upgrading gpu in my 6700K-based (aging) PC for 4k 60fps gaming

[Dragaan]

I have a 6700K-based system I build in 2016. Started with a 980Ti, upgraded to 1080Ti in late 2017. I game almost exclusively at 4k (on a 55" 60hz tv), and I don't game lower than 60fps w/ vsync. Surprisingly, my system still handles almost every game I play at 4k 60fps at max or near max. Thing is, I have a growing library of games I've been 'putting off' (or haven't bought yet, in the most extreme cases) until I am able to get a better gpu.

I mostly play indie games, and many are AA quality. I rarely play big blockbuster AAA games. "Beefiest" game I'm playing atm is the next-gen version of Witcher 3, which I'm able to play at 4k + all settings on high with 1 or 2 on Ultra, with FSR enabled and set to balanced (DX12 version, obviously). I get a solid 60 w/ vsync with those settings. I would like to push that up to max settings at 4k, WITHOUT FSR/DLSS if possible (but if I still need it then no big deal). I say that because many of the games I play and plan on playing don't have DLSS/FSR support (yet, or if they do it's low-end). I also play a lot of 4x-type games, which are usually fine, but in the last year or so there have been a few big games that I am unable to play, such as Age of Wonders 4 (which my system can't handle at 1440p even near max/60, and is one of my most-wanted games). I also own RDR2 and God of War on steam, and I'd LOVE to play those at 4k as well. I also play all 3 Total War: Warhammer games at 1440p near max (well, part 1 I can play at 4k near max)and I would LOOOOVE to play those on the highest settings I possibly can at 4k (I'd even be fine with 1440p MAX for TWW3 if I had to..). Oh, one other AAA game I'm planning to play asap once I upgrade is Baldur's Gate 3 (so I can play at 4k/60 - I currently can but only with FSR 1,which is wha they use I think, and obv not close to max).

Anyway, my main question is this - is there a specific GPU I should be looking at considering what I just mentioned? Like I stated, I almost always play at 4k. If a game is specifically demanding or poorly optimized I will sometimes play at 1440p and crank it as high as I can while still being able to lock 60/vsync. But the goal is to continue to play the games I play at 4k/ultra/60. Because my CPU is an aging 4core/8thread (i have it at 4.5 atm but I can push it to 4.7 if needed), does it matter if the gpu is lower clock speed with higher memory bandwith (such as a 3080 12GB edition - ~2ghz clock and 912 GB/s bandwith) or high clock speed lower memory bandwith (such as a 6950XT 16GB - ~2.5ghz and 575 GB/s bandwith)?

Maybe that's a silly question, but I would like to make sure everything runs as smoothly as possible regarding 1% lows and whatnot. I also ask this because the 3 cards I am looking at are a (used) 3080 12GB edition, a (new) 6950 XT, or a (new) 7800 XT (all 3 are between $500-600, which is my absolute limit atm). Is there a big difference pairing any of these with a 6700K system (I have a 750W Platinum EVGA PSU so power should be just fine)? Or do the stats I mentioned above have nothing to do with how 'smooth' the game will run when paired with an older/slower processer. I know there are many folks that will be QUICK to say "You should be upgrading your Platform/CPU, not your GPU!" or "you have a 1080 Ti and anything more is a waste!", but I am not upgrading anything but the gpu at this very moment. I'm also pretty darn certain (can't say I'm 100%, tho...) that I can still get a sizeable performance boost at 4k/60fps with my 6700K system, which has been phenomenal for me these past years. It's my 1080 Ti atm that's failing me... (power/clock speeds dropping, temps rising, etc., can no longer overclock the thing).


I realize I just wrote what looks like a thesis paper..... but this is a pressing question for me and I really trust this site and value the opinions of folks here. I would GREATLY appreciate anyone's time/help in the matter, as I'm hoping to snag the best deal I can on a card prior to the approaching holidays

THank you for your time.

 

[Toothless]

I'll tell you right now that my overclocked 4790k that was matching or beating 6700k chips was holding back a 1080ti. Went to a 3700x and there was a good chunk of improvement on 3440x1440.

That being said, just reading reviews for cards to see the 4k performance is going to be your friend.

