Which $800 upgrade?

[Gerr]

This Black Friday or Xmas season, I plan on upgrading my gaming system, but torn as to which upgrade path to choose.

 

Current system:

i7-9700KF @ 5.0Ghz CPU

EVGA 280mm AIO

EVGA Z370 mATX mobo

16GB(2x8) 3200 CL14 DDR4

512GB NVMe SSD

MSI 1080 Ti Gaming X Trio

Seasonic G12 750W Gold PSU (about 4 years old)

27" ASUS 1080p 144Hz IPS monitor

 

Upgrade option #1 = new GPU.

While my 1080 Ti is very good for 1080p gaming, I would like to upgrade to a better GPU so I can turn on ray tracing and still get good frame rates.  And anyone who say a 1080 Ti is overkill for 1080p gaming, that's only true for 60Hz monitors while my monitor is 144Hz.  Even a 3080 can't hit 144FPS on most AAA games!  Maybe within a year or two I'll get a 1440p@144Hz monitor, just not now.  This upgrade will mainly help me max out my FPS on AAA games but will also allow me to turn on ray tracing on those games that support it for better visuals.  Just worried that a big GPU upgrade might run in a CPU bottleneck.

 

Upgrade option #2 = new Ryzen 5000 CPU & mobo.

Since I am playing at 1080p, that resolution is much more CPU bound than higher resolutions, so getting a faster CPU like a 5900X & B550 mobo might help as much or more than a new GPU.  I know I need to wait for Zen 3 benchmarks, but if they show a decent uplift vs my 9700KF even at 5.0Ghz, it's something to consider.  This upgrade would help me increase the FPS on all games that don't already hit my 144 FPS cap, but it doesn't allow for Ray Tracing.  It would also allow me to upgrade to 32GB RAM without having to swap the RAM as my current mobo only has 2 RAM slots.  Lastly is that I do a lot of H265 encoding of movies for my Plex server, so hoping this would speed that up as well.

 

I know it's too early to make this decision as I need to see the Zen 3 benchmarks as well as see what AMD brings to the table GPU wise, but just wondering what people's initial thoughts are.  And any spare parts left over will trickle down to my daughter's PC, so not going to sell it for more upgrades.

 

Thanks!

[Ihobonu3]

I would go for the second option Because what is your sister gonna do with such a beast gpu

I wouldnt upgrade maybe just swap out the ram for 2*16 gb

[EpiCheeseTime]

I would keep the 32gb since you want a plex server. 

 

I personally would wait and see what actual benchmarks of the 5000 series is and may vouch for that route. 

[Hairless Monkey]

The 9700KF is a great gaming CPU. I think you would benefit much more from a GPU/Monitor upgrade.

 

Edit:

To get some more CPU performance, you could OC that RAM. I have a kit of 3200 CL14 that I have OCed to 4000 CL16 with my 9900K @ 5Ghz.

[Mister Woof]

1 minute ago, HairlessMonkeyBoy said:

The 9700KF is a great gaming CPU. I think you would benefit much more from a GPU/Monitor upgrade.

This. Display upgrade would almost as huge as the pixels on a 27" 1080p display

[i_build_nanosuits]

Get a new 1440p monitor with variable refresh rate that way you don't have to worry about hitting 144fps ever again.

[HoneyBadger84]

I would honestly do the upgrades in that order, Monitor, then GPU, then step up to the Zen 3 5000-series CPU later since your current CPU isn't "bad" by any aspect.  That's basically what I'm doing, minus the Monitor because I love my 3440 x 1440 100/120Hz monitor to death (and it wasn't cheap, so it hasn't outlived it's usefulness yet).  If you do so quickly enough and land a 3080, you could still resell the 1080 Ti for a good price ($300-$400) and get a lower-tier GPU for your daughter's setup since I doubt she'd actually put the 1080 Ti to good use anyway.

I have a 3080 FTW3 Ultra coming on Tuesday thanks to eVGA's queue system & registering for auto-notify the day of launch after they sold out/crashed for 15 minutes straight, very excited to finally "upgrade" from my 1080 Ti FTW3 Hybrid & resell it to the next lucky person to be graced with the 1080 Ti's awesomeness.

[Fatih19]

3 minutes ago, HoneyBadger84 said:

I would honestly do the upgrades in that order, Monitor, then GPU, then step up to the Zen 3 5000-series CPU later since your current CPU isn't "bad" by any aspect.

He should wait for AM5 for any CPU upgrade IMO, the 9700KF is perfectly fine.

[Gohardgrandpa]

@Gerr

 

If it was me with $800 to spend I would sell the 1080ti and sell the 1080p monitor add that money to what you already have and buy a 144hz 1440p monitor and buy a rtx 3080.