2700X to 5950X?

[HRL]

Assuming there are a fair few 5950X owners on here and I’m after a little advice please.

I’ve had what I should probably consider a golden sample 2700X for two years, boosts to 4.5Ghz across all cores using PBO on air.

Recently bought a 3090FE and I’m wondering if now would be a good time to upgrade. Not sure if the 2700X is now holding me back in games at 4K. Possibly not but some opinions would be greatly appreciated.

Only really game on my PC, so understand if 16C/32T is considered overkill but the same was said about the 2700X at the time and that’s served me well.

 

[Grim5]

If you unlock the frame rate, does your gpu run under 100% load in any of your games at 4k?

 

[Brazo]

I upgraded from a good 2700x (10k in timespy) to a 3800x (10k in timespy) you can imagine how overjoyed I was with the upgrade.

Assuming 4K/60 the 2700x is sufficient for most but not all games, some recent ones although essentially badly optimised ones, rely on single thread speed that a 5 series cpu would be better.

 

[Troezar]

Do you just game? If so probably not at 4K, or at least it wouldn't be an efficient use of money. Probably better to go 5600X then upgrade when a faster platform comes out using the money saved plus whatever the old gear sells for.

Whilst I do like the idea of high end parts I may go lower tier next time and upgrade more frequently. As with most things it depends on your use case/disposable income.

 

[HRL]

If you unlock the frame rate, does your gpu run under 100% load in any of your games at 4k?

Oh, for sure I’m GPU limited in CP2077, but I’ve heard that minimum frame rates are raised considerably using the newer CPU’s. IPC improvements and more cores at work potentially?

 

[HRL]

I upgraded from a good 2700x (10k in timespy) to a 3800x (10k in timespy) you can imagine how overjoyed I was with the upgrade.

Assuming 4K/60 the 2700x is sufficient for most but not all games, some recent ones although essentially badly optimised ones, rely on single thread speed that a 5 series cpu would be better.

Pretty much the reason I was looking at the 5950X rather than another 8C/16T chip.

Core count aside, are the IPC improvements significant enough to justify an upgrade?

Also, I’ve had pretty tight RAM timings using Samsung B-die, I take it the same can be done again but with faster RAM this time. Similar improvements seen with the 5-series when matched with tight timings?

 

[MasterOC]

My 2700x and 3800x bottlenecks a 2080super in a lot of scenarios. My 5900x solves at least 95% of any issues I had. 5950x would be the same. My 5900x loves fast and tight ram, running 32gb 3600 at cl 16 fair easy. Ipc improvements from a 2700x are a lot. Minimums will be far more stable and averages a lot higher.

 

[Jimmy Weirdarms]

I’m wondering if now would be a good time to upgrade

Right now, probably not. I'd give it two or three more weeks for supply and prices to settle, if you do decide to upgrade.

 

[HRL]

My 2700x and 3800x bottlenecks a 2080super in a lot of scenarios. My 5900x solves at least 95% of any issues I had. 5950x would be the same. My 5900x loves fast and tight ram, running 32gb 3600 at cl 16 fair easy. Ipc improvements from a 2700x are a lot. Minimums will be far more stable and averages a lot higher.

Cheers for that. Did wonder if the new Ryzen’s liked fast RAM as much as Zen+.

These numbers look promising at least:





Are IPC improvements really almost 50% up since Zen+?

 

[HRL]

Right now, probably not. I'd give it two or three more weeks for supply and prices to settle, if you do decide to upgrade.

Yep, looking at getting it prebuilt as I’m only willing to pay RRP for the 5950X if I go down that route. Specced a build up and it will only cost an extra £50 or so over what I can source the parts for, if I can find them at RRP.

 

[mickyflinn]

Gaming at 4k the 5950x makes no sense compared to the 5900x pricing.

 

[Zefan]

Are IPC improvements really almost 50% up since Zen+?

No, the difference in the image cited is 43.4%, and the 5950x has a 14% higher boost clock than the 2700x. Zen+ -> Zen 2 and Zen 2 - > Zen 3 were both in the 15% IPC bump ballpark. Some of that maths is slightly off due to percentages of one thing not applying equally to something else, but it roughly checks out as what you should expect to see. I really wouldn't waste my money on it however, unless you're experiencing really bad minimum framerates.