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

Depending on the game, even an RX 5600 XT can do 4K 60. The best thing to do, for an older rig like that, is get a card with 16 lanes.

Last I checked, Halo MCC runs fine at 4K 60 with RX 5600 XT. You likely will be stuck with games older than 2022, though.

Halo Infinite has a higher requirement and you will need to drop the res with Navi10, most likely. There are other FPS games that seem to work fine with almost everything.

 

[N/A]

3080 is going to be worth alot less when the 4070 SUPER comes out in January and draws double the power. Just replace the thermal paste and pads and try to hold out for longer. Unless you have a good deal now that prompted you to act reckless. 4K could demand more than 12GB in the future. So that may be the deciding factor.

 

[Dragaan]

I'm definitely upgrading before christmas. And, yea, since I only play at 4k (and maybe it has to do with the types of games I play - I almost never play AAA games and I have NEVER seen my card use more than 7gigs or so of VRAM in any game I play, even at 4k MAX, and it's usually under 5gigs) ,my setup certainly hasn't been holding me back much (besides the games I mentioned being 'on hold' for now). I've also looked over all the charts, etc. as far as benchmarks @ 4k and whatnot. I was more wondering if there was a difference between going with higher mem bandwith (slightly older card) or higher clock speed (and newer card) when pairing with my 6700K. Charts I've seen show the 6950 on top for 4k and 1440p, although the 3080 12gb is RIGHT there with the 6950 at 4k, but even the 7800 XT isn't that far behind (and it's newer tech so may improve, esp with FSR3?). What bothered me is that the 6950 shoots way up in the 1440 charts (up above the 3080 and even 3090). I don't play at high framerates and I rarely play at 1440, so I was making me think the 3080 12gb was more 'suited' for 4k. But that's why I'm here...

At the moment it's almost certainly going to be one of the 3 I mentioned. If there's zero difference then I may just go with one of the AMD cards, as I don't have to buy used and they have slightly newer tech. Deciding between the 6950XT at $600 or the 7800XT at $520ish is tough, though... I know the 7800 XT is rdna3 and has the AI accelerators or w/e (which I guess are equiv to nvidia's tensor cores, even though I thought rdna2 cards already had an amd equiv. to those, which is why I thought they worked better with FSR2 than a card like my 1080Ti), but the 7800 XT is also not a flagship card, while the 6950 is/was (and in some ways the 3080 12gb, just going by the bus width, etc). I've noticed that flagship cards seem to hold out much longer than cards marketed from teh start as more midrange-y, which is why I'm even considering the 6950 xt when the 7800 xt is an option (although, unlike with nvidia's higher end cards, both the 7800xt and 6950xt have the same bus width - and it's only 256bit and G6 commpared to the 3080 12gb's 384bit G6X).

I'd have already decided on the 7800 XT if it wasn't for that fact about 'flagship' cards (for gaming at 4k) seeming to perform better and endure longer, but like I said I am also wondering if anyone knows whether the whole gpu clock speed vs memory bandwith when paired with an older CPU like the 6700K makes a difference at all in terms of smoother framerates.

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

I'd have already decided on the 7800 XT if it wasn't for that fact about 'flagship' cards (for gaming at 4k) seeming to perform better and endure longer, but like I said I am also wondering if anyone knows whether the whole gpu clock speed vs memory bandwith when paired with an older CPU like the 6700K makes a difference at all in terms of smoother framerates.

If your CPU is the bottleneck, then you probably will see less frame rate increase at 1080p. That doesn't tend to show much at 4K.

 

[Dragaan]

Right. If I were looking to game at 1080p (or any resolution) but at >60fps then I would just wait a year or two until I end up building a new PC (can't afford that now). There's no way my PC would handle 120+ fps even at 1080p for AAA games, or 1440 for indie games, and if it did it would struggle and it wouldn't be pretty.

