Is a modern GPU (eg: NVidia 4070) a total waste of time on an old CPU (eg: Intel I7 4790K)? - Anyone running a modern(ish) GPU on an old CPU?

[NeilF]

I've read through this thread with interest and at first I thought buying the 4070 would give you a marked improvement in performance, albeit, it would be bottlenecked largely, but still, a marked improvement on your current card. However, after reading the thread fully, I now think it'd be a wasted upgrade, unless you upgrade the rest of your system too, i.e motherboard, ram, CPU.

If you are deadset on wanting to keep your current machine intact, then obviously you need to upgrade everything, not just the motherboard , CPU, RAM, and card. Without wanting to sound rude, you seem to be looking for a solution that isn't there, when basically you have two choices at this point, buy the 4070, be disappointed in its massively bottlenecked performance, or upgrade your full system from top to toe. If cost is an issue, like it is for most of us, then do like most of us do, which is make do and mend with your current system, whilst saving for a new one. Look at it this way, your current system is almost ten years old, it owes you nothing, I dare say you've had your monies worth out of it. To be honest, regardless of whether you were looking at a new graphics card or not, if you're a gamer, which you clearly are, then it's probably time to upgrade the lot anyway - the performance improvement could be massive for not a great deal of money, bearing in mind you were buying the 4070 anyway.

Yes, it appears some games/titles - eg: CoD:MW2 Al Mazrah DMZ - are bouncing off the peak performance of the CPU (4790K)... So yes, I fear upgrading the video card would achieve minimal improvements in these scenarios

 

[bjmnz]

Just to add some more input in addition to my RDR2 experience with a i5-6600K + 16GB + 7900XT - I purchased the Metro bundle on a recent Steam sale. Played through the first two Redux versions, and currently half way through Metro Exodus Enhanced Edition (the ray-traced version). 1440p, all graphics settings to max including tesselation and ray-tracing, with VSR at 1 (which I think is off), motion blur off and it's running perfectly fine. Don't think I've seen the framerate below 60, and usually it's 80-110fps.

 

[jonessa]

Just my 2p.

Recently upgraded my OC'd 4690k paired with a 3060 to a 13700k. The difference is night and day. Previously in MW2, I was getting 99% CPU utilisation and only 50-60% GPU utilisation. Since the upgrade, i'm getting 30% CPU and 99% GPU. Performance in Multiplayer was still a really good experience, but in Warzone it was really struggling. I hadn't realised by how much until the upgrade.

 

[Rroff]

Recently upgraded my OC'd 4690k paired with a 3060 to a 13700k.

4690K is going to struggle a whole lot more without the additional 4 threads from HT, even so too many games now are edging past what 4 core 8 thread can deliver at settings where a more recent GPU is worthwhile.

 

[mrk]

I went from an i7 6700K (OCd) to a 12700KF (not OCd). the RAM remained DDR4 3600 between both. The fps minimums and frametime stability uplift is in orders of magntude greater. And that was with just a 2070 Super at the time.

Old gen quad cores are simply outdated now and quite literally unsupported by many newer game engines which rely on 6 to 8 physical cores to work best.

 

[NeilF]

On a side note, with my main current and only concern being MW2:CoD Al Mazrah DMZ being a touch stuttery/clunky on my hardware. I'll swear the latest big update (for MW3?) has improved performance a bit?

As it stands with me increasing my performance about 15% by - 9yrs after building the system - finally enabling XMP memory on my motherboard (embarrassing ), and the apparent recent engine improvement, I'm happy to soldier on for the moment.

 

[RBImGuy]

bottlenecks are usually by the weakest link
either it be, ssd,gpu, cpu or ram

Many buy a new gpu and forget the cpu still needs to be able to keep up or they may not get any or small improvements due to that

 

[NeilF]

bottlenecks are usually by the weakest link
either it be, ssd,gpu, cpu or ram

Many buy a new gpu and forget the cpu still needs to be able to keep up or they may not get any or small improvements due to that

Yeh, I suspect keeping my 4790K but upgrading my 1070 would allow me to up the visual quality in most of the games I play with a good smooth frame rate. But going forwards, MW2:CoD DMZ is showing that some titles are bottlenecking that CPU now... If I were to upgrade my GPU I suspect CoD would have some small improvements, especially visually, but where I'm beginning to feel that odd stutter/judder (eg: in Al Mazrah) I suspect that might persist. And in future titles this (CPU bottleneck) is only more likely to be the case...

