Will RTX 2070 work with my i5 6600 processor?

[Magicdragon]

Hello I've ordered an RTX 2070 and I'm wondering if it will work properly with i5 6600 processor, I've heard that hardware can bottleneck and I'm curious to see if this will happen and what affects this has on gaming, I'm quite new to PC's so any advice would be helpful.

 

[INSTG8R]

Fine...don’t fall for “bottleneck hype”

 

[Lionheart]

It will work fine/okay, some bottlenecks will occur in some of the more current titles though, I'd recommend a GTX 1660 Super or an RTX 2060 non Super TBH.

 

[Jetster]

Yes of course, not even close to a bottleneck

 

[Nuckles56]

Well I had an i5 6500 paired with a 1080ti and I picked up a hell of a lot of performance with the 3700x in quite a few games, so the CPU will hold you back in many cases.

 

[ginokiptoli]

Hello I've ordered an RTX 2070 and I'm wondering if it will work properly with i5 6600 processor, I've heard that hardware can bottleneck and I'm curious to see if this will happen and what affects this has on gaming, I'm quite new to PC's so any advice would be helpful.

I'd recommend a GTX 1660 Super or an RTX 2060 non Super TBH.

 

[mrthanhnguyen]

I wanted to upgraded my gtx970 to 1070 but end up with 2060 super due to good price. Then it bottleneck my 3770k in BF5, so I have to upgraded the entire system.

 

[GlacierNine]

Simple answer: Yes.

Slightly more complex answer: Yes, although in some titles you might see less of a performance uplift than you would if you were making the same change to a system with a stronger CPU.

There's no real reason not to do this upgrade as long as you're being realistic about what you'll get out of it. There are plenty of titles where this is going to give you a *big* boost in performance. There are some where you're going to be CPU limited and it won't make a lot of difference except in how high you can push some of the GPU-specific settings.

 

[Papahyooie]

Yes of course, not even close to a bottleneck

Not necessarily... Depends on the use case. For gaming at high FPS (144hz plus) it is going to bottleneck in games that are highly threaded. Overwatch is a good example. Any quad core without hyperthreading (until at least 7th gen i5) won't be able to hold over 120fps. I had a whole thread about it some time ago. I could have upgraded to a GTX2080 and still wouldn't have gotten over 120fps, but an upgrade to a Ryzen 5 made my 980Ti get 180+.

@OP: Yea, it's going to bottleneck in some games, IF you are looking for high refresh rates. If you game at 60 fps, you're good. If you're trying to do high refresh rates, you're going to need more CPU grunt.

EDIT: (and honestly, if you're not doing high refresh rate, why buy a 2070 at all? Unless you're doing super high resolution, 4k, etc. Then that's fine.)

 

[bug]

Hello I've ordered an RTX 2070 and I'm wondering if it will work properly with i5 6600 processor, I've heard that hardware can bottleneck and I'm curious to see if this will happen and what affects this has on gaming, I'm quite new to PC's so any advice would be helpful.

It depends what resolution you're using. At 4k or QHD the GPU is the bottleneck. At FHD the CPU may hold back the GPU a little, but not enough to worry about it.

 

[Jetster]

Not necessarily... Depends on the use case. For gaming at high FPS (144hz plus) it is going to bottleneck in games that are highly threaded. Overwatch is a good example. Any quad core without hyperthreading (until at least 7th gen i5) won't be able to hold over 120fps. I had a whole thread about it some time ago. I could have upgraded to a GTX2080 and still wouldn't have gotten over 120fps, but an upgrade to a Ryzen 5 made my 980Ti get 180+.

@OP: Yea, it's going to bottleneck in some games, IF you are looking for high refresh rates. If you game at 60 fps, you're good. If you're trying to do high refresh rates, you're going to need more CPU grunt.

EDIT: (and honestly, if you're not doing high refresh rate, why buy a 2070 at all? Unless you're doing super high resolution, 4k, etc. Then that's fine.)