Only reason I'm upgrading the gpu once more is because I REALLY need a performance boost (of maybe 10-15fps) and it's exclusively at 60fps. For those games I play that DO have FSR (or DLSS) support, that alone would be massive if I get a card that NATIVELY allows for +15fps but, also, isn't the new frame generation tech supposed to actually enable you to get past a cpu bottleneck in games that have full DLSS3 support (although I know this is 40series+) or FSR3 support? (edit: my main focus is better rasterization performance; native gains at 4k. any FSR/DLSS/frameGeneration is just icing)

 

[Toothless]

I'll say that yes the 6950XT doesn't have the AI frames unless AMD decides to throw them out, but man does that card chew through anything you throw at it. It's worth the price.

 

[Dragaan]

I'll say that yes the 6950XT doesn't have the AI frames unless AMD decides to throw them out, but man does that card chew through anything you throw at it. It's worth the price.

Oooh, yeah. I've seen what people have to say about that card in real world reviews, and seen benchmarks. $600 is a steal, imo (I can't BELIEVE it was the exact same price last christmas - same model, on amazon). Whether it's a better option for my older (but still goin strong) PC than the other cards is what I'm pondering.

 

[Toothless]

Oooh, yeah. I've seen what people have to say about that card in real world reviews, and seen benchmarks. $600 is a steal, imo (I can't BELIEVE it was the exact same price last christmas - same model, on amazon). Whether it's a better option for my older (but still goin strong) PC than the other cards is what I'm pondering.

Mine is the XFX brand one. Coil whine on compute loads but other than that I've loved it. A bit sad it's sitting on storage right now but I need the heat from the other cards right now.

 

[N/A]

There is no reason to consider 6950 when 7800 XT exists, can be overclocked 10% and 100 W less power.
but I would go with 3080 /12 under powered to 250 W and anti aliasing off just because nvidia or a 4070.
don't get lost in Vram bandwidth versus L3 cache versus cpu bottlenecks. it's very entangled as a subject.

 

[Vayra86]

7800XT > RDNA2 and certainly anything Ampere.. Featureset, power, support are all better. Price should be equal and you have 16GB.

 

[Dragaan]

There is no reason to consider 6950 when 7800 XT exists, can be overclocked 10% and 100 W less power.
but I would go with 3080 /12 under powered to 250 W and anti aliasing off just because nvidia or a 4070.
don't get lost in Vram bandwidth versus L3 cache versus cpu bottlenecks. it's very entangled as a subject.

I would love to go with the 3080 12gb, but I would HAVE to get one used, and it's very tricky trying to find someone honest who's selling one that's not been sold as "used/refurbished" multiple times or have some other issues (not saying I can't do it - it's just a lot trickier.....). I've always used nvidia and I hate to give up Afterburner and get used to a whole new driver 'ecosystem' and way of overclocking/UNDERvolting.. 4070 was my first consideration, but with just how wimpy the card is without DLSS3 backing it up (compared to what else is out there and, quite frankly, what it SHOULD have been), I just won't consider it any longer since the VAST majority of my games are indie/AA and will not have DLSS, let alone DLSS3+.

Mine is the XFX brand one. Coil whine on compute loads but other than that I've loved it. A bit sad it's sitting on storage right now but I need the heat from the other cards right now.

Yea, that's the one. There's an absolutely glowing review on amazon for that card by someone who went with it after first considering a 4070, then being blown away by it, then buying a 4070 anyway for a 2nd rig and after like 3 days returning it for a 2nd 6950, lol.

Wanna sell it?

7800XT > RDNA2 and certainly anything Ampere.. Featureset, power, support are all better. Price should be equal and you have 16GB.

6950 blows the doors off the 7800 XT in raw rasterization performance at all resolutions. I'm a bit afraid of that one being a BIT too much for my PC. But in the end I think it would be a good choice, as would the other 2. Only thing 7800 XT has is the lower power requirements and the "AI accelerators", which we really don't know hwo much they are going to help in gaming (yea, I've read the 200% "in AI-based workloads" bit several times) and FSR3 hasn't really shown us much yet (as far as I know?)

