PC Update Tips

paolocayman · 20 Mar 2025 at 14:33

Hi,
I am considering upgrading my PC, which is currently 4 to 5 years old. Below are its specifications:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (12-core)
Motherboard: ASUS® TUF X570-PLUS GAMING
Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER (6 GB)
RAM: DDR4 Corsair Vengeance RGB PRO (32 GB, 2 x 16 GB, 3200 MHz)
Power Supply: Corsair 650 W

I am planning to upgrade the following components:

Graphics Card: Gigabyte RTX 4060 Ti WindForce OC (16 GB GDDR6X PCI-Express)
RAM: Team Group Vulcan Z T-Force (32 GB, 2 x 16 GB, DDR4 PC4-25600C16, 3200 MHz)

Could you please confirm if this upgrade is compatible with my current hardware?
I intend to use the PC for both rendering images and playing Forza Horizon.
Additionally, do you believe this upgrade represents a good solution without incurring significant costs?

Thank you for your assistance!

Kithran · 20 Mar 2025 at 15:05

Just wondering why you are upgrading the RAM from 32GB 3200 MHz to 32GB 3200MHz - that strikes me as simply staying the same?

nlel1975 · 20 Mar 2025 at 15:07

Kithran said:
Just wondering why you are upgrading the RAM from 32GB 3200 MHz to 32GB 3200MHz - that strikes me as simply staying the same?

I think he's adding an extra 32GB

paolocayman · 20 Mar 2025 at 15:14

Yes, I would like to increase the Ram by an additional 32GB

Tetras · 20 Mar 2025 at 15:59

paolocayman said:
Could you please confirm if this upgrade is compatible with my current hardware?

Yes, though running 4 sticks may mean that XMP/DOCP stops working and you need to do some manual tweaking.

paolocayman said:
Additionally, do you believe this upgrade represents a good solution without incurring significant costs?

If you really need the 16GB of VRAM for your rendering, maybe?

The performance of the 4060 Ti is still poor value for the cost (doubly so now that everything is unavailable/inflated) and nvidia's decision to keep the same bus makes it less effective at higher resolutions than you'd expect.

paolocayman · 20 Mar 2025 at 17:01

Thank you for your answers.
Based on your information, it seems adding one 32GB of Ram would be the best option.
As for the Graphics Card, could you recommend an alternative with 8/12GB VRam that would meet my needs?

Tetras · 20 Mar 2025 at 17:09

paolocayman said:
As for the Graphics Card, could you recommend an alternative with 8/12GB VRam that would meet my needs?

What software do you use for rendering?

What is your max budget?

paolocayman said:
Based on your information, it seems adding one 32GB of Ram would be the best option.

2x32GB is usually safer (for compatibility/not needing manual tuning) than 4x16, especially when you're using mixed sticks. If you're comfortable doing some level of manual tuning, it will probably work.

paolocayman · 20 Mar 2025 at 17:17

Vray Cinema 4d
I would like to stay within £500

Tetras · 20 Mar 2025 at 19:40

paolocayman said:
Vray Cinema 4d
I would like to stay within £500

There's some benchmarks here:

V-Ray: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 Series Performance

The RTX 4070 Ti has now joined the RTX 4080 and 4090, completing NVIDIA’s launch of the initial trio of their GeForce RTX 40 Series of GPUs. How do these cards compare in V-Ray GPU rendering versus the previous generation RTX cards?

www.pugetsystems.com

I think the 3060 12GB would be your baseline purchase. It used to be widely recommended for creators (when current), it would double your VRAM and it offers a mild gaming upgrade (TPU says +44% in their database, from a 1660 Super).

In the launch review of the 4070, Puget benched the 4070 12GB with a 30% higher score in vray than the 4060 Ti (8GB version), which roughly corresponds to the gaming performance.

I'm not sure on the impact of VRAM specifically for vray, Puget say this in one of their articles:

It is worth noting that these tests do not take into account the amount of VRAM available. With GPU rendering, VRAM can become constrained somewhat easily as scenes become larger and more detailed. This can lead to “out of memory” errors or defaulting back to CPU rendering and losing out on the speed advantages that GPUs provide. Also, note that NVLink is not offered on any of these GPUs, so pooling the VRAM of two GPUs is no longer an option.

In the circumstances, I am confident to recommend the 3060 12GB, but it is harder (without understanding the implications on usage) to choose between the 4070/4070 Super and 4060 Ti 16GB.

Jupiter · 20 Mar 2025 at 22:45

Tetras said:
There's some benchmarks here:

V-Ray: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40 Series Performance

The RTX 4070 Ti has now joined the RTX 4080 and 4090, completing NVIDIA’s launch of the initial trio of their GeForce RTX 40 Series of GPUs. How do these cards compare in V-Ray GPU rendering versus the previous generation RTX cards?

www.pugetsystems.com

I think the 3060 12GB would be your baseline purchase. It used to be widely recommended for creators (when current), it would double your VRAM and it offers a mild gaming upgrade (TPU says +44% in their database, from a 1660 Super).

In the launch review of the 4070, Puget benched the 4070 12GB with a 30% higher score in vray than the 4060 Ti (8GB version), which roughly corresponds to the gaming performance.

I'm not sure on the impact of VRAM specifically for vray, Puget say this in one of their articles:

In the circumstances, I am confident to recommend the 3060 12GB, but it is harder (without understanding the implications on usage) to choose between the 4070/4070 Super and 4060 Ti 16GB.

Future me says go for the 4070 Super...

paolocayman · 21 Mar 2025 at 06:59

Your answers were helpful! Thank you very much