Older CPU + New GPU = Good or Bad Idea?

[ChrisLoudon]

Hi guys, a friend of mine was asking me about getting a gaming PC but when he mentioned the words Argos and £800, I told him to hang fire and see what I had spare.

 

As it turns out, I have a fully functioning i7 6700k, Gigabyte Z170 Gaming 7, 16Gb Ram, 512Gb SSD and a 750w PSU kicking around my attic.

 

The question I ask is, if he was to take that and buy himself a 3060ti or something in that class range, would he have a half decent experience or would the aging guts of the machine bottleneck the GPU?

 

He's primarily a console gamer but has recently wanted to get into city building type games like Anno, Satisfactory and Farthest Frontier. Are these games more CPU or GPU bound?

 

I'd like him to be able to play at 60FPS and 1440p if possible.

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks

 

C

 

[mystery_xD]

Completely fine. Ur friend is getting a bloody good deal. Not completely future proofed he would probs have to upgrade cpu 2-3 year mark, less if ur cpu is not been treated well. if its just been collecting dust than its fine.

 

https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/should-i-pair-an-i7-6700k-with-a-3060-or-a-3060-ti.3745668/

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Delid that 6700 and put some fresh thermal paste on the die to ihs (just use a thin razor, you can get one from destructively dissasembling a generic shaving razor) so it doesnt suck ass temps wise, oc to 4.8g+ (min 4.6g), and you stil have a decent cpu that shouldnt be too much of a bottleneck to a 3060ti

[Chiyawa]

Depends on the system, but most is still okay if their performance difference are not too far off. I have one of my friend pair an Intel Core i5 2500 with RTX 3080 and ask me why his frame rate is horrendous. Core i7 6700K with RTX 3060 or RTX 3060 Ti is okay, but you'll be most likely CPU bound and will face stuttering issues. Also do note that 6th gen runs PCIe 3.0 so there'll be bottlenecking as well.

[Jeppes]

800£ budget aint that bad. Maybe use the old ram if its fast enough and the ssd. Psu depending on how old it is and if its some garbage tier fire starter.

 

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12400 2.5 GHz 6-Core Processor  (£176.99 @ Technextday)
Motherboard: Gigabyte B660M GAMING DDR4 Micro ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  (£103.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Asus GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB DUAL MINI OC V2 Video Card  (£403.48 @ Ebuyer)
Case: Silverstone FARA H1M MicroATX Mini Tower Case  (£48.94 @ Box Limited)
Power Supply: EVGA G5 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (£59.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case Fan: ARCTIC P12 56.3 CFM 120 mm Fan  (£7.98 @ Box Limited)
Case Fan: ARCTIC P12 56.3 CFM 120 mm Fan  (£7.98 @ Box Limited)
Total: £809.35
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-08-16 11:45 BST+0100

 

 

[trevb0t]

There shouldn't be any bottleneck. I think the 3060Ti is about as powerful as you'd want to go.

[Queen Chrysalis]

2 hours ago, Chiyawa said:

Depends on the system, but most is still okay if their performance difference are not too far off. I have one of my friend pair an Intel Core i5 2500 with RTX 3080 and ask me why his frame rate is horrendous. Core i7 6700K with RTX 3060 or RTX 3060 Ti is okay, but you'll be most likely CPU bound and will face stuttering issues. Also do note that 6th gen runs PCIe 3.0 so there'll be bottlenecking as well.

PCIe3.0 is not gonna bottleneck a 3080.  A 6700k is also not gonna bottleneck a 3060ti.

[Chiyawa]

11 hours ago, Queen Chrysalis said:

A 6700k is also not gonna bottleneck a 3060ti.

Some CPU intensive game such as Anno 1800 or City Skyline will have a noticeable lack and severe stuttering issues, due to CPU is peg at 100% processing game element and your GPU was put on hold.

 

11 hours ago, Queen Chrysalis said:

PCIe3.0 is not gonna bottleneck a 3080. 

If you're a competitive gamer, you'll notice slight lag (well, in ms, but hey, they are super human who perceive 1ms delay as 1 hour delay, who am I to judge), the real reason why nVidia hop in to PCIe 4.0 even though they claim we are not saturating PCIe 3.0 bandwidth. So in a sense, it'll bottleneck the RTX 3060 in a way, but nothing noticeable for average gamers.