It IS newer, though... and so I expect driver support to be better way down the line? And, who knows, maybe FSR3 WILL do big things with rdna3 (although it should work with any card). it's also $100 cheaper and has the same amount, bus width, type of ram , but it's faster clocked than the 6950 (so ~70 MB/s faster , I believe)

I have another question for you guys, though. I've heard people say things like, you can get away with less ram if it's much faster. Is that not true to some degree? Isn't the 3080 12GB's 912 MB/s (384-bit bus gddr6x) going to be nearly as good as the AMD cards' 16GB GDDR6 (256-bit bus) with 550/625 MB/s? Or is that not true at ALL? (edit: fwiw, I don't think I'll EVER use more than 10 or 12GB, even if it were GDDR5, in any game I play until much later down the line and after I've upgraded the rest of the rig)

 

[Vayra86]

6950 blows the doors off the 7800 XT in raw rasterization performance at all resolutions. I'm a bit afraid of that one being a BIT too much for my PC. But in the end I think it would be a good choice, as would the other 2. Only thing 7800 XT has is the lower power requirements and the "AI accelerators", which we really don't know hwo much they are going to help in gaming (yea, I've read the 200% "in AI-based workloads" bit several times) and FSR3 hasn't really shown us much yet (as far as I know?)

It IS newer, though... and so I expect driver support to be better way down the line? And, who knows, maybe FSR3 WILL do big things with rdna3 (although it should work with any card). it's also $100 cheaper and has the same amount, bus width, type of ram , but it's faster clocked than the 6950 (so ~70 MB/s faster , I believe)

I have another question for you guys, though. I've heard people say things like, you can get away with less ram if it's much faster. Is that not true to some degree? Isn't the 3080 12GB's 912 MB/s (384-bit bus gddr6x) going to be nearly as good as the AMD cards' 16GB GDDR6 (256-bit bus) with 550/625 MB/s? Or is that not true at ALL? (edit: fwiw, I don't think I'll EVER use more than 10 or 12GB, even if it were GDDR5, in any game I play until much later down the line and after I've upgraded the rest of the rig)

There is also a price difference, isn't there? You get some odd 20% raster perf in exchange for somewhat under 20% in price gap (600 ish vs 500). And that's being lucky on a 6950XT deal I reckon, too. You're going to pay more $/FPS over time because the 6950XT will use more power, so that card is only really an advantage if you're going to pull 100% out of it right away. And if price is no object, get a 7900XT or better, instead, that is, if they're also on a good price point, like 700 - 750 ish.

However, they're all going to present you with a CPU bottleneck. That's why I'd recommend a 7800XT now, save the extra cash for later and upgrade again. The 6950XT isn't a unicorn right now, at least not ever since RDNA3 got discounted. RDNA2, and especially the higher end chips also still suffer from the transient power spikes and RDNA3 does not. The PSU requirement therefore is lower on RDNA3, which has advantages now but also when you want to resell the card, its simply easier to slot into systems.

Some things to consider In the end there isn't a wrong choice here.

I have another question for you guys, though. I've heard people say things like, you can get away with less ram if it's much faster. Is that not true to some degree? Isn't the 3080 12GB's 912 MB/s (384-bit bus gddr6x) going to be nearly as good as the AMD cards' 16GB GDDR6 (256-bit bus) with 550/625 MB/s? Or is that not true at ALL? (edit: fwiw, I don't think I'll EVER use more than 10 or 12GB, even if it were GDDR5, in any game I play until much later down the line and after I've upgraded the rest of the rig)

Bullshit. The Fury X 4GB didn't get away with 512GB/s either. If a game wants 6GB, its perf is in the shitter, while the 980ti 6GB happily whistles and waves goodbye (on 336GB/s...). Similarly, the 980ti is now truly end of life as is the 1060 6GB, since games really do demand the full 8GB now. You can be a few hundred MBs short, but not much more, and then you're not on any kind of exotic resolution or setting. And depending on what you're playing, 8GB is also moving to the dust bin now or anytime soon.

This is just 3080 owners trying to talk themselves into thinking they have the best Ampere card. They might, actually. But 10GB is still too little; the 12GB version though isn't a bad call. It does play better than Ada's abysmal 4070 when memory is pushed, this is true. But is this really a duo you want to choose between? Subpar and subpar? Just get a 16GB card and be done with it. Bandwidth will not always carry you through lacking memory capacity. Its highly game dependant. Sufficient bandwidth and VRAM balanced out with a solid core perf is what good GPUs look like. Sufficient hardware resources always matter. Cards also have more cache now. And it helps. But not always.

