Time to upgrade my machine

Hi All,

It's time to look at upgrading my gaming machine, in particular the CPU, mobo, and RAM. Full spec in sig.

I already have a spare 250GB Samsung EVO 850 (used to be my DCS drive before upgrade to 860 1TB) and happy to use that for new Win 10 OS drive. Don't see the need right now for the extra cost of an M2. Maybe later.

I'm going to base the build around i7-9700K so looking for suggestions please for cooler, Z390 mobo, and 32GB RAM solutions.

Cheers,

R

I am thinking the same Ratfink, here is the mobo I probably will end up with Aorus Z390 AORUS ULTRA. and the memory, Corsair 163301 Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4 3200 MHz C16 XMP 2.0. The memory drops to around £120 every now and again on Amazon.

I just cant pull the trigger though, a 9700k with no H/T. I see from benchmarks it is within touching distance of the 9900K but so is the i5 9600k for £190, now that is a big saving from £450 for the 9900k. The i7 10700k is due out in a few months but looks like it will use more power 135w as against 95w. So maybe the 8700k 6 core 12 threads, still a great cpu but similar price as a 9700k 8 core 8 threads which is newer.

10700k could be around the £330 mark but I would need a new psu and maybe a new AIO unless they bring out a bracket.

I will probably wait a few more months until comet lake is out and see what the prices are then.

Thanks Bearskin, that's some really great info!

Does lack of H/T in 9700K matter to DCS, or other games like PUBG?

Intel 9th gen only makes sense if you plan to heavily overclock it. If you don't, a 3700X or better will perform better out of the box, speaking out of the box, doing so with the included cooler.

Not really, H/T is more for work, like video editing, photo editing, stuff with multi tasking, but I recall last week seeing a game coming out which under recommended specs mentioned hyper threading. A lot of people turn off H/T in the bios and swear it makes games quicker, gives them more FPS, but I have always left H/T enabled on my 3770k which I am sure you have too.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-163301-Vengeance-Performance-Desktop/dp/B016ORTNI2/ref=pd_ybh_a_3?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=QRX164J89S6WNM994DRY

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07HRVGDY3/ref=twister_B07Z847T4Q?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

From what I have read, the Aorus boards seem to have the best VRM out of the Z390 boards, but the BIOS is not the easiest. I hate to swap from the ROG boards (first one I had was the Rampage Formula) but the maximus Xl formula is too much, I only paid £200 for my MVF so I cant pay £380 for the MXlF.

I want to hopefully future proof myself for another 8 years so I cant see myself buying a CPU with no H/T.

Edit

Even this board, https://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/gigabyte_z390_aorus_pro_review,19.html, thermals seem great on this as there looks to be no difference even when overclocked. £70 cheaper too

Yes, any Bios seems strange when you are used to Asus Bios, that is true.

I put a rig together with a Gigabyte Aorus Ultra last week and it was not too difficult or too different from what you expect. It was a Ryzen system btw.

The manual from Gigabyte is a lot smaller than Asus too, but down the line, it performs like a charm and Asus ...I am fed up with Asus lately. Take the plunge and try another brand and we didnt regret it.

I would not consider a non-HT chip as a long term investment either, things change a lot over the years and if you plan for 3-5 years usage, think twice.

In that time, DCS will likely show up with Vulkan and HT/SMT might be of real value then, so do maybe other games and software as well.

Given the price for a 9700k, I would always consider a 3800x as my primary choice, 8/16 and 32MB Cache + PCIe v4. Intel lacks far behind

Does lack of H/T in 9700K matter to DCS, or other games like PUBG?

Nope, I keep HT off for my overclocked DCS/gaming profiles. I only turn it on when I am messing around in Blender. I have more headroom for OC without it. For older CPUs with less cores it's usually better just to keep it on, but you have to test it yourself to see. Neither the 9600K or 9700K have HT and are made for gaming. You can also OC 1-2 cores higher than 5.0 GHz for gaming, it will use less voltage and put out less heat than OCing all 8 cores.

