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CPU upgrade AMD or Intel?

Emjay86

Emjay86

Emjay86

Associate
Joined
2 Apr 2011
Posts
1,075
Location
Wales
Hi Guys,

I was hoping I could get some advice regarding a new upgrade I am looking to do!

My PC is an old workhorse from about 10 years ago, running an intel i7-2600k, 8GB RAM and an RTX 2070super...

Ok, so my GPU is newly upgraded. But this has brought about some massive performance issues, mostly because nvidia experience has tweaked game settings to match the card. Basically everything is on ultra but im getting serious bottleneck issues due to the other bits, likely more to be RAM than CPU but still.

So I am now in the market to upgrade and I saw a nice bundle deal on the OCUK store for a Ryzen 3900x and 32GB RAM and the ROG Hero viii mobo. I am quite happy to go with this as its not too steep in my pocket currently but I did the terrible thing of researching further into things and now have doubts.

Basically im not scared to upgrade for a bit of cash every 4 or so years (or 10 in my current case!) so i am looking for something that will possibly last a bit. Now my issue is that everyone raves on about Ryzen being amazing but all the benchmarking ive seen shows that Intel is still king when it comes to gaming, which is the ONLY purpose for my rig.

I know Intel don't have a great deal of wiggle room with their sockets and tend to force a larger upgrade than a simple CPU switch but im happy to take that on if I get a good amount of years out of it. £1000 every 6-10 years is acceptable for a gaming hobby.

I currently run a custom watercooling loop and will do the same for the new upgrade, so i dont care how good the ryzen's in built cooling is, because i wont be using it.

So all that in place. Do I go with the Ryzen 9 3900x or the i9-9900k?

I presume we are talking quantity over quality here? With Ryzen being quantity with the large number of threads and Intel being quality, being able to hit higher speeds better, which presumably is why Intel is better at gaming, for now.

I guess in part, the question is also, can we envisage games utilizing more cores, and if they do how far off will this be? Because im guessing until they start bumping into more cores the Ryzen is still second place?

Apologies as this has turned into bit of a brainstorm/ramble.

Thanks in advance!
 
I'm in a similar situation, though I've got an 8700K on a Z370 so not an old system at all but I'm giving this to the girlfriend and building a new system and decided to go with a 3900X on a X570.

Intel is still king for pure gaming FPS at 1080p but the higher the resolution you go there's not a lot in it at all and I'll be at 3440x1440 so the choice is pretty easy for me, not to mention if the AMD 4000 series is that much better for gaming than this series it'll be BC with these boards so that sealed the deal for me, not to mention I do a bit of video rendering here and there.

So I guess check some benchmarks on the games you mainly play and at the resolution you like to play at and see if there's much of a difference.

I'm just stuck on which RAM to get, it's going to be a white and silver build so I've painted myself into a bit of a corner haha!
 
It's very hard to recommend Intel at this point especially when the 9900k might be ~10 fps better than AMD. If games are the only thing you play then going for a 3900x seems overkill, as is that ROG Hero board. The best combo right now while being future proof is going for a 3700x (8 cores since consoles will be 8 cores) with a B450 Tomahawk Max which will handle 16 cores easily if you ever want to upgrade: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J69aiJJEHzQ

There is no way the 9900k can do anything about Zen 4000 in October-ish and it seems like Intel's 10th Gen won't either, especially not from a price standpoint.

If you want to have a good experience now, get a 3700x and B450 Tomahawk Max. If you want a complete Intel killer, wait till Ryzen 4000 also with a B450 Tomahawk Max.
 
I doubt that there will be a difference between the effective lifetime of those two CPUs in games, before their performance is simply too slow. The Ryzen would give you more breathing room and a more responsive system when games take up most of the cores. The 9900K isn't the 'quality' option either, it's actually only hitting competitive performance because of the clock speed and there's a cost to that. Like said already, the 3700X is a better point of comparison and it is much cheaper.
 
