i5-8400 + 1080Ti recommended PSU Wattage?

[Nintson]

Hey Guys, 

 

I'm currently thinking about upgrading my PC (for gaming).

I plan on buying an Intel i5-8400 and an Asus Rog Strix 1080Ti, other than that nothing too fancy about my build.

The only PSU-Calculator i found listing the i5-8400 was from Be-Quiet, estimating about 400 Wattage. However most people online recommend 650W PSU with an 1080Ti?

The thing is that i still own a good 500W PSU. Do you think it will suffice as i would rather not spend any more money?

 

Thanks for your help!

 

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Nintson said:

Hey Guys, 

 

I'm currently thinking about upgrading my PC (for gaming).

I plan on buying an Intel i5-8400 and an Asus Rog Strix 1080Ti, other than that nothing too fancy about my build.

The only PSU-Calculator i found listing the i5-8400 was from Be-Quiet, estimating about 400 Wattage. However most people online recommend 650W PSU with an 1080Ti?

The thing is that i still own a good 500W PSU. Do you think it will suffice as i would rather not spend any more money?

 

Thanks for your help!

 

different point but UPGRADE YOUR PROCESSOR DUDE. get something i7, or unlocked i5, or your GPU will be so bottlenecked. as for a PSU, go around 600-650W. Maybe use the 500 instead of buying a new one and get a better processor

[jeff.proto-_-]

Don't buy a mid-range CPU and an enthusiast-grade GPU, the GPU will be heavily bottlenecked.

[Eduard the weeb]

yeah I would get a I5 8600K because bottlenecking issues so your gpu won't preform at ful power but a 600 watt psu should be fine in either config

 

[genexis_x]

3 minutes ago, NovaMan01 said:

different point but UPGRADE YOUR PROCESSOR DUDE. get something i7, or unlocked i5, or your GPU will be so bottlenecked. as for a PSU, go around 600-650W. Maybe use the 500 instead of buying a new one and get a better processor

What are you talking, the 6c6t i5 is almost on par with 7700k in gaming performance, 1080TI will not be bottlenecked by i5 8400

[Guest]

Just now, ZM Fong said:

What are you talking, the 6c6t i5 is almost on par with 7700k in gaming performance, 1080TI will not be bottlenecked by i5 8400

core clock is the killer. you need an unlocked CPU with high core clocks

[genexis_x]

1 minute ago, NovaMan01 said:

core clock is the killer. you need an unlocked CPU with high core clocks

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Core_i5_8400/18.html

[Guest]

Just now, ZM Fong said:

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Core_i5_8400/18.html

for a 1080TI. 4 GHz is ok, but not worthy of a 1080TI

[Mira Yurizaki]

Oh noes, I'm not getting 160 FPS when I'm already getting 140 FPS.

 

Even if there is a bottleneck, it's at the point here you're pinching for peanuts and aiming for e-peen points. Plus it's likely that games going forward are going to enjoy more cores than not. So a hexacore is probably going to be a better investment than a quad core with SMT. Hell, I would argue even going to a hexacore with SMT wouldn't really be worth it.

[genexis_x]

1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

hexacore is probably going to be a better investment than a quad core with SMT.

Agree. That's what I'm taking about.

[Armakar]

1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Oh noes, I'm not getting 160 FPS when I'm already getting 140 FPS.

 

Even if there is a bottleneck, it's at the point here you're pinching for peanuts and aiming for e-peen points. Plus it's likely that games are going to enjoy more cores than not. So a hexacore is probably going to be a better investment than a quad core with SMT. Hell, I would argue even going to a hexacore with SMT wouldn't really be worth it.

Well, if people are playing at higher res or 165+hz monitors, it makes a difference.

[Mira Yurizaki]

Just now, Armakar said:

Well, if people are playing at higher res or 165+hz monitors, it makes a difference.

Higher resolution puts more strain on the GPU than the CPU. If OP is using a 4K monitor with all the bells and whistles enabled, then they can run the GPU on a potato CPU and it wouldn't really bottleneck.

 

Higher refresh rate... sure, but the games you're likely to play where that would actually be helpful can run at 60+ FPS on potato hardware anyway.

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Higher resolution puts more strain on the GPU than the CPU. If OP is using a 4K monitor with all the bells and whistles enabled, then they can run the GPU on a potato CPU and it wouldn't really bottleneck.

 

Higher refresh rate... sure, but the games you're likely to play where that would actually be helpful can run at 60+ FPS on potato hardware anyway.

try putting a celeron and a 1080TI together and running 4K. CPU choice matters

[genexis_x]

2 minutes ago, NovaMan01 said:

try putting a celeron and a 1080TI together and running 4K. CPU choice matters

In fact CPU don't really matter in 4k gaming, however that doesn't mean you can put a Celeron or Pentium

[Mira Yurizaki]

7 minutes ago, NovaMan01 said:

try putting a celeron and a 1080TI together and running 4K. CPU choice matters

It's the only review of a recent Celeron I could find, but: https://us.hardware.info/reviews/6709/24/intel-celeron-g3920-processor-review-skylake-for-a-trifle-benchmarksngtx-960980-gta-vn1920x1080-mediumultra Notice that when the graphics settings are cranked up even at 1080p, the gap closes quite a bit.

 

But yeah, as @ZM Fong says, this doesn't mean you should build with a Celeron.

