Graphics Card Choices

[Metrix]

Hi all,

I’m currently in the process of putting together a new build, as my current machine (i7 8700K & 1080ti) is now on its last legs.

I’ve decided to go with the following components for the new build:

• NZXT H9 Flow RGB (2025)
• Gigabyte AMD X870E AORUS PRO
• AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D
• Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro 420
• Corsair DOMINATOR Platinum RGB Grey 64GB 6000MHz AMD EXPO DDR5 Memory Kit
• Gigabyte NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 WINDFORCE OC SFF 16GB Blackwell Graphics Card
• Seasonic FOCUS GX 1000 Watt PCIE 5.1 Fully Modular 80+ Gold Quiet PSU, ATX 3.1
• Alienware AW3225QF 32" 4K UHD (3840x2160) 1700R Curved Gaming Monitor, 240Hz, QD OLED

My main question concerns the graphics card. I’m a little torn at the moment, as I’m wondering whether it’s worth waiting for the 5080 Super or simply going ahead with the standard 5080. My reasoning for waiting is that, as my intention is to game at 4K on a 32" 240Hz monitor, the additional 6GB of VRAM on the Super could prove useful. That said, I suspect the wait could be considerable — if I can even secure one at launch — and the release pricing is anyone’s guess.

As an alternative, I’ve also considered saving some money by opting for the 9070 XT, as there doesn’t appear to be a huge difference between it and the 5080. However, I’ve always been an NVIDIA fan, so I’m a little unsure.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Gray2233]

I would wait for the Super variants unless you're in a rush, it's close enough to launch date (probably end of year) that you're going to smack yourself with regret, especially when spending as much.

That said, some of your component choices appear to be unnecessarily costly, you might actually be sneaking into 5090 territory with that sort of expenditure in fact and for 4K gaming there is nothing better on the market.

What is your exact budget and use case? We may well be able to figure out an alternative that either costs a lot less or features in the aforementioned halo GPU.

 

[Tetras]

My reasoning for waiting is that, as my intention is to game at 4K on a 32" 240Hz monitor, the additional 6GB of VRAM on the Super could prove useful. That said, I suspect the wait could be considerable — if I can even secure one at launch — and the release pricing is anyone’s guess.

If you can wait a month or two, I'd definitely wait. The part choice on your build suggests you can pay the extra, so even if you need to pay another ~£150 then I'd do it.

As an alternative, I’ve also considered saving some money by opting for the 9070 XT, as there doesn’t appear to be a huge difference between it and the 5080. However, I’ve always been an NVIDIA fan, so I’m a little unsure.

Purely from price to performance, the 5080 isn't worth buying over the 9070 XT or 5070 Ti, no, but if you're buying just for gaming your build is overkill anyway.

 

[Metrix]

Thank you for the swift replies.

Part of me is buying the above parts for future proofing (which I know is daft in the PC game) and also for some of the tasks I will have for the machine. Specifically gaming, audio production, some coding and running multiple VM's in Hyper V. Please feel free to amend if you think it's too overkill. My only requests would be that I keep a Gigabyte motherboard and 64GB RAM but otherwise have at it.

 

[Gray2233]

Thank you for the swift replies.

Part of me is buying the above parts for future proofing (which I know is daft in the PC game) and also for some of the tasks I will have for the machine. Specifically gaming, audio production, some coding and running multiple VM's in Hyper V. Please feel free to amend if you think it's too overkill. My only requests would be that I keep a Gigabyte motherboard and 64GB RAM but otherwise have at it.

While we'd be happy to do so, we can't do that unless you give us the amount your planned build costs and how much you're willing to spend overall.

 

[Tetras]

Part of me is buying the above parts for future proofing (which I know is daft in the PC game) and also for some of the tasks I will have for the machine. Specifically gaming, audio production, some coding and running multiple VM's in Hyper V. Please feel free to amend if you think it's too overkill. My only requests would be that I keep a Gigabyte motherboard and 64GB RAM but otherwise have at it.

What kind of "future proofing" are you thinking of exactly? The 4K gaming part, or the work (audio, coding, VMs) part?

Does any of your work usage suffer with your current system (assuming it was functioning 100%)? If so, what problems do you experience?

 

[Metrix]

My apologies, I completely missed that bit!

I'm looking at around £2500-3000, although I'm not including the monitor in that price as I have the option to get that free (it's a long story).

In terms of future proofing, I mean just in general, have something that will see me being able to comfortably game and do my productivity items for the 4-5 years without having to worry that there is something significantly faster out there.

My current work usage doesn't suffer at the moment, but it would always be nicer to have it completed a bit quicker.

 

[Tetras]

In terms of future proofing, I mean just in general, have something that will see me being able to comfortably game and do my productivity items for the 4-5 years without having to worry that there is something significantly faster out there.

My current work usage doesn't suffer at the moment, but it would always be nicer to have it completed a bit quicker.

The 9950X3D is a CPU that is somewhat compromised from a gaming perspective, because it mainly relies on the 8 cores with the 3D cache and parks the other CCD. For productivity, sure, the extra cores are helpful, but even the 9800X3D would be enormously faster than your 8700K. The ideal CPU would be the upcoming 10800X3D, if it has the 12 core CCD with 3D cache that is rumoured, but I have no idea how far out that is. The 265K is a great all-rounder and much cheaper than the 9950X3D, though you do lose a chunk of gaming performance, so the compromise versus the 9800X3D does not make sense for everyone.