Adexus said:
I'm just stuck on which RAM to get, it's going to be a white and silver build so I've painted myself into a bit of a corner haha!
Click to expand...

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £169.99 (includes shipping: £0.00)
​

Matches your colour scheme and it's E-Die so it should hit 3600MHz with good timings without a hitch, no 16GB sets on OCUK unfortunately but you should be able to find them elsewhere.

I wouldn't invest in Intel right now, especially when talking about longevity. Technically the 9900K is faster in games, but the difference diminishes once you go beyond 1080P to almost nothing at 4K. With Intel you're investing into a dead socket, and it's also worth pointing out that games are becoming more multi-threaded, the more multi-threaded an application is the greater the advantage for AMD. With AMD you can either opt for a 8-16C on AM4 now and be set for the new consoles launching and beyond (the new consoles will have a CPU similar to the AMD 3700X), or opt for a cheaper CPU and upgrade to an appropriately powerful Ryzen 4000 series, and by everything I've seen it looks like AMD will take the single threaded crown.

In my eyes, a £500 8c16t 9900K vs a £300 8c16t 3700X or £400 12c24t 3900X, going AMD is the only sensible option. That's without getting into the cooling requirements which are an added expense, the 3700X and even 3900X will run happily with stock coolers, at most you'd want to spend another £20-45 on a third party option, running a 9900K at 5GHZ is going to require something beefier.
 
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Hi Guys,

Thanks for the advice thus far, really good stuff.

I should have mentioned, I am currently working on a 1080p although I am looking into going for a curved widescreen at some point, doubt ill manage to get the 49" ultra wide Samsung beast but id like something that looks widescreen and is curved so I will likely be going for a 3440x1440 also.

To top that off, I shamefully was going for an RGB build. The whole rig is going to be housed in a Corsair 680x case and i already have a bunch of Corsair peripherals synced up in RGB pukeyness and was hoping to utilise the iCUE software as much as possible. I have read that the Aura Sync for Gigabyte works fine with it (although I have yet to work out how to link my GPU!). The Tomahawk however is something completely different.

That all said, if I was to ignore that little detail (perhaps ill have to change the mobo!) how does this look:

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £730.42 (includes shipping: £10.50)​
​
 
Yep basically Intel is a no-go. You cant go wrong with a Ryzen 3600 or 3700. Or even a 1600AF for cheap and then drop a 4000-series desktop in there late this year or next year.
 
Gray2233 said:
My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £169.99 (includes shipping: £0.00)
​

Matches your colour scheme and it's E-Die so it should hit 3600MHz with good timings without a hitch, no 16GB sets on OCUK unfortunately but you should be able to find them elsewhere.
Click to expand...

Thanks man I'll give them a look! I was thinking of the Thermaltake ToughRAM in white/silver but the timing's aren't great and they don't use Samsung memory but I assume they'll be decent enough.
 
I went from intel to a 3900x. I don’t use it to its full potential but it’s nice to have.

Minimum I would get is a 3700 though if money is not an issue go with the 3900x bundle you mentioned.
 
TonTom said:
I went from intel to a 3900x. I don’t use it to its full potential but it’s nice to have.

Minimum I would get is a 3700 though if money is not an issue go with the 3900x bundle you mentioned.
Click to expand...

The difference between getting the 3700x as previously suggested to a 3900x in the bundle I mentioned is price (obviously), and that means in my case I will possibly have to wait a month, maybe two to get the 3900x whereas i should be able to get the 3700x now. I've put up with the bottleneck for about 3 months thus far so frankly i can wait a little longer for the 3900x. I guess i am more favourable of the bundle too as i know for a fact the mobo is a good one whereas looking for a good mobo to go with a 3700x that isnt limited, and looks the way i want it to is proving a bit tricky.

I think given all of the advise I will likely go with the bundle thats on offer, as I feel i would be creating bit of a powerhouse that should last me a good few years, which is what im after. Sure it will be overpowered to begin with but it will soon catch up. My rig originally started off as an overpowered SLI beast but has mostly last me 10 years, this is the kind of thing im after (not that im scared of upgrading sooner, its just hassle).