Our definition of Bottleneck is wildly different A 10% hit is not a bottleneck in my opinion. Notice his question. "Will it work" the answer is yes

 

[lexluthermiester]

Hello I've ordered an RTX 2070 and I'm wondering if it will work properly with i5 6600 processor, I've heard that hardware can bottleneck and I'm curious to see if this will happen and what affects this has on gaming, I'm quite new to PC's so any advice would be helpful.

You have no bottleneck issues to worry about. I have an older Xeon X5680 paired with an RTX 2080 and only experience CPU bottlenecking with certain titles.

You'll be fine with your 2070 and an i5-6600! Enjoy!

@OP: Yea, it's going to bottleneck in some games, IF you are looking for high refresh rates.

Nonsense! They'll be just fine.

 

[jormungand]

Personal case here and i even made the thread.
I7 7700k @ 4.5 ghz and @4.8ghz- 16gb 3000 - rtx 2070 [ SUPER ]
1440p 144hz
BATTLEFIELD V BOTTLENECK

Games like AC odyssey, witcher 3 and overwatch no problem.
I still wondering wth is going on in bfv.
6600 and the rtx 2070 should be ok....

question??? what are you planning to play.... ex MP titles/MOBA etc

 

[ppn]

2500K @ 4.0 bottlenecks many games to 60% load of the 2070 not allowing to display more than 40-60 frames regardless of the resolution and texture detail. I think 6600 @ 3.6 is pretty much the same. I am fine with 60, but the 40 drops are ruining the experience for me. needs 6 core at least. or 4 core hyperthreaded @ 5.0 or 8 core at 3.0, anything but simple quad.

 

[lexluthermiester]

2500K @ 4.0 bottlenecks many games to 60% load of the 2070 not allowing to display more than 40-60 frames regardless of the resolution and detail.

If that is happening, you're misconfiguring your setup or something else is holding you back.

 

[hat]

Nonsense! They'll be just fine.

Do note he said, IF you're looking for high refresh rates, which he defined as 144FPS (a common refresh rate for current high refresh monitors). You're not getting that with an i5-6600 in current titles.

If that is happening, you're misconfiguring your setup or something else is holding you back.

Sounds accurate to me for a 2500k, depending on the game, of course. 4.0 isn't quite fast on those old Sandy cores.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Do note he said, IF you're looking for high refresh rates, which he defined as 144FPS (a common refresh rate for current high refresh monitors). You're not getting that with an i5-6600 in current titles.

Ah but a default resolution was not disclosed. Most people are gaming at 1080P, and at that res, they should get close to(if not beyond) 144fps with a i5-6600 and a 2070. I have a friend that had an i5-3570 with his 2070S(before we upgraded him to a Ryzen9) and was getting between 80 to 90FPS in most titles at 1440P with AA locked at 16x in the driver. When I showed him the difference between his settings and AA off, he decided to shut off the AA. Then we dropped to 1080P and the FPS shot through the roof.

Sounds accurate to me for a 2500k, depending on the game, of course. 4.0 isn't quite fast on those old Sandy cores.

Agreed, but 100+FPS can be done with tweaking.

@Magicdragon
If you really want to get the most out of your system, tailor your GPU settings to your liking. Turn down(or off) AntiAliasing as it is a very resource intensive setting for both the GPU and CPU. Also, your 2070 has 8GB of ram onboard and your system will run best if you have 12GB or 16GB of system for most AAA titles that are RAM intensive.

 

[EarthDog]

So... your upgrade will be worth it, OP. If you play at 1080p, that cpu wont hold things back much. Only with games that can use more than the 4 available cores and threads will things be noticeable... which is a few/several titles now with more as time goes on. Higher clocks also help.

Make no mistake about it though, gents, at 1080p a 2500/2600k, even at 5 ghz, puts a glass ceiling on most titles. So does an ancient xeon. Just because it can reach 60fps or 144 doesn't mean there isn't a bottleneck and additional performance cannot be had using a faster processor as well. It just means the bottleneck doesn't affect them for their uses... it is still there. When a tree still falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, it still makes a sound.

