Getting back into PC gaming

mattp1986

mattp1986

mattp1986

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Hi all, after being underwhelmed slightly with the next gen consoles performance I've decided to get back into PC gaming after a few years out of the game.
I have around £4k to spend on parts and I know what I'm doing regarding the building process as I've built 2 or 3 rigs in the past.
I'm just having a hard time choosing a CPU and GPU.
The 3080 is the obvious choice but stock is completely depleted everywhere and I'm also concerned about the 10gb of VRAM, if that's gonna cause problems with modern games at high resolutions in a couple of years or so.
A 3090 is also viable but they are very expensive and probably overkill for 1440p gaming.
Heard rumours of a 3080ti on the horizon which is also making me consider waiting a bit longer, but as always if you wait for the latest and greatest with PC parts, you'll be waiting forever lol.

CPU wise is probably a easier choice as Ryzen seems to be the go to nowadays, how times have changed lol.
I'd probably look at a 5900x.

Just wondering what you guys would advise, and if it's worth waiting a few months I wouldn't mind.

Thanks in advance for any replies and a Happy New year to all
 
Well, I would ask at what resolution do you intend to play at? Will it be 4K, 1440p or lower?

Also, I would ask what peripherals you intend to use? You have two choices really (modern ones), the B550 chip set, or the X570 chipset to run an AMD 5900x. The B550 is the mainstream solution that came out in June 2020, X570 came out in 2019. X570 has more bandwidth and more PCI-E4 due to chipset. However here is the caveat, X570 boards have fans placed on the southbridge chipset cooling solution, B550 do not. Also, if you buy a board, you need to make sure you can use it with the 5900x and check if the motherboard has BIOS FLASH. Bios flashing can be done without CPU, and RAM, you only need to power the motherboard with your PSU.

Also, do you want features like ray tracing, DLSS, or just basic frames per second? AMD have only recently released the 6800, 6800xt and 6900xt, which have ray tracing, but not as advanced as the RTX 3080/3090. So for 4K, an RTX 3080/3090, for 1440p an RT 6800 from AMD. AMD have made some competitive cards, however like the NVIDIA solutions, stock is limited. Finally as mentioned NVIDIA have lots of trendy features, whilst AMD have had more focus on rasterization.
 
VonScar said:
Well, I would ask at what resolution do you intend to play at? Will it be 4K, 1440p or lower?

Also, I would ask what peripherals you intend to use? You have two choices really (modern ones), the B550 chip set, or the X570 chipset to run an AMD 5900x. The B550 is the mainstream solution that came out in June 2020, X570 came out in 2019. X570 has more bandwidth and more PCI-E4 due to chipset. However here is the caveat, X570 boards have fans placed on the southbridge chipset cooling solution, B550 do not. Also, if you buy a board, you need to make sure you can use it with the 5900x and check if the motherboard has BIOS FLASH. Bios flashing can be done without CPU, and RAM, you only need to power the motherboard with your PSU.

Also, do you want features like ray tracing, DLSS, or just basic frames per second? AMD have only recently released the 6800, 6800xt and 6900xt, which have ray tracing, but not as advanced as the RTX 3080/3090. So for 4K, an RTX 3080/3090, for 1440p an RT 6800 from AMD. AMD have made some competitive cards, however like the NVIDIA solutions, stock is limited. Finally as mentioned NVIDIA have lots of trendy features, whilst AMD have had more focus on rasterization.
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Thanks for the reply, I will mainly be gaming in 1440p on a 165hz monitor. But I do have a 4K 60hz monitor that I will probably use for the more chilled out action adventure games etc.
The AMD cards do look pretty impressive but after watching a few videos I have decided to go with Nvidia. So it's either a 3080 or 3090. However they're all out of stock as are the Ryzen 9 CPUs everywhere.

I'm starting to wonder whether waiting till mid 2021 would be the best option for me, especially considering Intel 11th gen CPUs will probably be here and I'm hearing more and more rumours of a 3080ti in the works.
Decisions decisions lol
 
New GPU's are coming from NVIDIA around March. However, whether anyone will be able to buy one is another story.

5900X AMD CPU's will be available. Rocket Lake is also coming, but the supposed best Rocket Lake has only 8 cores vs 12. So, even with IPC improvements, you would still have four less cores for a similar or same price. With Rocket Lake, I am wondering how they improved IPC? Its supposed to be a "new" architecture, but it is still 14nm and whats the TDP going to be?

If you wait there will always be the next thing to come out. For me I bit the bullet and got a 5600x. However, with absurd GPU pricing, I am sticking with my old GPU 980 Ti until we get a decent 4K card for a decent price. The 3080 has not got enough Vram for that.
 
The 3080 will be fine for a couple of years even at 4K and the cash saved over buying a 3090 will be able to by a faster 4080 in when they release.
 
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