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So the higher the resolution you game the less your CPU becomes a bottleneck?

Helen Barber

Helen Barber

Helen Barber

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9 Aug 2020
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492
I have 2700k @5ghz. I want to buy a 6900XT

I only play games like age of empires , Total war and like to stream games to my mobile phone.

I game at 4k

Do I really need to upgrade everything?

I currently have 8GB Ram and considering just upgrading to 16gb

Your thoughts ? :)
 
That is true yes, but there still becomes a point where an old/poor CPU will bottleneck at 4k especially with a high end GPU. It's not the peak/average frame rates that are impacted the most though, it's the drops in frame rates which can cause stutters.

I think 16GB RAM is a must these days. I don't run a single PC, laptop or server with anything less now.
 
Work out your CPU utilisation with your current GPU, then calculate the prospective CPU utilisation by increasing it by the same ratio that a 6900xt is better than your current GPU.

So, say you're currently at 80% cpu usage and the 6900xt is 50% better at that game in 4k than your current GPU, your CPU will be trying to push to 120%, meaning a bottleneck of 20%. I don't know how those games load a system so it's hard to tell know off the top of my head.
 
No, not resolution directly. It's the framerate which matters. The higher the framerate, the more work the CPU has to do to calculate all the geometry etc to feed to the GPU for rendering.

Of course the higher the resolution, the lower the framerate, all other things being equal, so there is a correlation. It's just worth remembering that lowering the frame rate will reduce the CPU dependence/bottleneck, which can also be done by raising graphics settings, not just resolution.
 
You received a lot of advice about this in your last thread, the 6900xt is going to be even worse than the 3080 would be. Don't forget, it isn't just about average and max FPS, you will experience much less pronounced minimum FPS dips with a newer CPU. Honestly at the point where you're considering a £1000 GPU you really should start balancing your system out.
 
Correct. Although if you play on aged games you shouldnt need bleeding edge hardware. The only time you can drag this out is your planning to save up and get the rest of the upgrade i.e. get a 3080/6800XT now, then in a years time get a 5000 ryzen/mobo/ram.
 
FWIW I had a 2600K at 4Ghz earlier this year, with a 1080Ti driving ultrawide at 3440x1440. I upgraded to a 10700K and the difference was staggering, far more than I ever expected.

I knew it would help in some titles but didn't realise just how CPU limited I was.
 
It's not the resolution that's the defining factor, it's the FPS... And it rarely gets mentioned in these conversations for some strange reason.

Your CPU will perform similarly at 1080p@60Hz than it will at 4k@60Hz
 
Helen Barber said:
I have 2700k @5ghz. I want to buy a 6900XT

I only play games like age of empires , Total war and like to stream games to my mobile phone.

I game at 4k

Do I really need to upgrade everything?

I currently have 8GB Ram and considering just upgrading to 16gb

Your thoughts ? :)
Click to expand...
you would be better off buying a 6800XT and anything Intel from 5000+ & AMD 3000 series+

even 5000 series from intel & AMD 3000+ would reduce your bottleneck and balance your system soo much better

i game at 4k (currently on a 1080TI soon to be 3090) but have a 2950X to put along aside it
 
Also averages aren't everything - some older systems will still post good averages versus a modern CPU but the minimums won't hold up so well with noticeable stutter at times, etc.
 
Helen Barber said:
So the higher the resolution you game the less your CPU becomes a bottleneck?
Click to expand...

Sort of.

More generally speaking if you take any specific game, it requires a certain number of CPU cycles to generate the next game engine tick (this is kinda like the internal "frame rate" of the engine). And it also takes a certain number of GPU cycles to actually render and draw the new frames to the screen. You can alter the amount of work the GPU has to do by changing the visual settings, as you make things more pretty it demands more from the GPU and the bottleneck tends to tip towards the GPU since its burdened with more work. Screen resolution is just 1 such video setting that does this, but basically they all do the same thing.

The trick people normally use to see what frame rates they'd get if they were CPU bottlenecked is to put the game into the lowest possible visual settings you can, like 800x600 resolution and everything low/off and see what your frame rate is, that's basically your tipping point of CPU/GPU bound. This is what is done when benchmarking CPUs against each other with games to rule out GPU bottlenecks.

I'd suggest you check CPU limitation in your fave games, the 2700k was a very good CPU especially overclocked (I still own mine) but it's quite old now so likely to be the bottleneck in many modern games, but that's something you can test in like 10-15 mins of testing so just do that, nothing like a good real world test!
 
Helen Barber said:
I have 2700k @5ghz. I want to buy a 6900XT

I only play games like age of empires , Total war and like to stream games to my mobile phone.

I game at 4k

Do I really need to upgrade everything?

I currently have 8GB Ram and considering just upgrading to 16gb

Your thoughts ? :)
Click to expand...
here is your answer .. you still need a good cpu to run 4k with 3080 or equivalent ..
 
You will be INFINITELY better off with getting a lower GPU and upgrading your CPU & RAM for those games & usage, than simply getting a 6900 XT.
 
Ultimately it depends what fps you are looking to achieve, if your current CPU cannot do 60 fps at 1080p then obviously it wont do 60 at 4K. My old CPU can do 60 fps in most games but runs into some issues with minimums in a few occasions. When I finally get a 6800XT or 3080 equivalent I'm sure it would expose even more CPU limitations on my 144Hz screen but I will be grabbing a new Zen3 chip too :)
 
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