# i9-9900k Build



## Agentbb007 (Oct 12, 2018)

My 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some games for my 2080 Ti so it looks like it might be time for a new build.  Here's the parts I've put together, anything you guys would change?  I'm going to use my current storage drives.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

*CPU:* Intel - Core i9-9900K 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor  ($529.99 @ Amazon) 
*CPU Cooler:* NZXT - Kraken X62 Rev 2 98.2 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  ($149.39 @ OutletPC) 
*Motherboard:* Asus - ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO (WI-FI) ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($289.99 @ Amazon) 
*Memory:* G.Skill - Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory  ($139.99 @ Newegg) 
*Case:* NZXT - H700 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case  ($149.99 @ Amazon) 
*Power Supply:* EVGA - SuperNOVA G3 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($85.88 @ OutletPC) 
*Total:* $1345.23
_Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-10-12 12:09 EDT-0400_


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

Aren't you going to reuse parts from your previous build? From your specs like ram, cpu cooler etc? Or did you sell the system?


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## Agentbb007 (Oct 12, 2018)

Xx Tek Tip xX said:


> Aren't you going to reuse parts from your previous build? From your specs like ram, cpu cooler etc? Or did you sell the system?


I'm going to use my old rig at work.  So the only thing I'm going to move to the new build are the 2 SSD's and 1 HDD.  Although now that you mention it maybe I will use my current power supply in the new rig.  It's a EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 P2 - 1000W Platinum, so definitely better then that 850W Gold.


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> maybe I will use my current power supply in the new rig. It's a EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 P2 - 1000W Platinum, so definitely better then that 850W Gold.


Definitely, That part list looks pretty solid and have you tried overclocking on that 6700k before you pull the trigger on a upgrade?


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## dgianstefani (Oct 12, 2018)

Great build, but the memory is a little low end comparatively, maybe check out the Trident Z 3200/14?


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## xorbe (Oct 12, 2018)

Yeah if you're going all in for $800 cpu+mobo with 16 threads, get 2x16GB CL14 memory.


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## Agentbb007 (Oct 12, 2018)

Xx Tek Tip xX said:


> Definitely, That part list looks pretty solid and have you tried overclocking on that 6700k before you pull the trigger on a upgrade?


Thanks! I always like to get a confirmation from someone else   I do have the 6700k overclocked to 4.5 on 1 core and 4.4 on the rest but I could try to squeeze a bit more and see if that removes some of the bottleneck.



dgianstefani said:


> Great build, but the memory is a little low end comparatively, maybe check out the Trident Z 3200/14?


Great thanks for the heads-up, is this the memory you were thinking?
https://pcpartpicker.com/product/gT...b-2-x-8gb-ddr4-3200-memory-f4-3200c14d-16gtzr


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

No offense 

But I can’t believe anyone would be willing to spend $500+ on the i9-9900K when you have cheaper options that are just as capable


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## xorbe (Oct 12, 2018)

Durvelle27 said:


> No offense
> 
> But I can’t believe anyone would be willing to spend $500+ on the i9-9900K when you have cheaper options that are just as capable



Poster also has a 2080 Ti and three g-sync screens, I doubt he cares if the 9900K costs $529.


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## 27MaD (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some games for my 2080 Ti


WTF?


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## Voluman (Oct 12, 2018)

Well nice build, but you can double the memory to 32 gb , maybe aiming the less latency you can like this or higher frequency ones, what your board/needs/budget allow.
You can never have enough ram and storage space


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## R-T-B (Oct 12, 2018)

27MaD said:


> WTF?



In agreement there.

If he has a bottleneck I doubt it's the CPU.

Upgrading us all well and good, but this won't remove any bottlenecks.


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

27MaD said:


> WTF?


Wrong. It's not really "wtf" since it's just what is the extent of the bottleneck, you don't know what he does other than gaming, and the cpu may hold him back, it depends though since at high clocks it a decent cpu.


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## R-T-B (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> it's a bottleneck *in some games* for my 2080 Ti



This is his stated issue and use case.  It's not...  plausible.


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## xkm1948 (Oct 12, 2018)

More like: I have the money and I have the itch for new stuff.    

Ain’t nothing wrong with that. Your money your choice. Let us know how well it overclock OP!


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

Well fair enough, it's worth the cash in that case, If he's running triple 1440p the bottleneck is definitely gpu bound and a 6700k might struggle at 1440p 144hz vs a 8700k on some games.


