GPU or CPU?

as I'm about to upgrade... again... would like to know

what will have a better effect on DCS world - frame rate wise - a stronger RAMier GPU or a beefier CPU?

thanx SB11

I offer you to buy new GPU...much better.

I've a GTX-970 too .. I would replace that item first. Its more cost effective, as replacing your CPU would require also a RAM and motherboard replacement, so it can be quite expensive.

I'm planning to replace my GTX-970 with a RTX-2060, as it's faster than a 1070ti at a lower price.

Yep. 2060 or higher.

Was thinking about the 2070 but I would be bummed

If It turns out that DCS is mainly CPU dipendent..

SB11

GPU or CPU?

I would also try over clocking your cpu into the 4Ghz range. I just upgraded my video card and while I get better details and less stuttering my frame rates didn’t change too much from before. Just more consistent.

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I3570K @ 4.5Ghz, 16Gb DDR3 @ 1600, Vega64 @1080p

I would sattle for a consistent 30 fps in 3D crouded ereas like cerrier deck or furballs. Right now I get sttttuttters in these cases...

SB11

Getting a new GPU will help, but keep in mind, DCS is very CPU dependent. So you will only get so much out of that GPU before you CPU becomes the bottle neck, and your GPU is waiting on your older CPU to feed it.

I don't get the impression that DCS is GPU hungry, pretty basic graphics. I would go for a strong CPU, with emphasis on single core power.

Hmmm... thats an interesting take on the subject. A new CPU will cost me a new MOBO and RAM as well...:( thats a big load to take... :(

SB11

Was thinking about the 2070 but I would be bummed If It turns out that DCS is mainly CPU dipendent..

SB11

You can do a simple test to see if you are CPU bound or not:

Lower your graphics settings ... if your average fps dont increase then yes, you are CPU-bound ... if the fps increase noticeably, then you are GPU-bound.

:)

Hmmm... thats an interesting take on the subject. A new CPU will cost me a new MOBO and RAM as well...:( thats a big load to take... :(

SB11

If it helps, with my i5 3570k clocked at 4.5 ghz and a Vega 64 I’m getting 40-70 FPS multiplayer and much higher single player. Over locking your i5 2500 should be a simple matter of 2 changes in your bios and I'm sure you could easily get to 4.2Ghz on air cooling. In my bios i simply changed the cpu multiplier to 45 and voila-4.5 ghz. If you only have a stock cooler I would start a bit lower and watch the temperatures, and slowly increase until you either hit the cpu wall or you feel uncomfortable with the temperatures. I've had mine overclocked since new (5 years) with no issues

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I3570K @ 4.5Ghz, 16Gb DDR3 @ 1600, Vega64 @1080p

The 3570 has a turbo frequency of 3.8 GHz, so an overclock of 4.5 GHz is only an 18% increase in performance ... nice, but I'm not sure if it's worth the increased failure risk or the expense of purchasing a better cooler.

Beefier GPU for DCS all the way, and possibly look into a new monitor (144/2k) if your still running 1080p/60fps

Always do 'profile guided optimizations'. That is, use a profiling tool to look at your system's performance.

For CPU profiling you can simply use the Task Manager built into modern versions of Windows, eg. Windows 10. Watch the CPU load.

For GPU profiling you can use the free tool GPU-Z

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

If your current graphics settings have the GPU running at 100% utilization you either must decrease your graphics settings or increase your GPU power.

If your current settings have the CPU core running DCS running 100% then you must either decrease your settings (eg. draw distance etc) or get a new CPU.

Eagle Dynamics has done a lot of work to offload what it can to other CPU cores (eg sound) but essentially DCS is still single threaded. That means it is better to have fewer but faster cores than many slower cores, at least for DCS purposes. Making DCS truly multithreaded would take a huge amount of effort so don't hold your breath for that (I wrote an unreleased flight simulator in Java that was multithreaded and getting it right was tricky - but worth it, but you have to start the architecture as multithreaded, adding it later would be very hard).

Given more resources you would always get a new CPU and GPU. In the real world resources are limited so you have to chose which to replace. Profile your system and see which of your CPU and GPU is being stressed the most. CPUs single core performance increases very slowly these days (increases in performance comes from using more cores on multithreaded problems). So generally it is best to upgrade your GPU for better DCS experiences.