Check out this page on Techradar. https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-ryzen-7-5800x/22.html which shows just how little difference it should make at 4K. I'm not sure of their exact test method, but I've found their GPU relative performance summary/comparisons to be really good in the past.

:edit: just read through the link properly, seems they're using a 2080ti in that comparison, which will obviously change things but I'm still not convinced it's worth the massive expense. Then again you're a 3090 owner so perhaps we're not on the same wavelength

 

[Muzzza]

Went from x470 to x570, 2700x to 5950x and its the ipc you notice too. I was surprised how much quicker it was. If you are just gaming then it's overkill. But sounds like you don't mind £££...

 

[Brazo]

Pretty much the reason I was looking at the 5950X rather than another 8C/16T chip.

Core count aside, are the IPC improvements significant enough to justify an upgrade?

Also, I’ve had pretty tight RAM timings using Samsung B-die, I take it the same can be done again but with faster RAM this time. Similar improvements seen with the 5-series when matched with tight timings?

I think you need to say what refresh rate you play at as if it’s just 60fps the 2700x will be more than enough for most games, if higher then yes it will be the weakest link.

 

[HRL]

Generally 4K/60 but have been dabbling in 4K/120 for games I can run at that res like the Doom games.

I wouldn’t say money is no issue but I’m going to be moving down to the SW of England in the summer and disposable income will probably be non-existent for a year or two, hence why I’m wondering if I’d be best off upgrading now while I can still afford to fairly easily.

 

[HRL]

Then again you're a 3090 owner so perhaps we're not on the same wavelength

Fair point.

According to that my old 8C/16T will only be 0.7% behind a like for like 5 series @ 4K, which I wasn’t expecting. Would expect the 5950X to stretch its legs when games support more cores but even so, that’s nowhere near as big an improvement as I was hoping for.

Anyone got any real world comparisons?

 

[Brazo]

Fair point.

According to that my old 8C/16T will only be 0.7% behind a like for like 5 series @ 4K, which I wasn’t expecting. Would expect the 5950X to stretch its legs when games support more cores but even so, that’s nowhere near as big an improvement as I was hoping for.

Anyone got any real world comparisons?

0.7% is within the realms of testing error!

Basically at 4K resolution and 60fps a 2700x is as good as a 5950x in nearly every game that exists. I can think of exceptions but these are very few and far between.

Given games are very slowly going the way of multithreading this will only work in your favour as a 2700x still has plenty of cores and threads (even if these cores are slightly slower).

All that said if I was in your position and had money to burn then yeah I’d deffo do it as I couldn’t stand having a chip slower than the 15w apple M1

 

[Grim5]

0.7% is within the realms of testing error!

Basically at 4K resolution and 60fps a 2700x is as good as a 5950x in nearly every game that exists. I can think of exceptions but these are very few and far between.

Given games are very slowly going the way of multithreading this will only work in your favour as a 2700x still has plenty of cores and threads (even if these cores are slightly slower).

All that said if I was in your position and had money to burn then yeah I’d deffo do it as I couldn’t stand having a chip slower than the 15w apple M1

maybe in 5 years we'll all be praying to our ARM Apple overlords after they destroy Intel and AMD. Apparently the M1 is so good that you can emulate Windows on the new Mac and it's still faster than the old Mac using an Intel CPU . Intel was first up, now Apple is coming for AMD with its 32 core M1/M2

 

[greatash]

Depending on the game it'll make a big difference. I don't like looking at CPU benchmarks from big sites because they rarely test the CPU demanding parts of the games - usually the start of a game just walking around or the in game benchmark.

No way a 2700x is holding 60 minimums in cp2077 (more like 40s) while 5000 series can. I went from a 2600 to a 5800x and the gains were massive in most games - total war Warhammer/three kingdoms, cp2077, hell let loose, death stranding, battlefield 1/5 all got at least a 50fps bump. Zen+ caps out at 60-100 FPS on most games in my experience, while the newer 5000 series can push 150+

 

[HRL]

Views a bit conflicting there.

Some say I won’t notice a difference over the 2700X at 4K, someone else saying I’ll see a massive difference.

It’s why I haven’t bit the bullet yet!