Also, keep in mind VRAM usage is actually inversely proportional to CPU performance: If you move to 4K, the CPU load goes down, as the FPS go down because you are more GPU constrained... and your VRAM usage will go up. So you might very well be using more than 12GB on that build. Its not going to make or break that much in 2023, I reckon; but '24/25? Likely. And if you want games to look better than their console counterparts, you're going to find yourself over 12GB even more often today.

 

[jesdals]

Dont know if your Hyperthreading makes the difference but my 6400 basically bootleknecks my 6900XT but still AM4 and ddr4 reuse might still be a big upgrade / cost - but I you have money for both you could start with the GPU and buy a 6950xt and perhaps look at deals for 6800xt in Denmark there was some realy nice deals for those this weekend

 

[Keullo-e]

Sold my 1080 Ti last year to my friend who has a 6700K @ 4.5GHz, wouldn't pair anything faster to an old 4c/8t CPU myself.

 

[Vayra86]

Sold my 1080 Ti last year to my friend who has a 6700K @ 4.5GHz, wouldn't pair anything faster to an old 4c/8t CPU myself.

Yeah I lose up to about 20-25% on this 7900XT.. And that's running on an 8700K 6c/12t.

 

[Hyderz]

Op if you decide on 6950xt your psu I think should be able to handle but from what I’ve learned that the 6950xt has this transient spikes that may or may not trigger your psu OCP

 

[Toothless]

Yea, that's the one. There's an absolutely glowing review on amazon for that card by someone who went with it after first considering a 4070, then being blown away by it, then buying a 4070 anyway for a 2nd rig and after like 3 days returning it for a 2nd 6950, lol.

Wanna sell it?

I'm keeping my baby with how good of a deal I got for it.

 

[Dragaan]

There is also a price difference, isn't there? You get some odd 20% raster perf in exchange for somewhat under 20% in price gap (600 ish vs 500). And that's being lucky on a 6950XT deal I reckon, too. You're going to pay more $/FPS over time because the 6950XT will use more power, so that card is only really an advantage if you're going to pull 100% out of it right away. And if price is no object, get a 7900XT or better, instead, that is, if they're also on a good price point, like 700 - 750 ish.

However, they're all going to present you with a CPU bottleneck. That's why I'd recommend a 7800XT now, save the extra cash for later and upgrade again. The 6950XT isn't a unicorn right now, at least not ever since RDNA3 got discounted. RDNA2, and especially the higher end chips also still suffer from the transient power spikes and RDNA3 does not. The PSU requirement therefore is lower on RDNA3, which has advantages now but also when you want to resell the card, its simply easier to slot into systems.

Some things to consider In the end there isn't a wrong choice here.


Bullshit. The Fury X 4GB didn't get away with 512GB/s either. If a game wants 6GB, its perf is in the shitter, while the 980ti 6GB happily whistles and waves goodbye (on 336GB/s...). Similarly, the 980ti is now truly end of life as is the 1060 6GB, since games really do demand the full 8GB now. You can be a few hundred MBs short, but not much more, and then you're not on any kind of exotic resolution or setting. And depending on what you're playing, 8GB is also moving to the dust bin now or anytime soon.

This is just 3080 owners trying to talk themselves into thinking they have the best Ampere card. They might, actually. But 10GB is still too little; the 12GB version though isn't a bad call. It does play better than Ada's abysmal 4070 when memory is pushed, this is true. But is this really a duo you want to choose between? Subpar and subpar? Just get a 16GB card and be done with it. Bandwidth will not always carry you through lacking memory capacity. Its highly game dependant. Sufficient bandwidth and VRAM balanced out with a solid core perf is what good GPUs look like. Sufficient hardware resources always matter. Cards also have more cache now. And it helps. But not always.

Also, keep in mind VRAM usage is actually inversely proportional to CPU performance: If you move to 4K, the CPU load goes down, as the FPS go down because you are more GPU constrained... and your VRAM usage will go up. So you might very well be using more than 12GB on that build. Its not going to make or break that much in 2023, I reckon; but '24/25? Likely. And if you want games to look better than their console counterparts, you're going to find yourself over 12GB even more often today.

