How far can I stretch it?

[XiiDamian]

Hi all

Just a quick question, I've wanted a high graphics card for aslong as I can think an now I can afford what ever one I want, but I can't afford a full new rig so I'm scared of causing a bottleneck,

MSi GTX 460 OC Edition 1GB
AMD Phen II X$ BE 955 - 3.2GHZ (stock cooler)
8GB DDR3 Ram
Win7 64Bit
Western Digital 320GB HD SATAII

Asus M4N98TD EVO 980a SLI Socket AM3 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard
OCZ GameXStream 850W PSU - Silent 120mm Blue LED Fan 4x PCI-E 6x SATA

is what I currently have, I was looking at a GTX580 or ATI 7970, I play at 1920x1080 would that CPU be fast enough to handle them or should I buy a CPU cooler and try to get 4GHZ then get one of them?

I mainly play MMOs BF3,FM12 and SC2

 

[CinderzFTW]

A GTX580/7970 would bottleneck your CPU...

Buy something like an arctic freezer pro 7 rev 2 for £20 or gelid tranquillo for around £25-30... this will do nicely to hit 4ghz...

 

[ALXAndy]

Even at 4ghz the 955 is a poor CPU.

I had a 940 @ 3.9ghz stable and my I7 950 wipes the floor with it. You really need to remember that the 940 and 955 were made to compete with the 45nm C2Qs and not the I7.

And my I7 950 bottlenecks my 7970 when compared to my friend's 2600k. He gets nearly 1500 more 3DM11 score than I do at the same settings.

However, don't let that stop you buying a GPU. You will still get perfectly playable frame rates out of it.

 

[CinderzFTW]

I would go for a 6950/GTX560Ti as they will perform brilliantly in any game with the 955 @ 1920*1080

 

[bhindi]

I would go for a 6950/GTX560Ti as they will perform brilliantly in any game with the 955 @ 1920*1080

+ 1

I have 560ti 448 core and eats everything i throw at it at 1080p. with my 955 @ 3.6 . The 955 is still an ok cpu in the real word .

 

[CinderzFTW]

The 448 is a good card, but for me, too close in price to the GTX570... I would spend the little extra to get the 570...

 

[shadow_boxer]

+1 for 2GB 6950. Shame it's not on this week only though. Wait for next Wednesday.

 

[andybird123]

Even at 4ghz the 955 is a poor CPU.

I had a 940 @ 3.9ghz stable and my I7 950 wipes the floor with it. You really need to remember that the 940 and 955 were made to compete with the 45nm C2Qs and not the I7.

And my I7 950 bottlenecks my 7970 when compared to my friend's 2600k. He gets nearly 1500 more 3DM11 score than I do at the same settings.

However, don't let that stop you buying a GPU. You will still get perfectly playable frame rates out of it.

I think you may be slightly confused about what a bottleneck is... benchmark tool scores are virtually useless in determining a bottleneck

a CPU bottleneck is when you have your CPU at 100% utilisation on all cores and you GPU < 99% constant

if your GPU is at 99% constant then there isn't a CPU bottleneck

you might get improved benchmark scores, and possibly even an extra FPS or 2 in a game, but a bottleneck is when you lose lots of FPS (like 10%+) because your GPU is not at 100%

at stock settings an X4 955 black edition is comparable to an I7 920 - at 4ghz it's a decent chip, more than enough for a GTX 580 / 7950, possibly even a 7970 though you may just start to see bottleneck creep in with a 7970 OC'd