With the DCS TrackIR use case you hit the 60 fps ceiling but if you are playing PUBG or other first person shooters at 1080p a fast CPU can get you more frames. Less so as you get into higher resolutions, then you are GPU limited. They make 240 Hz and soon 360 Hz monitors at 1080p for FPS games because they are so popular and competitive online.

I was able to get 120 fps on my rig at 1080p when flying DCS single player at high altitude but as soon as you fly low and/or have wingmen next to you the FPS drops and you can't maintain 120 fps at high preset. I didn't even bother checking online.

When you look at the absolute numbers on benchmarks you'll see that in some games there's not that much difference that would be perceivable to your eye so the limiting factor is more your budget. A good overclocking motherboard is the EVGA Z390 Dark but it costs $500. If you aren't planning on doing an SLI build you can save money by buying a Mini-ITX motherboard. Asus, Asrock, Gigabyte, etc. all make good ones for Intel and AMD and the money you save can be put toward a better GPU and faster RAM. Ultimately, for motherboards as long as you are buying from a reputable manufacturer that has a good VRM for OCing just buy whatever you think looks cool in your case.

Here's some good benchmark sources for games besides DCS. They tend to focus on 1080p, that's where CPU makes the most difference with framerates. You'll see that a 9700K matches or beats the 9900K in a lot of games. The AMD 3900X did beat the 9900K in CS:GO and Rainbow 6 but it costs a $100 more than a 9700K.

https://www.pcgamer.com/best-cpu-for-gaming/

https://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/3489-amd-ryzen-5-3600-cpu-review-benchmarks-vs-intel

I would agree if you don't want to build another computer for 5 years that you might consider a chip with HT, but I've never had a problem selling my stuff to upgrade. When you can sell your used stuff it's a lot easier to justify upgrading every couple years. The new Playstation and Xbox consoles are rumored to have multi-threaded chips but it will still be a while before games use hardware multi-threading. By the time games are common that use it we'll have another 2-3 generations of CPU performance to choose from. Both BigNewy and Nineline have said that the Vulkan API build isn't coming anytime soon.

Bitmaster, true the AMD cpu's are definitely the choice at the moment for price to performance, I just can't bring myself to swap to team red. Its like growing up in Australia, you were either Holden or Ford, I always had Holden's. GFX cards, AMD or Nvidia, always had Nvidia apart from a ATI HD4870 which I mentioned in another post, the only part that has ever failed on me out of maybe 25 years of building computers, pepsi or coke, allways drank coke, the full fat stuff too, none of this diet stuff.

So at the moment I am stuck, as the i7 9900k is too expensive, the i7 9700k and i5 9600k haven't got H/T and the 8700k is soon to be 2 generations old, the comet lake I will probably need to spend another few hundred pounds on top to get a new PSU and a new AIO. On the other hand the 9900k might drop to £350 when comet lake comes out, and the only thing comet lake has is a new iGPU which I wont utilise anyway. So its a waiting game to see what the 10*** series comet lake brings to the table and how that effects the 9*** series pricing.

Sorry if I have made you as undecided as I am Ratfink, but hopefully I have given you some food for thought. TBH I will probably end up getting the above mentioned mobo and memory, and also a 9900K, but hey its only money.

Bearskin, I respect your choices, no question. I just wanted to outline options.

I wouldnt hold my breath that 10th gen will impact the market and thus force a price drop.

They do have a TDP issue (*380watt real life consumption stock clocks for the highest models ) and if that doesnt get solved soon, I fear the 9900k will remain the top dog CPU for gamers that do not want to change to AMD for said reasons.

