Ryzen upgrade from 3600 - Worth it or not??

[irishbeast]

Hi all,

 

Looking for a bit of CPU advice here. Bought a new rig in February and with the prices of hardware being so shocking I had to make a sacrifice on the CPU. I have 2 machines now. Both for gaming. Both have ryzen 3600s. One a b450 motherboard and the other a b550. The main one (b550) has an rtx 3070 and the other an rtx 2060. Both run things fine but am looking to add more beef to the 3070 device while I have a bit of spare cash. Want to give it the edge for 4k gaming without going crazy overclocking.

 

Now my question is whether or not upgrading the 3600 to say a 5800x (the 5950 is a little pricey for me) would yield a decent result worthy of the £400 ($550). whilst everything runs fine on the device (apart from 4k cyberpunk which I have consulted NASA on :)) I would like to get the rig in a state where I don't have to spend anything on it for a few years. The other rig will be passed to the kids before long once they know how to use it without spilling coke, ice cream etc all over it (don't ask!)

 

From research the 3600 should only bottleneck my rtx 3070 by about 10% but I take all this with a pinch of salt. I have not upgraded a CPU in some time but I gather the ryzen would be a simple swap. The stock cooler may need to be replaced although the CPU doesn't get too warm really. I love in the UK so outside heat does not really come into it!

 

Any advice would be fantastic. The advice I have been given in person is very different to what the benchmarks would suggest so thought I would ask here.

 

I'm by no means an expert so please bare with me!

 

 

[Forfaxify]

If you want to go 4k60 then the 3600 should be great. When pushing that many pixels the gpu will have the most work do so i dont think your cpu will be any problem. If you want higher fps (say 120) then you might consider upgrading to something else, though driving 4k120 is not really possible with any gpu.

Edited July 8, 2021 by Forfaxify

[MrP6k]

i don't think the cpu would matter much when gaming at 4k

CMIIW

 

try watching this video

https://youtu.be/AlfwXqODqp4

[Chris Pratt]

A 5800X would be a significant bump due to both the extra threads and single core perf. 8 cores is also going to be the new mainstay for games in the future, now that the next gen consoles have gone there. A 5950X would be a complete waste, though, even if you wanted to spend the money on it.

 

If you use your rig for anything other than gaming, I'd strong consider a 5900X, though. It's dollar for dollar the best performance on the market, and 12 cores would actually be useful for a lot of productivity work. There's some games, like Cyberpunk, that will actually scale to 12 cores already, but it would mostly be unnecessary for just gaming alone.

[Brooksie359]

The 3600 vs a 5800x at 4k would be 0. You really won't get any better performance if you upgrade your gpu while playing at 4k. 

[irishbeast]

Thanks for the speedy responses!

 

It does seem like decent 4k is beyond the reach for most. I would love to invest in a 4k 144hz monitor but its quite a lot of money and don't want it to be a waste.

 

Have a 1080p 144hz monitor which is ace and a 4k tv which is not to bad although does stutter a little bit. I know the rtx 3070 is not an absolute powerhouse but its pretty good. The 4k tv is limited to 60hm unfortunately and even my rtx2060 can push well above 60fps on mosy titles at high settings. I just don't know whether to get another display. I would love a massive 4k display with high refresh and response but they cost quite a lot and I'm already in the doghouse for spending so much on IT equipment recently!

[freeagent]

I would do it. You are probably going to do other stuff with it too. It is better in every single way.

[irishbeast]

13 hours ago, freeagent said:

I would do it. You are probably going to do other stuff with it too. It is better in every single way.

Brilliant  -Thanks

 

Can still get £100+ for the 3600 so that will help a bit.

 

I assume the stock cooler that comes with the cpu will be fine? I have no plans to overclock.

 

If someone can recommend a better cooler that won't break the bank then please do

 

[irishbeast]

14 hours ago, Chris Pratt said:

A 5800X would be a significant bump due to both the extra threads and single core perf. 8 cores is also going to be the new mainstay for games in the future, now that the next gen consoles have gone there. A 5950X would be a complete waste, though, even if you wanted to spend the money on it.

 

If you use your rig for anything other than gaming, I'd strong consider a 5900X, though. It's dollar for dollar the best performance on the market, and 12 cores would actually be useful for a lot of productivity work. There's some games, like Cyberpunk, that will actually scale to 12 cores already, but it would mostly be unnecessary for just gaming alone.

They are both primarily for gaming. Bit of day to day work, youtube etc but nothing power hungry at all

 

Should be a simple swap on the b550m board? 700w PSU is plenty. Think my system only uses about 450w flat out

[irishbeast]

14 hours ago, MrP6k said:

i don't think the cpu would matter much when gaming at 4k

CMIIW

 

try watching this video

https://youtu.be/AlfwXqODqp4

Interesting! 

