i7 4790k - cpu or display upgrade ?

[gepowr]

I'm kind of curious which cpu upgrade would make sense in my situation. I'm playing at 1080p 144Hz and while that works awesome for lighter games like csgo, overwatch etc. it's getting hard to achieve those 120+ fps in newer triple A titles. Depending on the game and the action going on the i7 4790k doesn't seem to be able to keep up with the GTX 1080. Don't get me wrong, i still love this cpu and it performs great most of the time.

Upgrade wise the options are kind of limited in my opionion. I was looking at the Ryzen 2700x for example, but the only purpose of my gaming rig is gaming and after watching some gaming benchmarks on youtube i realised that, depending on the game, the i7 4790k is still on par or even faster with my 4.6GHz oc setting. So what would be a reasonable upgrade ? The i7 9700k is crazy expensive but it seems like it would be the only cpu that would be worth the money performance wise. (I was also looking at 4960x, 5820k, etc. but all of those older extreme platform cpus are probably even weaker when using them for games). Would upgrading my display to a 1440p one make more sense ? 

[Dedayog]

I'd look into 1440p monitors, standard or UW even.  

[gepowr]

1 hour ago, jstudrawa said:

I'd look into 1440p monitors, standard or UW even.  

What do you think of me getting a 4k monitor and upgrading to GTX 1080 SLI ? The 4790k should probably be able to handle them at that resolution right ? How's the SLI experience nowadays ? I really love those 144Hz screens and i can't stand micro stutter so i'm unshure of that ...

[Mister Woof]

I'd go with display upgrade right now. Zen 2 is around the corner and it might be a better time to upgrade then, and increasing resolution will shift more of the burden to your GPU.

 

As far as SLI, it depends on the game you play if it supports the feature and how well.

[Dedayog]

2 hours ago, gepowr said:

What do you think of me getting a 4k monitor and upgrading to GTX 1080 SLI ? The 4790k should probably be able to handle them at that resolution right ? How's the SLI experience nowadays ? I really love those 144Hz screens and i can't stand micro stutter so i'm unshure of that ...

1440p max.  4k is a lot to push and even 1080 SLI isn't guaranteed to make it work well.

 

The 1080 will be able to push nice frame rates on a 1440p monitor.

[Zando_]

1 hour ago, Plutosaurus said:

I'd go with display upgrade right now. Zen 2 is around the corner and it might be a better time to upgrade then, and increasing resolution will shift more of the burden to your GPU.

 

As far as SLI, it depends on the game you play if it supports the feature and how well.

Not just the games you play, it also depends on how your PC wants to behave, in my experience trying SLI with my 1080s and both a 2700X and 8600K it was pretty picky, though it did run much better with the Intel CPU and it seemed to be more the games fault than weird behavior. 

 

35 minutes ago, jstudrawa said:

1440p max.  4k is a lot to push and even 1080 SLI isn't guaranteed to make it work well.

If you can get it to scale properly, 4K is not that hard for SLI 1080s. In battlefront 2015 with no AA (offers 99% scaling at 1440p and 4K, about 60-70% at 1080p) I'd pull 200fps solid at 1440p ultra, 130-144 at 4K. So if your games scale around 90% or so pushing 4K 60fps should be no problem. This was on the 8600K btw, running at 5Ghz. 

[gepowr]

2 hours ago, Plutosaurus said:

I'd go with display upgrade right now. Zen 2 is around the corner and it might be a better time to upgrade then, and increasing resolution will shift more of the burden to your GPU.

 

As far as SLI, it depends on the game you play if it supports the feature and how well.

Seems like a great idea, thank you !

 

1 hour ago, jstudrawa said:

1440p max.  4k is a lot to push and even 1080 SLI isn't guaranteed to make it work well.

 

The 1080 will be able to push nice frame rates on a 1440p monitor.

Good to hear. SLI probably isn't worth it, more than half of my games wouldn't support it anyways... Sad though, i really like the idea of having 2 gpus working together.

 

47 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

Not just the games you play, it also depends on how your PC wants to behave, in my experience trying SLI with my 1080s and both a 2700X and 8600K it was pretty picky, though it did run much better with the Intel CPU and it seemed to be more the games fault than weird behavior. 