A 380w power draw wouldn't be out of line for a 10 core CPU that's overclocked and/or under stress tests. The 9900K can easily draw 30w+ a core. I've seen other overclockers get 50w+ on single core benchmarks when heavily overclocked. I've read the same rumors but they are just rumors that have not been verified.

https://videocardz.com/newz/intels-10-core-comet-lake-s-cpus-could-draw-up-to-300w

An Intel employee would be breaking their NDA and would get fired and/or sued if they gave out that info without permission. AMD wouldn't hire them either and their career would be over.

Now is a 300w+ CPU efficient? Probably not, but getting powerful processors to draw less power is a difficult design challenge for EEs. If you can design more efficient CPUs that match or beat current performance you can get a job at Intel or AMD and make a lot of money.

The TDP is a design guideline for coolers. It's not really indicative of what the CPU can actually draw under max loads. The 9900K has a TDP of 95w and the KS 127w due to the stock clock. They both can draw a lot more than that.

Noctua makes the best air coolers and there's several good options for AIOs and custom loops. But it's a lot more $ for just a little bit more performance so diminishing returns definitely applies. Overclockers are more into racing their computers on synthetic benchmarks for bragging rights. Not really practical for gaming without an expensive custom loop or an even more expensive chiller that also draws a lot of current.

If you can design more efficient CPUs that match or beat current performance you can get a job at Intel or AMD and make a lot of money.

How about an event-based reconfigurable multicore neural-network processor.

Bit off topic....lol

At first I thought that was a reference to Cyberdyne Systems from the Terminator movies. :)

They make it look so simple from those diagrams. Pffft...I can draw one of those out on a Powerpoint slide, no problem. I should be an Electrical Engineer. :smartass:

If you are into this sort of thing, Der8uer made a cool little series where he took a 9900K to U of Berlin and scanned it with different electron microscopes.

At first I thought that was a reference to Cyberdyne Systems from the Terminator movies. :)

 

They make it look so simple from those diagrams. Pffft...I can draw one of those out on a Powerpoint slide, no problem. I should be an Electrical Engineer. :smartass:

 

Except it is a working model using the computer pci slots and they have software too. Not just a nice diagram.:book:

16 channels of video simultaneously, with an effective throughput of over 600 frames per second.

The low-power characteristics of BrainChip's spiking neural technology results in a power-sipping 15 watts total consumption. This results in a lower total cost of ownership compared to using additional servers.

I wasn't trying to imply that it wasn't a working semiconductor just making a joke about how the diagrams are simplified.

I find microprocessor design fascinating but have pretty much reached the limit of my understanding without going back to school to take EE classes.

I should be an Electrical Engineer. :smartass:

HeHe, I really need to watch that movie again. I forgot John Goodman was in it as the football coach. The guy who played Ogre passed away a little while ago IIRC.

"Eat a pie for charity" ;)

Sorry if I have made you as undecided as I am Ratfink, but hopefully I have given you some food for thought. TBH I will probably end up getting the above mentioned mobo and memory, and also a 9900K, but hey its only money.

Lol, no need to apologise! I appreciate the suggestions and advice :thumbup:

Every few years I go through this process, and spend months being undecided! This forum really helps, and I'm very grateful to everyone for their thoughts.

I watched this video yesterday, thought it was interesting. Hadn't really considered AMD having not had one since Athlon 2100+ days...

Ratfink, I have got a mate who is also in the running for an upgrade, he has a i5 4670k and a maximus Vll hero board. I have been through all the pros and cons with him , like how the 9600k and 9700k have a lot higher usage, and temps, they have even more than the 8700k. So H/T is a big deal, imo anyway. So after giving my mate all the pros and cons he nearly switched to AMD, but I pulled him back from the brink and he is pulling the trigger on a i9 9900k and a Aorus Master Mobo next week .

I was the same as you, upgrading every 18 to 24 months, but everything seems to have stagnated for the last 6-7 years, as though the ceiling has been reached but now they are just making the ceiling bigger and not higher. Now VR is here and 8k monitors something needs to change pretty quick.