There is a price difference. I was hoping the 7800 XT would go SLIGHTLY below $500 USD on black friday or cyber monday deals (at least ONE model...), but I'm starting to think, if anything, it's going to go up shortly. You can get them for $500 and no less from what I can tell, although there are some very nice cards on sale at or around 500 (like 520 or 530) that include the new Avatar game (which I probably won't like but I would LOVE to LOOK AT, lol). Not sure if games come with the 6950 XT, but there are at least 2 models that are not hard to get at $599 (one of them was even 599 a year ago at xmas... i needed a new TV, tho:x ). The price difference is under $100.

As for the VRAM usage, I realize if a game has grotesquely-large textures, etc. then obviously memory bandwith shouldn't allow you to get away with a smaller size of VRAM. Thing is, for me, the last (and ONLY) game I've EVER played that used 8gb, or a little more, of VRAM was Shadow of War like 5 years ago. And it used that much even at 1080p (according to the game, I didn't actually play in 1080p and look at afterburner stats the way I do with every other game I play). I can't remember ever using more than 6 or 7GB in any game I really play, and that's a true rarity (maybe TW:WH1 @ 4k or when i ATTEMPTED part 3 at 4k, lol). I know blockbuster AAA titles have used large amounts of VRAM (8ish+?) for a few years now, but I don't generally play those. Next Gen witcher3 at 4k high/ultra (with 'ghetto' FSR, as I call it on my 1080 Ti, enabled) uses ~6GB tops so far (abotu the same as peak usage in the original game at 4k/ultra, which ii played for 1k hours on my 1080 ti).

Anyway, the way people would try and argue the point I was questioning in my last post (about lower vram, higher bandwith) I thought was more for games that aren't actually using ENORMOUS chunks of data at all times in the ram, but still store tons of things in VRAM for when they are used? And the argument would be that with a much higher bandwith card, the system would be able to move things in and out at a much faster rate, therefore minimizing the need to 'pre-load' the VRAM? Now that I'm typing this, I guess even if that WERE true at ALL it wouldn't matter nearly as much as cache sizes are WAY larger than even a few years ago. I believe the 6950 XT has like 128MB and I think the 7800 XT has half that (although it also has faster clocked ram and higher bandwith, new tech/rdna3, etc.).


Thank you guys for allt he responses. I gather, from what's being said, that my question regarding higher gpu clocks with lower bandwith Vs. lower gpu clocks w/ much higher bandwith having any discernable advantage when paired with an older CPU (such as a 4.7ghz 6700K) in terms of framerate stability isn't really a valid question (doesn't work like that, etc.). So if none of that matters in the least, I think I may just go with the 7800 XT. I would honestly rather have the 6950, I think..., but budget IS a concern and the fact that the 7800 XT MIGHT give it an edge even at 4k in the few games I do play that hvae solid FSR support (Baldurs Gate 3, Witcher 3, God of War, etc., and I think hopefully total war warhammer3) with its "tensor cores" (ai accelerators or w/e amd calls them) is nudging me more and more towards the newer, cheaper card. Too bad it's not Nvidia, tho.... I would much rather have an nvidia gpu, but the 40-series cards are just NOT made with gamers like me in mind (at least not the sub $900 ones). If anyone has a 3080 12gb that they'd be willing to sell fairly cheap, PM me and I may be interested. Or a 6950 for that matter )

Thanks again. Sorry I type so much.

Sold my 1080 Ti last year to my friend who has a 6700K @ 4.5GHz, wouldn't pair anything faster to an old 4c/8t CPU myself.

what about an old 6c/12t CPU? My brother wants a new card, too. He also has a 1080 Ti (EVGA limited Black FTW - one of hte only 1080 Ti's with overclocked memory). I told him he may only see benefits with DLSS/FSR (and frame generation), and not so much natively, but he doesn't care. His goal is to play BG3 @ 4k/60 (and he's veyr anal about ANY dips in framerate). He has a 10-yr old X-class intel build with what I believe was their first mainstream/enthusiast 6c/12t chip, i think it's the 3930K or something. He rarely uses his PC these days and will be upgrading his PC sooner than I will be, but when he did use it last he was getting 1440/ultra/60 in AAA games he plays like Remnant, that Star Wars Jedi game from like 2020, and Sekiro. May have even played one of them higher than 1440. So, at 60fps at least, these older flagship systems DO seem to hold up decently.