 

[heatonpkmassive]

Yeh, I suspect keeping my 4790K but upgrading my 1070 would allow me to up the visual quality in most of the games I play with a good smooth frame rate. But going forwards, MW2:CoD DMZ is showing that some titles are bottlenecking that CPU now... If I were to upgrade my GPU I suspect CoD would have some small improvements, especially visually, but where I'm beginning to feel that odd stutter/judder (eg: in Al Mazrah) I suspect that might persist. And in future titles this (CPU bottleneck) is only more likely to be the case...

I went from a 4790k to a 3700x while I had a 2080, it was a night and day difference, so much smoother with the 3700x. 3700x to 5900x nowhere near as much of a difference but still a difference.

In your shoes, I'd upgrade the system now and the graphics card in the new year when there might be better deals due to new 'super' graphics cards being released. You'll still get better graphics performance upgrading board, chip and memory because you'll see more FPS, I did with the 2080. A more powerful system will push the graphics card more, resulting in a moderate uplift in performance.

Just upgrading the card now would mean nicer graphical effects but still frame drops in CPU heavy titles, which MW2 appears to be. Your 1070 can be pushed more, you'd be surprised.

 

[NeilF]

Right... A report back. Now running a new machine with a Ryzen 5 7600 and an NVidia 4070 Super. DMZ is now running at high details smoothly, BUT there still times, even though it's running at a constant 75fps with CPU and GPU hardly taxed, the feedback feels laggy. This seems to particularly be related to when other players/squads are near. So is this just network related lag?

 

[mrk]

When you say feedback lag do you mean you move your mouse and the actual stuff on screen takes a moment to update or does it seem like your movements are realtime but other stuff nearby is taking a moment to update?

 

[NeilF]

When you say feedback lag do you mean you move your mouse and the actual stuff on screen takes a moment to update or does it seem like your movements are realtime but other stuff nearby is taking a moment to update?

Feels like if you're trying to turn using the mouse, it's not smooth, making it quite hard to react/aim. Just had a really bad example when I had a bunch of enemy players nearby. But the frame rate is a constant 75fps.

 

[mrk]

Doesn't sound like network lag then, your movement would be smooth but the stuff appearing on screen would lag if it was network lag. Sounds like frametime pacing could be an issue, are you on VRR or have Vsync on if not on a VRR display?

 

[NeilF]

Doesn't sound like network lag then, your movement would be smooth but the stuff appearing on screen would lag if it was network lag. Sounds like frametime pacing could be an issue, are you on VRR or have Vsync on if not on a VRR display?

Well, it seems to be when other players are around which is odd. And the frame rate is a constant 75fps vsync'd.

EDIT: Even turning off vsync and limiting to 100fps seems to feel the same...

 

[mrk]

Rather strange, if it's only that game then there's clearly something going on. Can you monitor an RTSS overlay for CPU usage vs GPU usage?

 

[NeilF]

Well well well....

In looking around I stumbled upon this - https://cps-check.com/polling-rate-check

Using my old mouse - a beloved microsoft mouse - it was measuring about 120hz. Using a spare Logitech mouse, that measured over 1000+hz.

I'll swear that has improved the smoothness... I'll have to do some more testing though. In one team on team combat, it was the smoothest I've ever experienced!

 

[mrk]

Good catch, yeah 125Hz polling rate mice will give unsmooth results in gaming, I use both a 125Hz (130Hz measured) MX Master 3S and 1000Hz measured Endgame XM2we and the difference is quite staggering. You would assume from the way the camera pans on the MX 3S that there was frametime issues but then you do the same movement with the 1000Hz and it's pure smoothness.

 

[NeilF]

Yeh, using that other (1000hz) mouse has definately smoothed out the game during more frenetic moments... Sheesh!

 

[NeilF]

Final plot twist. It's actually the dedicated mouse port on the KVM that's limiting the mouse down to ~100hz. Using one of the standard USB ports on the KVM gives ~1000hz.