GPU pairing question

[Lord_Rusty]

Hi all, 

 

I am looking for some general advice regarding upgrading my GPU; I would like to know what level of GPU I can buy before my CPU starts bottlenecking the performance.

 

My CPU is an i5 4690K overclocked to 4.6GHz (base clock 3.5GHz), I'm currently running a GTX 970 but that's starting to show its age and I was thinking of picking up a GTX 1070 Ti second hand. Would my CPU be able to handle that? Could I go even higher, to something like a 1080?

 

I'm not looking for blistering fast frame rates but I would like something that could handle HL:Alyx in VR without any dropped frames, and if possible, handle Warhammer 2 in 4K at 30 Fps.

 

I expect anything in the RTX line will be both out of budget and well beyond my poor little i5's capabilities! 

 

Thank you for any advice you can offer.

 

 

My full specs are:

i5 4690K (baseclock 3.5GHz, overclocked to 4.6GHz)

ASUS Maximus Gene VII

MSI GTX 970 

16Gb RAM DDR3 1886mhz

Coolermaster 240mm AIO (4 fans set to push +pull)

SSD boot drive

Windows 10

[AndreiArgeanu]

I wouldn't really recommend going past a 1070 with the i5 4690k to be honest as even running at 4k it may bottleneck your GPU in some titles. You may also want to wait for the new nvidia and AMD cards since prices for used hardware for RTX cards, and potentially older cards may drop as a result.

[Moonzy]

personally tried a gtx 970, 1070, and 2070 super on my i5 6600(non-k)

 

felt like 1070 is already pushing the limits, 2070 super is just overkill

 

i suspect you'll have similar experience

 

edit: for 1080p

[Lord_Rusty]

Thank you both, that's very helpful.

 

Looks like its a 1070 for me then, and I'll wait until the release of the new cards to see if the prices come down a bit.

 

Thanks again.

[dfsgsfa]

17 minutes ago, Lord_Rusty said:

Looks like its a 1070 for me then

get better gpu when possible, used 1080 or new rx5600xt / 5700

coz these cards will suite better for your new sys later on