Monitor and GPU upgrade advice

Sanjiv

Sanjiv

Sanjiv

Associate
Joined
10 Feb 2018
Posts
226
Hi All,

The dreaded upgrade itch has struck and I'm in a quandry as to what to do as I want to upgrade my monitor and GPU.
My current spec is:
GPU: Gigabyte 2080 Super Windforce OC 8Gb
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X running at 4.2GHz
Mem: 2x16Gb Corsair Vengance DDR4 PC4-28800 (3600) CAS18
Mbd: Gigabyte x570 Aorus Elite
Mon: Dell ultrawide U3818DW at 3840x1600@75Hz (native is 60Hz but I've got it OCed)
SSD: Samsung 970Evo 1Tb PCIe Gen. 3x4 NVME (also have 2 Sata SSDs: 850Pro and 840Pro)

I primarily game (fps such as far cry 6) and do some dev as well.
The monitor has been great as it has a built-in KVM and the USB-C allows me to connect my work laptop with no fuss, but gaming wise it's not so great.
I love the ultrawide format and want to replace it with something of the same size and ideally with the same set of features, but can't find anything that will match all of those wants.
If I have to lose the USB-C and KVM I'm not that bothered as my current contract is coming to an end and the laptop is going.

What should I replace it with?
To go with the new monitor what GPU should I go for where I won't be CPU bottle necked (or should I also be looking to upgrade the CPU as well?)?
I do also have a HTC Vive 1st generation that get's used once in a while so would ideally like to see an improvement there too.

I ran time spy (via the 3dmark demo) and got back a score of 11345 (graphics score of 11471 and a CPU score of 10685) which is ok, but since the average is 11656 and the best is 13519 for the 2080 Super according to 3dmark I want to do better.

Moneywise I'm open to whatever is best as I want to game at this near 4K res, but don't really want to go and do a complete re-build.
The 2080 Super will get donated to one of the kids PCs and the monitor will get sold on (probably).
I have looked at 49 inch screens but think that they will not be so great for work so have discounted them really even though I do have the space.

Thanks for reading.
 
dfour said:
At that resolution you will be relying on the gpu over the cpu so a 3080/ti/3090 would be a great upgrade to your rig.

You can always slot in a 5900x to gain a bit more cpu firepower if you want.
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Thanks, I was wondering about going to the 5900x or 5800x3D and maxing out the AM4. On the 3090 front I'm annoyed that the prices have gone upwards at present so will wait to see what happens on the 13th of Dec with the AMD release.
 
Haz123 said:
@Sanjiv When you make a decision and get a new monitor then pls give your feedback on how good the new one is pls. I am in very similar situation to you and love the Ultrawide format but there is no perfect monitor available so always have to compromise on something.

You would notice a difference going to Ryzen 3 5000 series when gaming , significant single threaded performance gains over Ryzen 3900x. If you keep eye out for a decent deal on 5900x or 5950x you may get lucky , black friday is coming up after all. You are gaming at high res so any gains would be minimal because the gpu will be the bottleneck in the vast majority of games.

GPU- If you can get a 3080ti/3090 at a sensible price then they are very good high res cards or wait till Dec 13th and try and bag a 7900xtx/xt, they are looking very good as long as Raytracing is not a priority. If you win the lottery then the 4090 is a great card but does have downsides with power requirements and the cable. I cannot see the upcoming 4080 16gb being that great but I may be surprised so keep eyes on benchmarks when it is released.

I was hoping the new releases would simplify the situation but it just seems to be getting more complicated and nuanced with each release.
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I'll definitely keep an eye out on Black Friday for a new CPU. Waiting for the performance reports for the 7900xtx before biting. The 4090 is in reach for me, but I don't really want to bite at the price it's at and with the cable situation at the moment.
Monitor wise I totally agree with you in that I will have to compromise. I wish there was an OLED 38inch UW that was 120hz or more at near 4k res. I'm tempted by the dell 34inch that's out, as the dell I have has been great and when I did have an issue with it Dell were really good at sorting stuff out. But, I'm not sure about dropping down in size.
 
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Craig_d1 said:
Went back and looked at the presentation again..the sammy he mentioned was the ultrawide 8k neo G9..so not quite 1440p :cry: . Behind on screen though, has Dell, Sammy, Asus, LG and Acer all launching high refresh monitors with DP2.1 early 2023 so expect to see them all announced CES in Jan. Hopefully some of them will be smart enough to do a 1440p ultrawide variant..or 4k actually....usinng 4k 43" at work now...60Hz though but still...amazing how quickly you adapt to bigger screen and don't want to go back...same with TV's i guess
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I'm not convinced I'd be able to see the difference with an 8k display really. If I go the AMD route I'll definitely wait for the new DP2.1 ultrawides. Hopefully we will see 38" UW with near 4K in the new year. In the meantime I'll get the CPU and GPU upgrade. Did consider the 49" UW but I think the letterbox view would get to me when trying to Dev on it. Would be great for gaming but I mainly play FPS games so not sure if that would be a good way to go.
 
Fun video which proves to me that we don't need 8K at all. I really want a 4090 now though as that is a monster card!!!:D
 
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CPU upgrade wise this has given me more food for thought: 3900x vs 5900x
Not sure what to do as I do game at near 4K and I'm not going to drop from that with whatever upgrade I do.
 
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mickyflinn said:
4k gaming is mainly gpu bound so not reallly worth the cost going to a 5900x but you will gain pcie4 support which mite give you a little performance boost at 4k.

5800x3d mite be better choice if primarily gzming.
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I'm seeing the GPU bound aspect right now whilst playing Far cry 6, CPU is sat at about 20-30% utilisation whilst the GPU is maxed out and that's with a lot of settings on low. FPS is sat at about 60.
 
So I've stopped procrastinating and ordered a 5800X3D and will wait for the 13th of December for the reviews for the new AMD 7900XTX.
Still can't find a UW 38inch replacement for my Dell U3818DW, so will probably have to wait for next year's batch of OLED loveliness to arrive and hopefully take advantage of the 7900's display port 2.1 support.
 
Got the 5800x3D ready to upgrade my system, came with a free tube of mx4 so I'll give that a go on the weekend.
Now got an extra quandary, in that I could use the existing AMD Ryzen 9 3900X CPU and upgrade my son's ageing pc which has DDR4 memory, a intel core i7-4790K on a Gigabyte z370 Aorus Ultra Gaming wifi mbd, but what am4 board to go for that has wifi and isn't silly expensive?
 
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dfour said:
With no idea of a budget

My basket at OcUK:

Total: £159.95 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

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My basket at OcUK:

Total: £129.95 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

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Both Can be had instock in places for not much more than OC sell it for.
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Thank you that gigabyte atx one looks perfect. I was wondering whether to go for a B550 or a x570, but this looks perfect.
 
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So I've replaced my AMD Ryzen 9 3900X and installed the 5800X3D and re-run timespy (v1.2) and the score has gone down.
It's gone from:
11345 overall, made up of gpu score of 11471 and cpu score of 10685, cpu test 35.90 FPS
to:
11078 overall, made up of gpu score of 11571 and cpu score of 8927, cpu test 29.99 FPS

What have I done wrong?
 
Decided to build an AMD micro-atx build instead so that my son can take it to Uni with him after Christmas (started another thread about the case and mbd choice, hope that's ok)
The 5800x3D is working out great by the way.:)
 
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