Heres a good read where you can see the difference. Granted, this is with a 2080ti, but a 2070 is still a powerful card that can use higher clocks at the lower res.

Redirect Notice

Edit: OP is a post and run... hasn't been back since a day after he posted (and never responded..).

 

[Toothless]

OP probably ain't coming back. Last seen Nov 11th.

 

[lexluthermiester]

OP probably ain't coming back. Last seen Nov 11th.

They might be lurking and taking in the info.

 

[r9]

Fine...don’t fall for “bottleneck hype”

+1

Bump the graphics settings up and the bottleneck problem is solved.

 

[Papahyooie]

All you "there is no bottleneck" types, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. You simply don't fit the use case where it will bottleneck.

As I said.. if you game at high resolutions and/or lower frame rate, it will do just fine. However, it will not be able to hit 144hz in many games, no matter what graphics card you buy, even a 2080. That is the definition of a bottleneck. Doesn't matter if it's 1% or 99%. In my case, I was bottlenecked to the tune of about 20% in a similar situation. Couldn't hold over 120fps minimums no matter how low I set the graphics. Upgraded processor, bam, problem solved. Now I'm doing 144 locked. That's a bottleneck. The fact that you don't notice it does absolutely affect your decision on what to do, but it doesn't affect the fact that the bottleneck is still there, so don't give some "you can't see 144hz anyway" bullcrap.

Bottom line is, IF the OP wants to game at high refresh rate, he will not be able to do so in some titles, because it is a bottleneck. That's not really up for debate, it's a provable fact. What he does with that information is purely up to him. If it doesn't matter, and he doesn't plan on playing at high refresh rates, then roll on with it. But don't attempt to mislead him by saying there is no bottleneck. There most certainly is.

 

[bug]

All you "there is no bottleneck" types, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. You simply don't fit the use case where it will bottleneck.

As I said.. if you game at high resolutions and/or lower frame rate, it will do just fine. However, it will not be able to hit 144hz in many games, no matter what graphics card you buy, even a 2080. That is the definition of a bottleneck. Doesn't matter if it's 1% or 99%. In my case, I was bottlenecked to the tune of about 20% in a similar situation. Couldn't hold over 120fps minimums no matter how low I set the graphics. Upgraded processor, bam, problem solved. Now I'm doing 144 locked. That's a bottleneck. The fact that you don't notice it does absolutely affect your decision on what to do, but it doesn't affect the fact that the bottleneck is still there, so don't give some "you can't see 144hz anyway" bullcrap.

Bottom line is, IF the OP wants to game at high refresh rate, he will not be able to do so in some titles, because it is a bottleneck. That's not really up for debate, it's a provable fact. What he does with that information is purely up to him. If it doesn't matter, and he doesn't plan on playing at high refresh rates, then roll on with it. But don't attempt to mislead him by saying there is no bottleneck. There most certainly is.

I'm sorry, but it's you who is wrong here.
A bottleneck happens when one component holds another one back (it cannot feed it fast enough). The scenario that you keep referring to is not a bottleneck: today's GPUs simply cannot deliver 144fps in most tiles, period. No CPU bottleneck involved.

 

[P4-630]

I had a i5 6500 previously and it was bottlenecking my GTX1070, for example GTA V, I barely could get to 80fps @1440p.
I've upgraded my CPU to a i7 6700K and got much better results, +- 100fps with GTX1070 @1440p.
Now I've got a RTX2070 Super with i7 6700K and now again the CPU is the bottleneck for example in GTA V, WD2.

 

[ShurikN]

To sum it up, in older titles it will work fine. In newer titles it will perform like shit.
And also note the video was done with a 7600K overclocked to 4.8GHz as opposed to that stock 6600 running a whole GHz slower.
It all depends on what you plan to play and at what resolution... If you want to futureproof the system for at least a couple of years, get rid of the 6600.