I assume my 6700K is stronger in new titles than his 3930K, but I could be wrong? I haven't really researched it. But he plays AAA games almost exclusively, and I thought he could actually benefit a decent amount from DLSS or FSR, especially with frame generation/interpolation (with a 4070 or 7800 XT).

 

[Toothless]

There is a price difference. I was hoping the 7800 XT would go SLIGHTLY below $500 USD on black friday or cyber monday deals (at least ONE model...), but I'm starting to think, if anything, it's going to go up shortly. You can get them for $500 and no less from what I can tell, although there are some very nice cards on sale at or around 500 (like 520 or 530) that include the new Avatar game (which I probably won't like but I would LOVE to LOOK AT, lol). Not sure if games come with the 6950 XT, but there are at least 2 models that are not hard to get at $599 (one of them was even 599 a year ago at xmas... i needed a new TV, tho:x ). The price difference is under $100.

As for the VRAM usage, I realize if a game has grotesquely-large textures, etc. then obviously memory bandwith shouldn't allow you to get away with a smaller size of VRAM. Thing is, for me, the last (and ONLY) game I've EVER played that used 8gb, or a little more, of VRAM was Shadow of War like 5 years ago. And it used that much even at 1080p (according to the game, I didn't actually play in 1080p and look at afterburner stats the way I do with every other game I play). I can't remember ever using more than 6 or 7GB in any game I really play, and that's a true rarity (maybe TW:WH1 @ 4k or when i ATTEMPTED part 3 at 4k, lol). I know blockbuster AAA titles have used large amounts of VRAM (8ish+?) for a few years now, but I don't generally play those. Next Gen witcher3 at 4k high/ultra (with 'ghetto' FSR, as I call it on my 1080 Ti, enabled) uses ~6GB tops so far (abotu the same as peak usage in the original game at 4k/ultra, which ii played for 1k hours on my 1080 ti).

Anyway, the way people would try and argue the point I was questioning in my last post (about lower vram, higher bandwith) I thought was more for games that aren't actually using ENORMOUS chunks of data at all times in the ram, but still store tons of things in VRAM for when they are used? And the argument would be that with a much higher bandwith card, the system would be able to move things in and out at a much faster rate, therefore minimizing the need to 'pre-load' the VRAM? Now that I'm typing this, I guess even if that WERE true at ALL it wouldn't matter nearly as much as cache sizes are WAY larger than even a few years ago. I believe the 6950 XT has like 128MB and I think the 7800 XT has half that (although it also has faster clocked ram and higher bandwith, new tech/rdna3, etc.).


Thank you guys for allt he responses. I gather, from what's being said, that my question regarding higher gpu clocks with lower bandwith Vs. lower gpu clocks w/ much higher bandwith having any discernable advantage when paired with an older CPU (such as a 4.7ghz 6700K) in terms of framerate stability isn't really a valid question (doesn't work like that, etc.). So if none of that matters in the least, I think I may just go with the 7800 XT. I would honestly rather have the 6950, I think..., but budget IS a concern and the fact that the 7800 XT MIGHT give it an edge even at 4k in the few games I do play that hvae solid FSR support (Baldurs Gate 3, Witcher 3, God of War, etc., and I think hopefully total war warhammer3) with its "tensor cores" (ai accelerators or w/e amd calls them) is nudging me more and more towards the newer, cheaper card. Too bad it's not Nvidia, tho.... I would much rather have an nvidia gpu, but the 40-series cards are just NOT made with gamers like me in mind (at least not the sub $900 ones). If anyone has a 3080 12gb that they'd be willing to sell fairly cheap, PM me and I may be interested. Or a 6950 for that matter )

Thanks again. Sorry I type so much.