Bearskin, I'll likely stay Intel, and I'm liking the idea of the Aorus Pro board. I'm not very into pushing for max performance, not at first anyhow, and not into RGB LEDs and all that. Was looking at Asus Prime Z390-A but the Aorus does seem the better board for cooling at they are around the same price.

I did see a bundle deal based on Prime Z390-A and 9700K on Aria that caught my eye...maybe add another 2x 8GB to it?

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/Other+products/ASUS+PRIME+Z390-A+%2B+Intel+i7+9700K+%2B+16GB+Corsair+Vengeance+White+3000MHz+?productId=70900

I get the HT thing, and if there was a good deal on i7-8700K I would go for it, but they seem to be pretty much the same price as the 9700K which is a shame. I guess I could look at eBay etc.

I would definitely go for 32 gig of RAM as the consensus on this forum says 32 is a must for online gameplay on DCS, the price of the 9700k looks good on the site you linked, as direct from Amazon it is £370 (I am not keen on buying from third party sellers)

With the memory 2 things to look out for is speed and the timings, I have 1600 DDR3, I over clocked it once to 1866 like yours, but my timings @ 1600 are 9,9,9,24, and to clock it to 1866 I had to change the timings to 10,9,10,27. So with slower timings, it was really defeating the purpose of over clocking. So faster speed and lower timings are better, but I can't see there being much difference when playing games.

Hey thanks for posting this! I've never watched this guy's videos before. The Youtube algorithm has been failing me. I surprised this guy hasn't popped up in my feed with almost 500,000 subscribers. I like they way he benchmarks with the 4 way split screen. Much more edifying than just looking at graphs. He makes good points about future proofing, costs, real world usage, etc. Very sound rationale for specific uses cases.

Can't really go wrong with the 9700K especially if you get a good deal on it. Something to keep in mind, logical cores ≠ physical cores. Even in a heavily multi-threaded application that properly utilizes Hyperthreading you won't get a 100% bump in performance from a 9700K to a 9900K. It's more like 20-30% even under ideal circumstances. 8 fast cores that you can overclock will keep you happy for a while for gaming. DCS only needs 3.

What the guy said in your video is true about games using more cores and multithreading over time but it's going to be a while before games are bottlenecked by 8 fast cores. You'll have a couple more generations of processors by then that will smoke a 9900K and cost a lot less. "Future proofing" has diminishing returns in cost when tech moves so fast.

Just over 10 years ago I built myself what was at the time a fairly high spec machine, i7 965, 8GB RAM 2x 2TB HDD in RAID and from before that I had an Athlon 64 which I had for 6 years or so. I'm hoping I get as good a run out of this new PC as I have had before.

Going from the i7 965 24GB RAM GTX760 to the i9 9900k 64GB RAM RTX2080Super has been a huge step up in performance, I know that my PC is a bit of over kill in terms of gaming but for video editing and photoshop work it's like night and day compared with what I had before.

I do some work in converting old home videos, VHS, VHSc, SVHS, 8mm, Hi8, D8, DV to DVD and/or Bluray and also digitising photographic slides either as images or as videos. As the software got more powerful so my old PC got slower. Before I retired part of my work was to make corporate sales videos tailored to the particular customer's needs/wants.

Ratfink, have a look at the 9700KF same as the 9700K but with no iGPU, might save yourself 20 quid.

Ratfink, have a look at the 9700KF same as the 9700K but with no iGPU, might save yourself 20 quid.

Thanks for the tip, but seems not. Strange.

https://pricespy.co.uk/computers-accessories/computer-components/cpus/intel-core-i7-9700kf-3.6ghz-socket-1151-2-box-without-cooler--p5026136

https://pricespy.co.uk/computers-accessories/computer-components/cpus/intel-core-i7-9700k-3.6ghz-socket-1151-2-box-without-cooler--p4921332

BTW, would my H60 cooler do with a 9700K to start with, running stock? I won't be OC'ing straight away, no need considering where I'm starting from. Maybe in a couple of years, then upgrade it. Could save me 60 odd quid