3060 ti Processor pairing

[uwshirk]

Hello all! I was wondering what everyone's recommendation on a CPU to pair with a 3060 ti. 

The i9-11900K, Ryzen 5900X and 5950X are a little out of reach right now without some sort of sale so that leaves me to wonder about the Ryzen 5 5600X, Ryzen 7 5800X and the i7-11700K. The main usage would be gaming and maybe streaming. The main thing is I do not want to go too low/cheap and bottleneck myself.

[bmx6454]

a 5600x would be fine, and not bottleneck it even slightly imo. even an 11400 would probably be fine, so the 11700k would be great as well.

[aisle9]

The work "bottleneck" falls into the "does not mean what you think it means." That's the generalized "you", applicable to most of PC-dom.

 

When discussing things like a 5600X with a 3060 Ti, is the GPU more powerful than the CPU? Sure, absolutely 100% it is. But things like stutter and dropped frames don't become an issue unless you're doing something marginally to extremely dumb like slapping a Ryzen 3 3100 in with a 3080, or a 3060 Ti with a Pentium. My philosophy has always been buy the GPU you want and the CPU you can afford. The price of used CPUs usually comes down much faster than the price of GPUs with subsequent generational releases, and that's only going to become more true with time now that "midrange budget" GPUs are a thing of the past.

[Mister Woof]

5600x/b550 or 11400/b560 - they both will be pretty similar with the 5600x being a little better but more expensive.