Considering that rumours currently suggest AM5 might even get another gen (Zen 7), I'd be leaning towards the 9800X3D (the 9900X3D is compromised by the 6x6 config) and upgrading it at a future date, if it becomes necessary. From what I'm aware those Dominators are pretty expensive, so if you're getting the X3D I'd get a 96GB kit instead, since the 3D cache mitigates the impact of slower memory. If you went with the 9800X3D, you could also tone down the cooling.

 

[Gray2233]

My apologies, I completely missed that bit!

I'm looking at around £2500-3000, although I'm not including the monitor in that price as I have the option to get that free (it's a long story).

In terms of future proofing, I mean just in general, have something that will see me being able to comfortably game and do my productivity items for the 4-5 years without having to worry that there is something significantly faster out there.

My current work usage doesn't suffer at the moment, but it would always be nicer to have it completed a bit quicker.

For a 4K build utilising a 5080, you could build a very healthy one for £2-2.4k, but unless your PC is literally dead I'd wait until Christmas for sales and the Super refreshes.

There's a lot of areas that could save you money, and while you might not necessarily want to put that cash elsewhere you could still add it to future upgrades down the line. The next gen Ryzen 10K series is looking very promising, and will be supported by AM5. Given you're on a 8700K you could perhaps opt for a 9600X which would match in cores/threads but be far quicker and then slap in the 10950X3D or whatever it ends up being called in a year or so, I know the VM software you use loves cores.

Coming from what you have I'd opt for a cheaper B850 (unless you badly need USB4) with good VRM's and a base level AM5 CPU with those intentions, and if you save on the GPU with the 9070XT you could also revisit that as the "Super" range is more or less a refresh of what we already have with more VRAM. End of next year we'll be seeing new GPU architecture from Nvidia and probably AMD, and it may well be a lot faster for the money you have left over in both instances. AM5 is a mid life platform and you're looking to do a hugely expensive "longevity" build during a GPU refresh, while that would normally be fine I'd lean toward either making the best of the platform with the aforementioned options or waiting out until AM6.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

I wouldn't stress too much over vRAM which is rumored to be the most significant upgrade of the 5080 Super. Future proofing, as you acknowledge, is generally not a good idea because the life cycles of hardware is quite rapid. The increases per generation are waning, you can literally always justify waiting to upgrade because something better is just around the corner. Don't get me wrong if we were 2 weeks away from a 6080 launch, i'd tell you to wait for sure, but the 5080 to 5080 super is an intergenerational upgrade, same architectures, same features, damn near the same cores and so performance will be almost the same. The extra vRAM is nice on paper but it does nothing for your performance or ability to run games in 4k.

We saw this in the endless arguing in the 500 page thread (or whatever it got to) about "is 10Gb enough" for the 3080. I personally spent months testing various games and found that vRAM was never a problem. Peoples general perception of how much was needed was grossly inflated by things like games using bad allocation rules and our monitoring tools not able to get accurate readings of what's really in use vs what is reserved. Even today my 3080 is never vRAM constrained on any game I've played, and I play in 4k and have a wide range of modern games. My bet would be your 1080 never uses more than 8Gb in real life scenarios, the GPU craps out way before the RAM does.

There are exceptions, but they are extremely cases most users will never be in.

The only other warning I would heed, curved monitors are memes. 3d rendering creates a perspective and draws stuff to screen assuming a flat surface is what is being looked at. Curved monitors mess with (warp) perspective and don't look quite right. As far as I can tell there's no benefit from a curved monitor only drawback, it's a marketing gimmick.

 

[Metrix]

The 9950X3D is a CPU that is somewhat compromised from a gaming perspective, because it mainly relies on the 8 cores with the 3D cache and parks the other CCD. For productivity, sure, the extra cores are helpful, but even the 9800X3D would be enormously faster than your 8700K. The ideal CPU would be the upcoming 10800X3D, if it has the 12 core CCD with 3D cache that is rumoured, but I have no idea how far out that is. The 265K is a great all-rounder and much cheaper than the 9950X3D, though you do lose a chunk of gaming performance, so the compromise versus the 9800X3D does not make sense for everyone.

I'll do a bit of digging and look at the 9800X3D

ur PC is literally dead I'd wait until Chri

Yeah I'm thinking I might hold out until Christmas, as painful as I know that will be I suspect there will be better deals on anyway and hopefully more will be known about the 5080 Super.

The only other warning I would heed, curved monitors are memes. 3d rendering creates a perspective and draws stuff to screen assuming a flat surface is what is being looked at. Curved monitors mess with (warp) perspective and don't look quite right. As far as I can tell there's no benefit from a curved monitor only drawback, it's a marketing gimmick.

My current monitor is a Alienware AW3418DW which is 'curved' and I'll be honest, I've fallen in love with it. I find it really comfortable for productivity tasks and a bit more immersive when gaming. I realise that in terms of performance, it makes absolutely no difference but I guess people like what they like!

 

[Gray2233]

I'm definitely inclined toward a curved screen when running ultrawide, less so for standard widescreen.