what about an old 6c/12t CPU? My brother wants a new card, too. He also has a 1080 Ti (EVGA limited Black FTW - one of hte only 1080 Ti's with overclocked memory). I told him he may only see benefits with DLSS/FSR (and frame generation), and not so much natively, but he doesn't care. His goal is to play BG3 @ 4k/60 (and he's veyr anal about ANY dips in framerate). He has a 10-yr old X-class intel build with what I believe was their first mainstream/enthusiast 6c/12t chip, i think it's the 3930K or something. He rarely uses his PC these days and will be upgrading his PC sooner than I will be, but when he did use it last he was getting 1440/ultra/60 in AAA games he plays like Remnant, that Star Wars Jedi game from like 2020, and Sekiro. May have even played one of them higher than 1440. So, at 60fps at least, these older flagship systems DO seem to hold up decently.

I assume my 6700K is stronger in new titles than his 3930K, but I could be wrong? I haven't really researched it. But he plays AAA games almost exclusively, and I thought he could actually benefit a decent amount from DLSS or FSR, especially with frame generation/interpolation (with a 4070 or 7800 XT).

6700k for games is easily stronger than a 3930K.

 

[damric]

Of the 3 options, I would choose the new RX 7800XT, because it's more efficient, and it's going to have more features than the RX 6950XT. I wouldn't even consider the RTX 3080. I had one and it was meh.

 

[mb194dc]

If the gpu is the bottleneck at 4k your CPU needs to be just good enough to keep it utilised. Cpu reviews are always done with 4090 which can be incredibly misleading depending on your use case with a much slower card.

I have a 6800xt with a 4790k at 4.7 and still seen no reason to change it as getting min 60fps at 4k in all games I play min and that's fine for my uses.

 

[Dragaan]

If the gpu is the bottleneck at 4k your CPU needs to be just good enough to keep it utilised. Cpu reviews are always done with 4090 which can be incredibly misleading depending on your use case with a much slower card.

I have a 6800xt with a 4790k at 4.7 and still seen no reason to change it as getting min 60fps at 4k in all games I play min and that's fine for my uses.

What were you using prior to the 6800xt? How much improvement did you see? Also, do you use FSR usually? Or always go native if possible?

And, yeah man, regarding fps... for one thing I only game on TVs nowadays, so 60fps is max for me. Reason I don't mind it so much is I use interpolation on my TV and that makes it seem like ~90fps - really smooth on such a big screen, especially in slower games like 4X/Civ type games where you kinda pan around (which I use a steam controller for and it's been a literal game changer for me since I started doing that in 2016 w/ my TV). Until I get around to a TOTAL (and expensive) overhaul and new build maybe 2 years down the road, 60fps w/ vsync and I'm golden.

This PC cost me nearly 3grand to build and that was in early 2016 (with the initial 980 Ti); I'm squeezin it for all I can - i's been on 24/7/360 for nearly 8 years. I say 360 because it's turned off for maybe 5 days out of the year, and it's been close to FLAWLESS (I htought I'd be re-installing windows10 every few months or so since I am anal about my OS being clean and lean, but to my shock Win10 has been so great I never had to do it ONCE). I love this PC. :|

 

[Keullo-e]

This PC cost me nearly 3grand to build and that was in early 2016 (with the initial 980 Ti); I'm squeezin it for all I can - i's been on 24/7/360 for nearly 8 years. I say 360 because it's turned off for maybe 5 days out of the year, and it's been close to FLAWLESS (I htought I'd be re-installing windows10 every few months or so since I am anal about my OS being clean and lean, but to my shock Win10 has been so great I never had to do it ONCE). I love this PC. :|

Funny to think how many upgrades I've had in that time myself.

Pentium G4400 -> G4560 -> 7600K -> 7700K -> 5820K -> R5 2600 -> R5 3600 -> R7 5800X
R9 290 -> GTX 780 Ti -> GTX 970 SLI -> GTX 980 -> GTX 780 -> R9 290 CF -> GTX 980 Ti -> GTX 1080 Ti -> RX 6700 XT

I guess that it's the benefit of having a high-end system is that you don't need to upgrade so often unlike I do.