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## 27MaD (Oct 12, 2018)

Xx Tek Tip xX said:


> Wrong. It's not really "wtf" since it's just what is the extent of the bottleneck, you don't know what he does other than gaming, and the cpu may hold him back, it depends though since at high clocks it a decent cpu.


He says "My 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some (((GAMES)))", that's so freaking weird , even a Sandy bridge I7 won't bottleneck a 2080TI.

I think this CPU can last for another 2-3 years (for gaming).

until GTA 6 comes and makes everyone upgrade to 6-8 cores CPU's.


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## Agentbb007 (Oct 12, 2018)

27MaD said:


> He says "My 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some (((GAMES)))", that's so freaking weird , even a Sandy bridge I7 won't bottleneck a 2080TI.


Eek sorry guys didn't mean to cause such a ruckus.  Here are a couple benchmarks from Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider that I posted on YouTube.  You can see in Tomb Raider around the 2:30 mark CPU hits 99% and GPU drops to about 94% and Assassin's Creed it's pretty much the entire benchmark the GPU hovers around 90%-95%.  Tomb Raider is great because in that the benchmark it says GPU Bound 87% so you can see an actual number.


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## 27MaD (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> Eek sorry guys didn't mean to cause such a ruckus.  Here are a couple benchmarks from Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider that I posted on YouTube.  You can see in Tomb Raider around the 2:30 mark CPU hits 99% and GPU drops to about 94% and Assassin's Creed it's pretty much the entire benchmark the GPU hovers around 90%-95%.  Tomb Raider is great because in that the benchmark it says GPU Bound 87% so you can see an actual number.


Even if the CPU was running at high usage , the 2080TI is running at 80%+ and he is getting around 100 FPS on 2K Ultra-high settings and that's fine.


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## the54thvoid (Oct 12, 2018)

Even the 1080ti was capable of bottlenecking some decent CPU's. With your build, on a 2080ti I'd be looking at any Intel recent CPU that hits 5Ghz. And NVMe drives.


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

27MaD said:


> Even if the CPU was running at high usage , the 2080TI is running at 80%+ and he is getting around 100 FPS on 2K Ultra-high settings and that's fine.


Yeah.. NO.





72 average on a 144hz monitor is just sad and 34 as a minimum must be a pain - he definitely needs an upgrade, Issue is most people here are assuming that he doesn't need an upgrade and it will "last" because they're not taking into account the rest of his setup - go for a 9900k.



27MaD said:


> He says "My 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some (((GAMES)))", that's so freaking weird , even a Sandy bridge I7 won't bottleneck a 2080TI.
> 
> I think this CPU can last for another 2-3 years (for gaming).
> 
> until GTA 6 comes and makes everyone upgrade to 6-8 cores CPU's.


2-3 years yet he can't hit 144fps average on a modern title - your on another planet.


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## 27MaD (Oct 12, 2018)

Xx Tek Tip xX said:


> Yeah.. NO.
> View attachment 108540


I won't lie , the performance of the 6700K in those benchmarks shocked me . i thought it would perform better , but there is no need to upgrade to an I9 , maybe the 8700K would be perfect , or a ryzen 2700x , the I9 is overkill (unless he wants to do other things than gaming).


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

27MaD said:


> I won't lie , the performance of the 6700K in those benchmarks shocked me . i thought it would perform better , but there is no need to upgrade to an I9 , maybe the 8700K would be perfect , or a ryzen 2700x , the I9 is overkill (unless he wants to do other things than gaming).


Nope, an i9 9900k would be the best bet, If he can afford a 2080 ti and 3 g sync screens and all the rest of that hardware and yet alone configure the upgrade with high end components it's clear value isn't a problem here.



27MaD said:


> the performance of the 6700K in those benchmarks shocked me .


Why? Intel has moved up to 6 cores and amd pulled out 8 and intel is looking at moving to 8 cores - with both companies already rocking 6 core+ mainstream processors it's fairly obvious most developers are being paid by the competitors to optimize the game to utilize the higher core count. The issue is that these games take advantage of 6 cores+ leaving 4c8t's in the dust or performing worse than a 6 core cpu.



27MaD said:


> maybe the 8700K would be perfect , or a ryzen 2700x


The 8700k would be a great choice if he wanted value - which isn't the case, and ryzen is out of the question, he is doing high refresh rate gaming and needs the best available - I'm not hating on amd here but if he wanted the best gaming performance from amd or if they were to surpass intel that'd be 7nm which is too long for that 6700k to hold out for.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Xx Tek Tip xX said:


> Yeah.. NO.
> View attachment 108540
> 
> 72 average on a 144hz monitor is just sad and 34 as a minimum must be a pain - he definitely needs an upgrade, Issue is most people here are assuming that he doesn't need an upgrade and it will "last" because they're not taking into account the rest of his setup - go for a 9900k.
> ...