 

Video suggests that the upgrade is not really worth it with a 3070 for many games. I imagine that will change in at some point. I have no intention of buying a 3090 in todays market! 

 

All games I play at the moment are fine with the exception of Cyberpunk at 4k, which even a 3090 cant really nail. Saw a few videos which got 45-50 fps at 4k which is not bad but not brilliant either after forking out a massive amount of money for the rig

[shaz2sxy]

personally I would just wait, the 3600 is still a good CPU

 

especially with the current Ryzen chips ebing the last of the AM4 .

 

skip this gen

[irishbeast]

1 minute ago, shaz2sxy said:

personally I would just wait, the 3600 is still a good CPU

 

especially with the current Ryzen chips ebing the last of the AM4 .

 

skip this gen

Having watched the video which someone kindly posted I am inclined to agree. Maybe re-assess things in 6/12 months as the cpu is not problematic at the moment. Can pick up the 3800x for about £350 which is not too bad but seems as though the gain would only be noticeable in some games and not massively noticeable. 

 

I doubt I will upgrade the 2nd machine either as a 3600 and rtx 2060 seems a nice combo. Will certainly run new titles for a while.

Maybe when prices drop I will see. I am not bothered about having cutting edge gear but like to have something fairly decent

 

Really looking forward to Forza Horizon 5 so when that comes out I hope it will still run well on both rigs. Temptation of a new display is massive but my god PC gaming can be an expensive hobby!

[rxn99ne]

It really doesnt matter with a cpu of that caliber. An i5 10k can max out a 3080 or a rx6800 both overclocked running 8k while gaming   I'd say do a M2 ssd 4.0 upgrade or something. or Upgrade your internet. *assuming you ment a ryzen 5-7

[irishbeast]

I am running off purely SSD. Primary drive is a Western Digital M2 - 2280 I think (hard to read tiny text)

 

System is absolutely fine. Everything is fast but would like to squeeze out some extra FPS if possible as I would like to buy a 4k 144hz display but want to ensure I have the hardware in place before spending a lot of money. A 144p display might be a better shout. 

 

I love gaming on my living room tv which is only 60hz but not bad at all. Once I swap to my 1080p 144hz monitor the difference in smoothness is very notable. its only 22 inch though so you don't get to see the images in all their glory. Need to merge the two somehow!

[rxn99ne]

It seems win 11 will be intergrating more proficient use of ssd's  for gaming. If that is the 2280 heres a bit of comparison to its 4.0 pcie counterpart. 

WD BLUE SSD M.2 2280

Sequential Read Performance

550MB/s

Sequential Write Performance

525MB/s

vs.

WD BLACK 

Interface: M.2 PCIe 4.0 x4

Seq. read: 7,000 MB/s

Seq. write: 5,300 MB/s

Also what is the specs on your ram? mhz / cl?

 

Yeah i'd agree on a monitor upgrade at that point also, or some high performance thermals would be good to secure your investment.

[rxn99ne]

I have a ryzen 7 3700x and i have never seen it past 24% utilization lol. 120-200 fps max settings on apex while streaming in max quality and streaming youtube 4k for music at the same time while doing updates and such. It's quite overkill as is..

[irishbeast]

1 hour ago, rxn99ne said:

It seems win 11 will be intergrating more proficient use of ssd's  for gaming. If that is the 2280 heres a bit of comparison to its 4.0 pcie counterpart. 

WD BLUE SSD M.2 2280

Sequential Read Performance

550MB/s

Sequential Write Performance

525MB/s

vs.

WD BLACK 

Interface: M.2 PCIe 4.0 x4

Seq. read: 7,000 MB/s

Seq. write: 5,300 MB/s

Also what is the specs on your ram? mhz / cl?

 

Yeah i'd agree on a monitor upgrade at that point also, or some high performance thermals would be good to secure your investment.

 

Wow that's an insane speed difference!

 

Just looked and my board will support it  Is there a big price difference?

 

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/B550M-GAMING-rev-10#kf

 

16 gigs of Corsair dual channel ram (2x8gb) running at 3200mhz (running at factory speed)

[irishbeast]

The above image is not of my board  My bad

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08BJB8B2H/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

Thats the fella there. 4 Ram slots and 2 PCI3

[freeagent]

4 hours ago, irishbeast said:

I assume the stock cooler that comes with the cpu will be fine? I have no plans to overclock.

There has been some complaints about heat, even with good cooling.

 

I vote for Thermalright FC140, can be found on Aliexpress. It is literally the best heatsink I have used, and I have had a few.. It lets my 5600X and 5900X wind right up, it should be good on the 5800X as well.

[CryingWimp]

IMO the 3600 is showing its limit with a 3070+. Many people are shocked how responsive even daily task are after upgrading.

 

In many games you would have a better experience, depends on the games you mostly play.