 

If you can get it to scale properly, 4K is not that hard for SLI 1080s. In battlefront 2015 with no AA (offers 99% scaling at 1440p and 4K, about 60-70% at 1080p) I'd pull 200fps solid at 1440p ultra, 130-144 at 4K. So if your games scale around 90% or so pushing 4K 60fps should be no problem. This was on the 8600K btw, running at 5Ghz. 

So my current setup is 1 1080p 60Hz monitor and 1 1080p 144Hz monitor. I'm thinking of replacing the 60Hz with a 1440p 144Hz one. With my "mixed refresh rate" setup right now, i experienced quiet a few issues like: netflix stuttering on the 60Hz monitor while playing a fullscreen game on the 144Hz one which also lead to stuttering ingame sometimes. The only way i could fix this was turning down the refresh rate of my main monitor to 60Hz. Do you think that having 2 monitors with the same refresh rate but different resolutions is a better idea ?

[Zando_]

3 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Seems like a great idea, thank you !

 

Good to hear. SLI probably isn't worth it, more than half of my games wouldn't support it anyways... Sad though, i really like the idea of having 2 gpus working together.

 

So my current setup is 1 1080p 60Hz monitor and 1 1080p 144Hz monitor. I'm thinking of replacing the 60Hz with a 1440p 144Hz one. With my "mixed refresh rate" setup right now, i experienced quiet a few issues like: netflix stuttering on the 60Hz monitor while playing a fullscreen game on the 144Hz one which also lead to stuttering ingame sometimes. The only way i could fix this was turning down the refresh rate of my main monitor to 60Hz. Do you think that having 2 monitors with the same refresh rate but different resolutions is a better idea ?

From everything I've read Windows does terribly with different resolution monitors, but as far as refresh rates go it shouldn't really make a difference. What's causing the stutter is watching Netflix while gaming, it'll do the same to me with a 144hz and 60Hz monitor, so I usually don't stream any video, just music and discord or something when I'm using dual monitors. 

[gepowr]

32 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

From everything I've read Windows does terribly with different resolution monitors, but as far as refresh rates go it shouldn't really make a difference. What's causing the stutter is watching Netflix while gaming, it'll do the same to me with a 144hz and 60Hz monitor, so I usually don't stream any video, just music and discord or something when I'm using dual monitors. 

Hmm that's a problem then. I don't want to get rid of my 1080p 144Hz monitor since it isn't old and it's a pretty nice monitor in general actually. I love having a dual monitor setup and i don't think i want to go back to just a single one. Maybe i have to take a look at some of these ultrawide ones... It really is hard to think of a reasonable upgrade to my rig right now. At least my arctic accelero for my gtx 1080 is coming soon, can't wait to put it on and check out the temps! Do you know the feeling of wanting to upgrade at least something ? I should probably get a x58/x99 project myself...

[Zando_]

1 minute ago, gepowr said:

Hmm that's a problem then. I don't want to get rid of my 1080p 144Hz monitor since it isn't old and it's a pretty nice monitor in general actually. I love having a dual monitor setup and i don't think i want to go back to just a single one. Maybe i have to take a look at some of these ultrawide ones... It really is hard to think of a reasonable upgrade to my rig right now. At least my arctic accelero for my gtx 1080 is coming soon, can't wait to put it on and check out the temps! Do you know the feeling of wanting to upgrade at least something ? I should probably get a x58/x99 project myself...

X series project PCs are pretty darn awesome. And I'd do some research first before deciding not to get a 1440p monitor, there's probably ways to get windows to behave, just from everything people have told me it's pretty eh. I personally haven't tried it on my PCs though, only Macs and those deal with it better. Though wait, I think I actually used to run a 1920x1080 and 1680x1050 monitor together and it wasn't that bad. 

[Dedayog]

Just now, gepowr said:

Hmm that's a problem then. I don't want to get rid of my 1080p 144Hz monitor since it isn't old and it's a pretty nice monitor in general actually. I love having a dual monitor setup and i don't think i want to go back to just a single one. Maybe i have to take a look at some of these ultrawide ones... It really is hard to think of a reasonable upgrade to my rig right now. At least my arctic accelero for my gtx 1080 is coming soon, can't wait to put it on and check out the temps! Do you know the feeling of wanting to upgrade at least something ? I should probably get a x58/x99 project myself...