The 3570 has a turbo frequency of 3.8 GHz, so an overclock of 4.5 GHz is only an 18% increase in performance ... nice, but I'm not sure if it's worth the increased failure risk or the expense of purchasing a better cooler.

Mine ran at 3.4GHz when I last checked with DCS up, constantly. Just boosting up in regular Windows activities. So going up o 4.5 is lots. Just did the same, well, almost. Ramped mine up to 4.4. FPS are almost doubled by this on a 1080

Of course this also depends on the cooler installed. I had a big and very efficient custom one installed from the beginning, so I didn't have to care about that anymore. But anyway I'm totally impressed that I could just up this thing by a whole GHz without any issues...

Back in the time, I had one of those:

Well, actually, I still have that rig... that CPU was one hell of a monster for OCing. The best you could get. Could only ramp up mine from 1833 (=2500+ rating) to 2083 (=2800+ rating), while they usually were capable of running 2.4GHz or even more in extreme cases.

Getting a new graphics card first and trying to up the CPU a bit definately is not a wrong step to take here

i would not go for 2070 its too powerfull for 2600 i7 i would go for something 1660ti range/ rtx2060

If you need to upgrade today and can't wait then I'd say go with a 1080ti over the 2070, the difference in performance is almost negligible but the 1080ti has 11GB of memory vs the 2070's 8GB. That extra memory may not seem like much but it is going to future proof your system much more than some RT cores that you'll likely never use, especially with a simulation like DCS that can really put all that memory to good use. Either way you're going to eventually have to upgrade you're CPU/MOBO, any modern GPU you put in that system will likely be bottlenecked by the CPU. As of now though I'd say your GPU is probably what's holding you back, I'd say good strategy for future proofing a system is more memory on the GPU and more cores on the CPU, all things being equal a system that has a CPU with more cores and a GPU with more memory will theoretically age better than a system that has less.. which is why a lot of old AMD CPU's are handling modern games pretty well now that developers are finally starting to really go for multithreaded performance.

TL/DR: Buy a 1080ti for the extra memory with plans to buy a newer CPU in the future

the Ti is super expensive... double the price of a 2070! I guess it's because of the extra mem. Plus it's out of stock at Best Buy and target... :)

I was wondering about what some people said here about the 2070 being too powerful for my CPU what does it mean?

SB11

Well, if you intent to stay on a 24" 1920x1080 screen, get the 2060 GPU.

Do you have a decent CPU Cooler on that 2600K? That thing should Turbo up to 3.8GHz, so you can push it with a sufficient cooler above 4.0GHz with ease. Replace the thermal compound as well.

DDR3 shouldnt be to expensive. An Upgrade to 32GB will help as well. (more room for preloading, less stutters)

Any SSD in that System? Just smoothens the experience.

Btw, whats your budget?

Well, if you intent to stay on a 24" 1920x1080 screen, get the 2060 GPU.

 

Do you have a decent CPU Cooler on that 2600K? That thing should Turbo up to 3.8GHz, so you can push it with a sufficient cooler above 4.0GHz with ease. Replace the thermal compound as well.

 

DDR3 shouldnt be to expensive. An Upgrade to 32GB will help as well. (more room for preloading, less stutters)

Any SSD in that System? Just smoothens the experience.

 

Btw, whats your budget?

1.Yes, planning to stick to my 24" for now

2. have had bad experience with OC (burned my older CPU) so I prefer staying with the stock clock speed.

3. Upping my RAM to 32GB will require a newer MOBO

4. DCS is running on an SSD HD

BTW as long as we are on the subject - what will be a descent CPU without stretching my budget too much? I have about $US 1000 for GPU+CPU combined. (MOBO AND RAM are on a different budget :))

SB11

Sorry, seemed for some reason like you had a smaller budget.

Get a 2070 and a 9700k. About 950$

The 9700k will boost up to 4.8GHz... Get a good cooler.

That's OK :) no need to be sorry...

And what will be a descent MOBO for these two bad boys?

SB11

Basicly any Z370 or Z390 board from a known manufacturer (MSI/ASUS/Gigabyte etc).

Depends on the goodies you want... RGB, Wifi

I would go for a board with two M.2 slots.

150 - 250$.

Since you are not planning on dooing manually OC you can go for the cheaper boards anyway.