Thanks a lot for the feedback, I really appreciate it.

Hope your all staying safe.
 
definitely get 32gb if you're expecting it to last a few years. unless you're desperate for the RGB i think this is hard to go past:

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team...3600mhz-quad-channel-kit-black-my-095-tg.html

not that i've looked extensively, but seems to be one of the few kits to put it on the line and guarantee 16-16-16-36 in a 4-DIMM configuration, at 1.35V!

EDIT: i should say i don't have this myself, one of the reviews has commented that even though OcUK's page says 16-18-18-38, the packaging says 16-16-16-36.
 
One thing that hasn't been mentioned is the speed of the ssd's in the new consoles especially the PS5 at 5GB/s If I were in your boat I would not consider anything less than a good X570 board with PCIE 4 because in a year or 2 you may find that games requires this kind of bandwidth to work correctly.

Just my 2Pence :-)
 
welshrat said:
One thing that hasn't been mentioned is the speed of the ssd's in the new consoles especially the PS5 at 5GB/s If I were in your boat I would not consider anything less than a good X570 board with PCIE 4 because in a year or 2 you may find that games requires this kind of bandwidth to work correctly.

Just my 2Pence :)
Click to expand...

You've obviously not seen the der8auer video on YouTube where he tests those PCIe 4 SSDs and they fail big-time unless you water-cool them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47dGG8ZnN2g
 
WJA96 said:
You've obviously not seen the der8auer video on YouTube where he tests those PCIe 4 SSDs and they fail big-time unless you water-cool them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47dGG8ZnN2g
Click to expand...

That may be the case but I would rather hedge my bets and get a board that supports these speeds as these drives will improve and given the OP wants a machine for gaming that will last I don't think PCIE3 is a good idea.

EDIT - BTW this is only my thoughts and only adding it so that the OP has options, I only mention it as reading a lot about the new consoles it seems that it could be a paradigm shift in the way games are streamed and designed.
 
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welshrat said:
One thing that hasn't been mentioned is the speed of the ssd's in the new consoles especially the PS5 at 5GB/s If I were in your boat I would not consider anything less than a good X570 board with PCIE 4 because in a year or 2 you may find that games requires this kind of bandwidth to work correctly.

Just my 2Pence :)
Click to expand...

I don't think PC SSDs will be able to match the PS5 SSD for a while as it's not just the crazy read/write speeds its got but the 12-channel memory controller, whereas the fastest NVMe drives have 3 or 4 channels only.

But yeah I agree do not go cheap with SSD with PS5 on the horizon.
 
WJA96 said:
You've obviously not seen the der8auer video on YouTube where he tests those PCIe 4 SSDs and they fail big-time unless you water-cool them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47dGG8ZnN2g
Click to expand...

Stop using outdated videos mate. This was posted in September 2019. Now is April 2020.
Samsung has the 980 series out alongside numerous other makers having really fast NAND that could even overwhelm the PCIe4
 
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Panos said:
Stop using outdated videos mate. This was posted in September 2019. Now is April 2020.
Samsung has the 980 series out alongside numerous other makers having really fast NAND that could even overwhelm the PCIe4
Click to expand...

And they’ve been tested to run cool enough they don’t throttle?
 
Boot_Loop said:
I don't think PC SSDs will be able to match the PS5 SSD for a while as it's not just the crazy read/write speeds its got but the 12-channel memory controller, whereas the fastest NVMe drives have 3 or 4 channels only.

But yeah I agree do not go cheap with SSD with PS5 on the horizon.
Click to expand...

Totally agree, it will be a while before the drives are out that match PS5 but wouldn't want to hinder myself entirely with PCIE3, I regret my X470 board for this reason but will be happy to upgrade when the 4000 series arrives. Besides will have a PS5 to play as well :-)
 
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