Half of the things in my sig are unnecessary and results of that feeling

 

I'm forcing myself to "upgrade" other things like cars, that leak in the roof, clothing, even washer and dryer... gotta spread the love

[gepowr]

7 minutes ago, Zando Bob said:

X series project PCs are pretty darn awesome. And I'd do some research first before deciding not to get a 1440p monitor, there's probably ways to get windows to behave, just from everything people have told me it's pretty eh. I personally haven't tried it on my PCs though, only Macs and those deal with it better. Though wait, I think I actually used to run a 1920x1080 and 1680x1050 monitor together and it wasn't that bad. 

Well back in the days i was using a 1080p 60Hz monitor paired with a 4:3 768p 75Hz monitor and it worked flawlessly (windows 7). My current monitors both basically look the same (my acer predator 144Hz has some orange details on its stand but other than that they're looking the same) which i really like. There's no 1440p 144Hz acer with the same looks available which makes it even harder to upgrade. My GTX 1080 would probably hate me if i would run 2 different refresh rates with 2 different resolutions spread to 3 monitors.. lol

 

11 minutes ago, jstudrawa said:

Half of the things in my sig are unnecessary and results of that feeling

 

I'm forcing myself to "upgrade" other things like cars, that leak in the roof, clothing, even washer and dryer... gotta spread the love

That's true and i tried that, however i always see me coming back to thinking of upgrading pc stuff. There's almost nothing better than getting some new parts (or used ones, doesn't really matter to me). I really do wonder why those newer i7's/i9's are so expensive. Back in the haswell days you could pick up the top of the line i7 for 300€. I can't seem to find an i7 9700k under 440€...

[Dedayog]

4 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Well back in the days i was using a 1080p 60Hz monitor paired with a 4:3 768p 75Hz monitor and it worked flawlessly (windows 7). My current monitors both basically look the same (my acer predator 144Hz has some orange details on its stand but other than that they're looking the same) which i really like. There's no 1440p 144Hz acer with the same looks available which makes it even harder to upgrade. My GTX 1080 would probably hate me if i would run 2 different refresh rates with 2 different resolutions spread to 3 monitors.. lol

 

That's true and i tried that, however i always see me coming back to thinking of upgrading pc stuff. There's almost nothing better than getting some new parts (or used ones, doesn't really matter to me). I really do wonder why those newer i7's/i9's are so expensive. Back in the haswell days you could pick up the top of the line i7 for 300€. I can't seem to find an i7 9700k under 440€...

Intel's just being Intel.

 

For upgrades, look into cables, colored thumbscrews, more LED/RGB, a new case even?!?!  Keyboard, mouse, speakers?

 

Lots of options outside of direct performance.  

[gepowr]

4 minutes ago, jstudrawa said:

Intel's just being Intel.

 

For upgrades, look into cables, colored thumbscrews, more LED/RGB, a new case even?!?!  Keyboard, mouse, speakers?

 

Lots of options outside of direct performance.  

Well, good idea! I've never been into this crazy RGB hype though, i like clean, i like understatement. 2 years ago i upgraded to a bequiet pure base 600, which i really dig. However, i always wanted to have one of those cube cases (where the mainboard and parts get mounted horizontally). Most of them only support yatx though which wouldn't fit. Peripherals are pretty engame aswell (Logitech G403, G502, G910, G633, Beyerdynamic DT990 (600Ohm)). 

[Mick Naughty]

I upgraded. The 4790k wasn’t gonna work with a 1080, let alone two. 

 

Even at 1440 it couldn’t keep up with one card in the games I play. 

 

I ended up just getting an 8700k. Didn’t wonna pay more and not be happy. Large price gaps with the nice boards I want. Getting ddr4 on top of that. 

 

I use it it on my 1080p monitor still as I prefer the gameplay and FPS. Using 1440 didn’t get me the frames I wanted either. 

[gepowr]

17 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

I upgraded. The 4790k wasn’t gonna work with a 1080, let alone two. 

 

Even at 1440 it couldn’t keep up with one card in the games I play. 

 

I ended up just getting an 8700k. Didn’t wonna pay more and not be happy. Large price gaps with the nice boards I want. Getting ddr4 on top of that. 

 

I use it it on my 1080p monitor still as I prefer the gameplay and FPS. Using 1440 didn’t get me the frames I wanted either. 

Same here. I highly prefer refresh rate/fps over resolution. I still feel like the performance gain is not quiet significant enough. What do you think of the i7 6800k? I could get that one for around 250€ new, unsure if that would be worth it though.