[pyrojoe34]

4 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Higher resolution puts more strain on the GPU than the CPU. If OP is using a 4K monitor with all the bells and whistles enabled, then they can run the GPU on a potato CPU and it wouldn't really bottleneck.

 

Higher refresh rate... sure, but the games you're likely to play where that would actually be helpful can run at 60+ FPS on potato hardware anyway.

What a ridiculous claim to make, you can't run higher resolutions well on a crappy CPU. And no, resolution has no direct effect on the CPU to GPU use ratio, it is almost entirely reliant on framerate. This misconception comes because higher resolutions tend to achieve lower framerates on any given system. 4k at 60Hz and 1080p at 60hz will have near identical CPU usage (if anything the 4k will use slightly more CPU depending on the game design).

 

Having said that, an i5-8400 will not be a much of a bottleneck for a 1080Ti in the vast majority of cases. Personally, I would probably go with the 8600k (although the $60 price delta makes it a tough choice, that and the motherboard will likely be more expensive for the 8600k so that adds even more cost), If it saves him ~$100 to go with the 8400 vs the 8600k then it may be worth it to him. A system with an 8400 and 1080Ti will still destroy a system with an 8600k (or even 8700k) and a 1080. The 8400 will be more than enough CPU for most games, even with a 1080Ti (it's almost as fast as the i7-6800k, just without HT).

[Mira Yurizaki]

9 minutes ago, pyrojoe34 said:

What a ridiculous claim to make, you can't run higher resolutions well on a crappy CPU. And no, resolution has no direct effect on the CPU to GPU use ratio, it is almost entirely reliant on framerate. This misconception comes because higher resolutions tend to achieve lower framerates on any given system. 4k at 60Hz and 1080p at 60hz will have near identical CPU usage (if anything the 4k will use slightly more CPU depending on the game design).

Of course 4K and 1080p at 60 Hz, assuming you've capped the FPS to 60, will have near identical CPU usage. The game logic doesn't change with resolution and the CPU is always going to send 60 commands to the GPU per second (though that's very likely a simplified explanation). However, if the CPU usage is already low in the game on a higher end CPU, you can stick in a lower end CPU to a certain point and the performance won't change. As long as the CPU can get the game logic done and send out 60 commands to the GPU per second, it doesn't matter what the performance of the CPU is overall. You've met a baseline.

 

If you are bottlenecking the GPU because the CPU can't send commands fast enough at 1080p, setting the resolution to 4K may keep the GPU busy long enough because there's more work to do to where the CPU can send commands at a rate it can actually do.

 

Also I should point you to the PS4 Pro or Xbox One X, two systems that can do true 4K (and in some cases on the XBOX, 60FPS) and they do it on netbook CPUs from 2012.

[pyrojoe34]

12 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Of course 4K and 1080p at 60 Hz, assuming you've capped the FPS to 60, will have near identical CPU usage. The game logic doesn't change with resolution and the CPU is always going to send 60 commands to the GPU per second (though that's very likely a simplified explanation). However, if the CPU usage is already low in the game on a higher end CPU, you can stick in a lower end CPU to a certain point and the performance won't change. As long as the CPU can get the game logic done and send out 60 commands to the GPU per second, it doesn't matter what the performance of the CPU is overall. You've met a baseline.

 

If you are bottlenecking the GPU because the CPU can't send commands fast enough at 1080p, setting the resolution to 4K may keep the GPU busy long enough because there's more work to do to where the CPU can send commands at a rate it can actually do.

Right, but then you're just switching the bottleneck from the CPU to the GPU, one of the two will bottleneck in any situation. The point is that the 8400 will not be a significant bottleneck for the 1080Ti (unless he's playing at like 240Hz), even at 144Hz. If you have to choose between the 8400 (+ B350) with a 1080Ti, or a 8600k (+ Z370) with a 1080, for close to the same price, then the 8400 system will win every gaming benchmark and have a significantly higher price to performance ratio. That's the point.

[Nintson]

Didn't think this would end up in a CPU discussion. Maybe i should add:

I am playing on an 1440p 144hz Monitor and am mainly looking forward to destiny 2.

In the few benchmarks i looked at the i5-8400 seemed like a great deal. Don't really have much clue of overclocking anyway.

[pyrojoe34]

2 minutes ago, Nintson said:

Didn't think this would end up in a CPU discussion. Maybe i should add:

I am playing on an 1440p 144hz Monitor and am mainly looking forward to destiny 2.

In the few benchmarks i looked at the i5-8400 seemed like a great deal.

Yea, you'll be fine. People fixate too much on the whole "bottlenecking" argument without really understanding what it means. Unless you have an extra $100 to burn on the 8600k + Z370 board then go with the 8400 + B350 board. You will be just fine and have a great system.

[Mira Yurizaki]

42 minutes ago, pyrojoe34 said:

Right, but then you're just switching the bottleneck from the CPU to the GPU, one of the two will bottleneck in any situation. The point is that the 8400 will not be a significant bottleneck for the 1080Ti (unless he's playing at like 240Hz), even at 144Hz. If you have to choose between the 8400 (+ B350) with a 1080Ti, or a 8600k (+ Z370) with a 1080, for close to the same price, then the 8400 system will win every gaming benchmark and have a significantly higher price to performance ratio. That's the point.

The point you were commenting on my original post wasn't trying to suggest such. It was only saying that gaming on a higher resolution would shift the bottleneck back to the GPU where it should be.