That seems like another underlying issue

As even in reviews the 8700K is not much faster than his 6700K. With a good OC Coffelake offers nothing over Skylake other than more cores


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## 27MaD (Oct 12, 2018)

May him upgrade to whatever he wants .


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## Vayra86 (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> Eek sorry guys didn't mean to cause such a ruckus.  Here are a couple benchmarks from Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider that I posted on YouTube.  You can see in Tomb Raider around the 2:30 mark CPU hits 99% and GPU drops to about 94% and Assassin's Creed it's pretty much the entire benchmark the GPU hovers around 90%-95%.  Tomb Raider is great because in that the benchmark it says GPU Bound 87% so you can see an actual number.



Don't worry about those who don't play on high refresh rates. They think any middle class CPU is capable enough for whatever GPU and 'otherwise you should be gaming at 4K anyway'.

Yes, you have a bottleneck with a 4c CPU in some situations. Yes, moving to CFL or newer will be a major performance boost. This is already true from a 1070 onwards if you speak of single-threaded limitations.

About your part list: I would personally not pick an Intel CPU with HT when there are 8 cores up for grabs. Get a 9700K and clock it to the moon. Physical cores > all.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Plus people commenting stating he’s looking into high refresh gaming 

Do you really think a RTX 2080 Ti can run triple 1440p monitors at 100+ FPS


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## Vayra86 (Oct 12, 2018)

Durvelle27 said:


> Plus people commenting stating he’s looking into high refresh gaming
> 
> Do you really think a RTX 2080 Ti can run triple 1440p monitors at 100+ FPS



Overwatch or any other game that demands high refresh rates?

Most certainly. It runs on a potato. I see 3x ROG SWIFT in his specs.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Vayra86 said:


> Overwatch or any other game that demands high refresh rates?
> 
> Most certainly.


But the games he mentioned are way more taxing than overwatch


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

Durvelle27 said:


> But the games he mentioned are way more taxing than overwatch


He has 3 1440p monitors I think he would've moved to 2080 ti nvlink if it was a gpu limitation.


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## Vayra86 (Oct 12, 2018)

Durvelle27 said:


> But the games he mentioned are way more taxing than overwatch



You don't buy a CPU to play two games. You buy it so that it doesn't stop you in ANY game. Let's not make it a slowchat, there is nothing to win here for you. Facts are facts, a 6700K is a limitation.

@OP as for the memory, I would wait a bit on some in-depth reviews before going big on 3200CL14 just yet. The sweet spot may have moved, this setup applied to Coffee Lake. (Not very likely a big difference, but given the expense of this upgrade, would be annoying to not get the most ideal sticks).

One bit of advice: don't take CPU utilization % too seriously in RTSS or videos. The thing is, there is more in the pipeline than just CPU core loads. RAM is an important bit of the puzzle, but even storage has proven to be a factor in certain situations. Another thing is HT, which will skew things as well because a saturated core will not be using it, but it may show load regardless and HT threads also tend to show 0-10% of overhead when the CPU isn't idle.


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## Deleted member 178884 (Oct 12, 2018)

Vayra86 said:


> You don't buy a CPU to play two games. You buy it so that it doesn't stop you in ANY game.


Damn really? I better get rid of my 7740x because I got it for civ 6 and total war rome 2! /s


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## dirtyferret (Oct 12, 2018)

Vayra86 said:


> You don't buy a CPU to play two games. You buy it so that it doesn't stop you in ANY game.



Nothing worse then a CPU that criticizes your choice in games!


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## R-T-B (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> Eek sorry guys didn't mean to cause such a ruckus.



Don't worry about it, your reasons are your own.  Just want to make sure your expectations are reasonable too.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Vayra86 said:


> You don't buy a CPU to play two games. You buy it so that it doesn't stop you in ANY game. Let's not make it a slowchat, there is nothing to win here for you. Facts are facts, a 6700K is a limitation.
> 
> @OP as for the memory, I would wait a bit on some in-depth reviews before going big on 3200CL14 just yet. The sweet spot may have moved, this setup applied to Coffee Lake. (Not very likely a big difference, but given the expense of this upgrade, would be annoying to not get the most ideal sticks).
> 
> One bit of advice: don't take CPU utilization % too seriously in RTSS or videos. The thing is, there is more in the pipeline than just CPU core loads. RAM is an important bit of the puzzle, but even storage has proven to be a factor in certain situations. Another thing is HT, which will skew things as well because a saturated core will not be using it, but it may show load regardless and HT threads also tend to show 0-10% of overhead when the CPU isn't idle.