[Mister Woof]

18 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Same here. I highly prefer refresh rate/fps over resolution. I still feel like the performance gain is not quiet significant enough. What do you think of the i7 6800k? I could get that one for around 250€ new, unsure if that would be worth it though.

For gaming the 6800k is going to be weaker than any of the 8th or 9th gen unlocked i5/i7; I don't know if you feel the prices are with it though depending on your locations prices

 

But also the x99 platform is more expensive, motherboard, quad channel ram, etc

[Dedayog]

14 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Same here. I highly prefer refresh rate/fps over resolution. I still feel like the performance gain is not quiet significant enough. What do you think of the i7 6800k? I could get that one for around 250€ new, unsure if that would be worth it though.

Honestly, if you have the scratch I'd do what McNaughty did. Upgrade to the 8700K.  There are some great bundle deals out there and it's a very easy 5GHz OC on all cores.

 

I think the 9th Gen stuff is way too expensive, and also lacking.  6 Cores with no HT, or 6/12 but almost $500?  No thanks to either.

 

I came from an i5 4670K to the 8700K and feel it was a fantastic upgrade.

 

 

[Mister Woof]

Just now, jstudrawa said:

Honestly, if you have the scratch I'd do what McNaughty did. Upgrade to the 8700K.  There are some great bundle deals out there and it's a very easy 5GHz OC on all cores.

 

I think the 9th Gen stuff is way too expensive, and also lacking.  6 Cores with no HT, or 6/12 but almost $500?  No thanks to either.

 

I came from an i5 4670K to the 8700K and feel it was a fantastic upgrade.

 

 

 

Hey not meaning to threadjack the OP, but looks like we have the same motherboard and CPU.

 

I don't know if you saw my other thread

 

 

Does your system have really high vboost?

 

I set mine to 1.355v with high LLC, and it sometime spikes above 1.45v

 

If this is inappropriate mods pls delete/move

[Mick Naughty]

13 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Same here. I highly prefer refresh rate/fps over resolution. I still feel like the performance gain is not quiet significant enough. What do you think of the i7 6800k? I could get that one for around 250€ new, unsure if that would be worth it though.

This is black ops 4 with a single card. Gpu usage is bugged as I just turned off sli. I’d get the best stuff you can afford if the games are cpu intensive. 

[Dedayog]

Just now, Plutosaurus said:

 

Hey not meaning to threadjack the OP, but looks like we have the same motherboard and CPU.

 

I don't know if you saw my other thread

 

 

Does your system have really high vboost?

 

I set mine to 1.355v with high LLC, and it sometime spikes above 1.45v

 

If this is inappropriate mods pls delete/move

I'm sure we all derailed it pretty well so far

 

I have mine set to Auto OC for an i7 8700k @ 5.0GHz, and I sit at 1.32 - 1.35v pretty steady.

 

I haven't gone back to a manual OC yet, but 1.45v I don't like the sound of that.

[Mister Woof]

1 minute ago, jstudrawa said:

I'm sure we all derailed it pretty well so far

 

I have mine set to Auto OC for an i7 8700k @ 5.0GHz, and I sit at 1.32 - 1.35v pretty steady.

 

I haven't gone back to a manual OC yet, but 1.45v I don't like the sound of that.

It's very random and only seems to Spike very briefly and only happens at idle.

 

Average is 1.36, very close to my target.

[gepowr]

5 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

This is black ops 4 with a single card. Gpu usage is bugged as I just turned off sli. I’d get the best stuff you can afford if the games are cpu intensive. 

Well that's definitely high usage of the 8700k but i bet you're maxing out the gtx 1080 at 1080p right ?

[Mick Naughty]

4 minutes ago, gepowr said:

Well that's definitely high usage of the 8700k but i bet you're maxing out the gtx 1080 at 1080p right ?

Yep. Which is what I want. No stutter. Great gameplay finally. Now I want a 240hz monitor and a 1080ti. 

[gepowr]

5 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

Yep. Which is what I want. No stutter. Great gameplay finally. Now I want a 240hz monitor and a 1080ti. 

That's good to hear. Well gameplay is pretty great with the 4790k still. Even though it struggles to keep the 1080 maxed out i almost never encounter stuttering or fps drops which is great. Thanks for all the input guys, i will consider the 8700k. I will wait for Anthem to release and check the performance of the final game then. Demo performed pretty solid on my rig.