CPU & GPU pairing is important?

[Arkland909]

Honestly i did not know this. 

Why is it important?

P.S - I'm new to pc build

[Slottr]

Bottlenecking

 

If your cpu can't keep up with your gpu then you'll be bottlenecked and vice versa

 

It really depends on what you're doing and what software you're using

[Prodigy_Smit]

4 minutes ago, Arkland909 said:

Honestly i did not know this. 

Why is it important?

P.S - I'm new to pc build

If you pair an underpowered CPU with a relatively highend gpu your gpu can't perform to its full potential and vice versa. But like @Slotter said it depends on what you are doing. Also there is no system with the perfect GPU and CPU combo, meaning no bottlenecking otherwise there would be infinite power.

[Mateyyy]

It depends mainly on what you're doing with the computer, but keeping things fairly balanced is generally a good rule of thumb.

 

For example, if all you do is code compiling or some other workload that is strictly CPU reliant, you could run a $700 16-core CPU like the 3950X with a cheapo $20 GPU that's there just to work as a display adapter, and you'd be fine. The CPU works to its full potential, since the task at hand only needs CPU power, and the GPU does its job - displaying an image on the screen.

On the other hand, if you're gaming, which needs both CPU but mostly GPU power, that $700 CPU and $20 GPU pairing won't do well at all - you'd be much better off going with a $180 CPU, like the 3600, and a $500 GPU, like a 2070 Super, because then the GPU could handle rendering the 3D scenes much, much better, and the CPU would be fast enough to keep up, but not overly fast so it just sits there doing nothing.

 

In short, it's a balancing act, with the biggest factor being what you do on your PC.

[Arkland909]

9 minutes ago, Smit Devrukhkar said:

If you pair an underpowered CPU with a relatively highend gpu your gpu can't perform to its full potential and vice versa. But like @Slotter said it depends on what you are doing. Also there is no system with the perfect GPU and CPU combo, meaning no bottlenecking otherwise there would be infinite power.

You mean my pc could blow up

[Kilrah]

13 minutes ago, Arkland909 said:

You mean my pc could blow up

No...

You can pair whatever you want, just some combinations will not perform optimally. 

If you get the best GPU out there but a shit CPU because you put all the money on the GPU then your GPU will be underused because the CPU can't keep up and you'll have paid for performance you can't make use of, so better save some on the GPU and get a better CPU so the performance of both is well balanced.