Limitation

I don’t see it

8700K barley outpaces it in most games

And with the screen shots he posted it shows more GPU bound than CPU

A RTX 2080 Ti is not enough alone for triple monitors 

If he really wants to upgrade the Best Buy is a Ryzen 2700X or i7-8700K

I’d recommend the 8700K any day over the high priced i9-9900K


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## Agentbb007 (Oct 12, 2018)

Thanks for all the input guys I really appreciate all the comments.  Here is the final parts list I'm going to run with.  I decided to go with the DDR4-3200 with CAS 14.  I also decided to add a 970 M.2 as my primary OS drive instead of using my existing 850 EVO 500GB SSD.  Sorry again if I caused a bit of friction!
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

*CPU:* Intel - Core i9-9900K 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor  ($529.99 @ Amazon) 
*CPU Cooler:* NZXT - Kraken X62 Rev 2 98.2 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  ($149.39 @ OutletPC) 
*Motherboard:* Asus - ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO (WI-FI) ATX LGA1151 Motherboard  ($289.99 @ Amazon) 
*Memory:* G.Skill - Trident Z 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory  ($214.99 @ Newegg) 
*Storage:* Samsung - 970 Evo 500GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive  ($147.99 @ Amazon) 
*Case:* NZXT - H700 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case  ($149.99 @ Amazon) 
*Power Supply:* EVGA - SuperNOVA G3 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($85.88 @ OutletPC) 
*Total:* $1568.22
_Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-10-12 15:35 EDT-0400_


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> Thanks for all the input guys I really appreciate all the comments.  Here is the final parts list I'm going to run with.  I decided to go with the DDR4-3200 with CAS 14.  I also decided to add a 970 M.2 as my primary OS drive instead of using my existing 850 EVO 500GB SSD.  Sorry again if I caused a bit of friction!
> PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
> 
> *CPU:* Intel - Core i9-9900K 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor  ($529.99 @ Amazon)
> ...


This my recommendation 

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/f7RJRJ


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## Vayra86 (Oct 12, 2018)

Agentbb007 said:


> Thanks for all the input guys I really appreciate all the comments.  Here is the final parts list I'm going to run with.  I decided to go with the DDR4-3200 with CAS 14.  I also decided to add a 970 M.2 as my primary OS drive instead of using my existing 850 EVO 500GB SSD.  Sorry again if I caused a bit of friction!
> PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
> 
> *CPU:* Intel - Core i9-9900K 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor  ($529.99 @ Amazon)
> ...



Gonna be beasty. Enjoy  And don't worry about the friction, just another day on TPU 

A point of note might be the Kraken, which is a decent AIO but there are better solutions to be had. Its strong suits are silence (pump noise is very low) and ofcourse the looks...



Durvelle27 said:


> Limitation
> 
> I don’t see it
> 
> ...



Sorry but recommending a last-gen, sub optimal, relatively hot CPU for a new rig where budget is obviously no object, when there are soldered 8 cores available is just madness.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

Vayra86 said:


> Gonna be beasty. Enjoy  And don't worry about the friction, just another day on TPU
> 
> A point of note might be the Kraken, which is a decent AIO but there are better solutions to be had. Its strong suits are silence (pump noise is very low) and ofcourse the looks...
> 
> ...


Last gen is still current and offers the best all around high refresh rate performance. New series won’t offer hardly any gains over current series. 

Heat is tamable upto 4.5GHz easily which is more than enough for today’s games plus longer


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## dgianstefani (Oct 12, 2018)

Yes I would definitely switch motherboards to the z390 Taichi or the Taichi Ultimate, they're the best on the market right now.

Otherwise a very solid build. If money isn't an issue, replace every fan (including on the watercooler) in the build with the Noctua NF-A12x25, this will give the best balance between airflow/pressure and almost absolute silence.


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## Durvelle27 (Oct 12, 2018)

dgianstefani said:


> Yes I would definitely switch motherboards to the z390 Taichi or the Taichi Ultimate, they're the best on the market right now.
> 
> Otherwise a very solid build. If money isn't an issue, replace every fan (including on the watercooler) in the build with the Noctua NF-A12x25, this will give the best balance between airflow/pressure and almost absolute silence.


