster than a 5060 Ti, according to TPU's GPU database (excluding ray tracing and upscaling).

The X3D's cache can make a big difference in some games and I believe WoW is one of those that likes it.

My take, is that the £700 saving is going to lead to needing a combined CPU and GPU upgrade sooner than the 5G.

If you think it would suffice for your needs through 5 years or so, then I guess it isn't important. But, if it will only get you 2-3 then that's more of a problem?

 

[Robbo]

I think in honesty it would be more than sufficient, and I wouldn't be against upgrading it in a couple of years if I felt it was necessary, but that's probably unlikely.

From doing some research, broadly speaking people don't seem to be having many issues on WoW with the 9070XT - particularly with fresh systems - and there are some complaints on Nvidia cards too.

I'll have to keep pondering it!

 

[Tetras]

From doing some research, broadly speaking people don't seem to be having many issues on WoW with the 9070XT - particularly with fresh systems - and there are some complaints on Nvidia cards too.

Hmm. If the 9070 XT can work, then that's the better value option overall.

It is £450 for an extra 1TB storage, the CPU swapped to 7500X3D, upgrade from a 5060 Ti to 9070 XT and probably a better quality PSU too (bronze versus gold, though can't see a model).

 

[Robbo]

So just out of interest I've specced up a custom build at similar cost to compare to the Mach 5G:

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x MSI B850 GAMING PLUS WIFI (AMD AM5) B850 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-MSI-03994) = £159.95
• 1 x AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Eight Core 5.20GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-AMD-03517) = £375.00
• 1 x KLEVV FIT V 32GB (2x16GB) 6000MHz C30 DDR5 Dual Channel Kit - Black (SKU: MEM-KLV-07036) = £359.99
• 1 x MSI MPG A850G ATX 3.1 PCIe 5.1 850W 80 Plus Gold Modular Power Supply (SKU: CA-00Y-MS) = £99.99
• 1 x Lian Li Lancool 216 RGB Mid-tower PC case - Black (SKU: CA-7B8-LL) = £89.99
• 1 x WD Black SN850X 2TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS200T2X0E) (SKU: HD-591-WD) = £269.99
• 1 x Gigabyte GeForce RTX 5070 Gaming OC 12GB GDDR7 PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GRA-GIG-04240) = £599.99
• 1 x NVIDIA Game Bundle - Pragmata (SKU: DIG-NVI-07855) = £0.00
• 1 x Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB Black CPU Cooler - 120mm (SKU: COO-TLR-02724) = £34.99

Total: £1,989.89 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

Obviously no Windows 11 on there, which is £100~ or so depending on how/where you get it. The GPU is notably inferior (5070 vs 5070Ti) but the other parts are all better. You can get a 9070XT for only a bit more, too...

The Mach 5R is out of stock for now.

The Mach 5G does look pretty good value overall though. It's full specs are -

• AMD Ryzen 5 7500X3D CPU with Zen 4 architecture and 3D V-Cache
• MSI GeForce RTX 5070 Ti 16GB Shadow 3X OC GPU
• MSI B840 Gaming Plus WiFi Motherboard
• MSI MPG A750GN PCIe5 80 PLUS Gold 750W Power Supply
• 2x16GB - 32GB DDR5 RAM at 6000MHz (KLEVV)
• 2TB NVME SSD (Kioxia Exceria Basic)

 

[tamzzy]

rejigged a few bits
9800x3d -> 7800x3d
5070 -> 5070ti
sn850x -> exceria g3 (pcie gen 5)
a more up to date case

My basket at OcUK:

• 1 x AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D Eight Core 5.00GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DT-AM) = £319.99
• 1 x MSI B850 GAMING PLUS WIFI (AMD AM5) B850 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-MSI-03994) = £159.95
• 1 x Palit GeForce RTX 5070 Ti GamingPro-S OC 16GB GDDR7 PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GRA-PAL-05411) = £799.99
• 1 x NVIDIA Game Bundle - Pragmata (SKU: DIG-NVI-07855) = £0.00
• 1 x KIOXIA EXCERIA G3 2TB SSD NVME M.2 2280 PCIe 5.0 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-KIO-07152) = £239.99
• 1 x MSI MPG A850G ATX 3.1 PCIe 5.1 850W 80 Plus Gold Modular Power Supply (SKU: CA-00Y-MS) = £100.00
• 1 x Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB Black CPU Cooler - 120mm (SKU: COO-TLR-02724) = £34.99
• 1 x Lian Li Vector V100 Mid Tower Case - Black (SKU: CAS-LIA-05153) = £69.95
• 1 x KLEVV FIT V 32GB (2x16GB) 6000MHz C30 DDR5 Dual Channel Kit - Black (SKU: MEM-KLV-07036) = £359.98

Total: £2,084.84 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

 

[Gray2233]

For the sake of £55 I think I'd pony up the extra personally for WoW:

The frame time spikes pretty high on the 7800X3D on that final boss, and the average fps dips to 41 vs 56 on the 9800X3D.

These are PvP bosses too (from 2024 no less), it's been donkey's since I played WoW but the bosses in actual end game raids can be a lot more complicated/visually intensive in my experience.

It always makes me laugh when people claim WoW isn't hardware intensive because of how it looks/the age.

 

[tamzzy]

The frame time spikes pretty high on the 7800X3D on that final boss, and the average fps dips to 41 vs 56 on the 9800X3D.

oh wow! (literally and figuratively )
yeah definitely pony up for the 9800x3d then

 

[iamgigglz]

The frame time spikes pretty high on the 7800X3D on that final boss, and the average fps dips to 41 vs 56 on the 9800X3D.

The 1% and 0.1% lows on those are much closer than I would expect considering the average fps difference

 

[Robbo]

I've gone for the Mach 5G - I just think it seems a good all rounder despite a couple of areas being suboptimal. The warranty sounds excellent too.

I know it's the lazy option but given the PC I'm coming from, I'm sure it'll exceed expectations! And I have the option to upgrade to a 9800X3D in future, should I feel it necessary...

Now I just have the nightmare of moving all my things/settings over!