Need more umph! New build or upgrades

[Arthur Hucksake]

Well, it seems to be coming to that time again.

Currently have a 2600K @ 4.5Ghz , 8gb ram and a first gen Titan.

Would upping to 16GB Ram and shoving a 1070 GTX in save me having to totally rebuild or buy again?

I only game at 1080p for streaming purposes.

Cheers

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

I took my 2600K out back and shot it in summer of 2016. It's still acceptable even today but it's getting long in the tooth. IPC doesn't stand up to modern chips. And with Ryzen 8 cores at such succulent and enticing prices... it's hard not to go for it.

I think a 1070 and 16GB of RAM will help, but I wonder if you wouldn't be better off starting over with a Ryzen 8 core.

I'm not sure Ryzen is that cost effective when up against a new set of RAM and GPU.

£450 spend vs new mobo, ram, cpu, gpu etc for a total rebuild.

Would be happy to squeeze 2-3 more years out of the 2600K.

I don't intend to go above 1080p neither. (for streaming purposes)

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

I was in the same boat as you with a 2500k @ 4.5Ghz - although I game at 1440p.

I dropped in a GTX 1070 with 16Gb of memory with the full intention of doing a Ryzen build once the 5s were released. However, I've been so impressed with the performance that i'm going to wait - even at 1440p.

It's totally reinvigorated my rig - Yes, there's a slight CPU bottleneck and the gen 2 PCIe knocks of another 1% - but I can't tell in real world situations. I can play most games on ULTRA without tweaking at 1440p. If you're playing at only 1080p you'll be smiling even more.

You could conceivably squeeze another 2 years out of it - and even if you get the upgrade itch early, the GPU will drop in nicely into your next rig until you upgrade again...

The only thing I will add - is that the Ryzen is proving very capable with streaming (on the same system) - reviews are very favourable. Something to consider if you start to experiencing problems...

Thanks, that's put it into perspective.

What kind of games have you been playing? Are you averaging over 60fps?

Battlegrounds and Escape From Tarkov are the two I am looking at.

Thanks

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

I haven't bothered getting BF1 until doing something about an upgrade. I don't need everything to run at Ultra, just need it to be over 60fps. (120hz screen)

Be good to know how that runs. 1080p with a bit of AA, Very High (or High).

Because i'm on a P67, not sure the memory will run above 1600mhz which is my only worry.

Cheers

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

Well....

I've gone for it.

ASUS STRIX 1070 OC and HyperX 16GB (2x8GB) - HX318C9SRK2/16

Is that ram likely to be ok? The mobo manufacturer site is so out of date it's nigh on impossible to know.

Asus P8P67 Pro board. (Rev B3)

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

OK, BF1, changed to 1080p with FXAA and everything else on and set to ULTRA - averaged about 90/95 FPS - but dipped when the zeppelin blew to 75 briefly but no noticeable stutter/tearing etc...

I don't have Gsync - 60Hz IPS 27" DELL Ultrasharp monitor

That's awesome!! Appreciate that. The 60fps dream is alive!!!!

 

[Arthur Hucksake]

No problem - let me know how you get on. I can't imagine you'll be disappointed - it's a fantastic boost for the money.

If you do run into any install issues - update the BIOS (if you haven't already), this should eliminate any compatibility issues. The latest updates are usually PCIe/ivybridge/memory compatibility related - clicky.

Just checked The Asus site - the latest BIOS, 3602, even has a 'Fixed Nvidia GTX 680 hang when runing with UEFI driver' - so I would perhaps recommend doing the flash in preparation with the system running as is. That way if the system starts acting odd - you know the BIOS may need a reflash/clearing or an erroneous BIOS setting and not the newly installed hardware.

I've got that bios and have been running a Titan without any issues for a long while. (First old Titan....getting a bit slow now)