Yea I’d definitely go with ASRock any day of the week over ASUS


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## John Naylor (Oct 13, 2018)

Not much to say here outside the cooler choice, but added a cupla things to take  a peek at before making final decision

*CPU:* Intel - Core i9-9900K 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor   - If that's what ya want, and budget not an issue, I can't speak against it.  I won't know what I want till after I absorb more test results.   To me the cost is a non issue tho it ill be a deal breaker for many.

*CPU Cooler:* NZXT - Kraken X62 Rev 2 98.2 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  -If you decide to change one thing from this post, I hope this is it.   I won't go near a CLC with an aluminum rad that doesn't even outperform a air cooler at 1/3 the price.   For liability issues, we refuse to install any CLC in our builds... only air coolers, OLC type AIOs and custom loops w/ felx tubing or rigid acrylic.  CLCs have mixed metals creating galvanic corrosion cells, weak pump, not expandable, corrosion inhibitors lose effectiveness after 18 months and no way to replenish, extreme speed fans too noisy.

If ya don't read the whole article, at least look at the pics.
https://martinsliquidlab.wordpress.com/2012/01/24/corrosion-explored/

Go to 23:00 mark...







...

H220X - 65C @ 43 dbA
H240X - 64C @ 46 dbA
Kraken - 69C @ 56 dbA 

The Kraken w/ aluminum rad is 4 C Hotter and 2.5 times louder than the Swiftech all copper / brass unit pre-assembled at factory from custom loop components that can be replaced individually, can also add water block and more components to loop with pump that has 10 times capacity of Kraken.  It's also $4 cheaper

http://www.swiftech.com/drivex3aio.aspx

*Motherboard:* Asus - ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO (WI-FI) ATX LGA1151 Motherboard - The Hero has the highest "RoG tax" up and down the line. To get decent sound (1220) and WiFi you'll need at a minimum the ASUS TUF Z390-Plus Gaming which is waaaaay cheaper.  Looking at a comparison with the Gaming and Hero, its an extra $120 and I don't see that you are getting much for that expenditure.

https://www.neweggbusiness.com/prod...^13-119-153-V15#,9B13-119-150^13-119-150-V07#

Here's some other comparisons with alternate manufacturers

Https://www.neweggbusiness.com/prod...^13-144-211-V08#,9B13-145-091^13-145-091-V08#

*Memory:* G.Skill - Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory  - On buy day, check and see if DDR4-3000 CAS 15 is cheaper which would give equivalent performance ... six of one / half dozen of the other kinda thing.

*Case:* NZXT - H700 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case - Wouldn't be my choice, but why should you like what I like. ? ... if ya want to take last look at alternatives I'd look at the Phanteks Tempered Glass models that handle 3 x 120mm or 2 x 140mm AIOs.  In addition to the better cooling I find them easier to work in and, of course, much better fans.

*Power Supply:* EVGA - SuperNOVA G3 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  - The G3 750 and 1000 both earned 10/10 Build Quality / Performance ratings so no knock on those.  But I tend to go for the Seasonc Focus Plus Gold which also scored 10/10 ... but also garnered an extra 10 for Value.   http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story6&reid=531

However, today the G3 is $10 cheaper so, unless that changes, it's a good way to go.  I  do find the Seasonic's quieter though if ya think that's worth the extra $10.

best of luck w/ new build.



27MaD said:


> He says "My 6700k has served me well but it's a bottleneck in some (((GAMES)))", that's so freaking weird , even a Sandy bridge I7 won't bottleneck a 2080TI.
> 
> I think this CPU can last for another 2-3 years (for gaming).
> 
> until GTA 6 comes and makes everyone upgrade to 6-8 cores CPU's.



Not weird at all... just "normal" ... It's not a big difference generation to generation but it is still there.  If you are saying that you won't get more fps with a newer CPU "on average", that's obviously incorrect....and cores is NOT the reason.  Tho many times an I5, even an older one,  will do better.  But yes, there are some 'weird' instances like Far Cry Primal.  From TPU CPU tests.

Civilization VI 6700k = 64.4 fps
Civilization VI 8700k =71.0 fps

Dishonored 2 6700k = 94.8 fps
Dishonored 2 8700k =104.2 fps

Far Cry Primal 6700k = 111.3fps
Far Cry Primal 8700k =108.1 fps
Far Cry Primal 8600k =111.7fps


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