Thanks, but that benchmark isn't helpful at all. 1) It only test up to DDR5-6000 with low and high timings on AM5, but I was interested in the benefit of higher clockspeeds like 6200, 6400 and much higher. 2) It's only 1080p with a 4090 in memory-sensitive games, that run at 200fps+ without any use to it. Sure it will show high benefits but that doesn't mean I gain anything from DDR5-6000 CL30 in 1440p with a less powerful GPU, which is what most people have.
Again, I am ok with buying DDR5-6000 CL30 or even slightly faster RAM that works out of the box, which is what I did. I am ok with buying cheap RAM and OCing it to DDR5-6x00 CL30 if you have the time, which I don't have.
But unless I see perceptible gains in several games, in low fps for example, in 1440p or 3440x1440, with anything you can't buy for a few bucks above what DDR5-6000 costs, I'm not convinced it's woth my time. Even then, since I don't wan't to spend 1.000€+ on a GPU and thus will never have a 4090 or even 4080, I still will always be GPU-bound in 3440x1440.
And what is the sensible limit of the IF? Did I read right that CPUs with only one CCD are limited in max bandwith, too?
That's one problem I see with memory benchmarks. People only use games they know will scale with memory, even though theyre old and it's totally useless in some cases (who still plays Tomb Raider and what difference does it make if it's 120fps or 200fps minimum?). If they just used the most played contemporal games, to many wouldn't benefit from fast RAM.
He didn't, his is a very common setup. And if this shows that RAM-speed doesn't make any difference to fps, minimum as well as average, in 3440x1440, if you don't have a 4090, then nobody that hasn't should care about memory speed. And there sure as hell won't be any tangible difference above DDR5-6000 CL30 out of the box that would be worth the trouble.
I will admit that any Radeon isn't ideal for Cyberpunk with RT but your argument is only half valid. Here in Germany a 7800X3D costs about 70€ more than a 7700X, which is 50€ above a 7700, which is only 25€ above a 7600X. The cheapes AM5-CPU, 7500F costs 190€ less than a 7800X3D.
The difference between the cheapest 7800XT and 7900XT is 210€, between the cheapest 4070S and 4070TiS 240€. Yes, a 7900GRE and 4070S would be only 50€ and 60€ above 7800XT and 4070 respectively, so I would at least go for those at the moment, but you can't buy that much more GPU-power by skimping on the CPU, even if you chose the cheapes CPU available. A 7800X3D is not a very expensive CPU, but anything from 7900XT and 4070Ti up is a very expensive GPU. If every € counts, you should skimp on every other component, including RAM, to buy the most potent GPU, it gaming is your goal, but the 7800X3D is worth it in most games. It's the only viable reason to choose AM5 for gaming. Anything below has a faster, cheaper Intel-counterpart, if not as efficient. Of course, there are other reasons to consider that are less ovjective.
There's zero reason to buy a 7800X3D for gaming unless you're buying a high end GPU. You can even make this argument for the AM5 platform, which isn't exactly cheap. The same logic you're using to dismiss RAM performance (which you're claiming makes zero difference unless you have a 4090, which is false) also applies to CPU performance, because they're two facets of the same thing. The 7800X3D simply reduces the reliance on fast RAM for high performance the non X3D chips have. Fast CPUs are good for one thing relating to gaming, low and consistent frame times (i.e. high average FPS, high minimum FPS, no stutters).
The point of a fast CPU is to provide more frames than the GPU can render, making you GPU limited.
If you're GPU limited all the time (99% usage while gaming), it's a sign of a well optimized PC. But there's a limit to this. Zero point building a super high performance CPU PC designed to push 2,3,400 frames consistently, if it's paired with a GPU that can't even consistently push 100 FPS at the settings/resolution you're playing at.
I'm a strong proponent against the 7900/X3D because of it's compromise 6+6 design, but if you're GPU limited to a significant extent (as a 7800X3D+7800XT GPU build is, especially at ultrawide), there's practically zero reason to pick the similarly priced 8 core 7800X3D, which gives up multithreaded performance and therefore productivity performance, for a gaming focused design. You might as well get the strong productivity CPU that gives up a little at the upper end of framerates, but is still well above the ~100FPS that the GPU can deliver). Although to be clear, we're talking about a build that gets ~45 FPS here. And the owner of that build is happy with that (I won't argue if this is right or wrong, but this emphasises the fact that CPU is of very little importance at these low frame rates, paired with a 7800XT, you could get an identical gaming experience with a 10400f, a $100 Skylake CPU).
In 90%+ of use cases, excepting CPU limited games such as simulation games (minecraft, racing games etc) or esports games (CS2, overwatch etc), the user is going to be GPU limited. Therefore GPU should be the main priority for budget. Spending $700+ on a platform (7800X3D + AM5 Motherboard + RAM), and $500 on a GPU is silly, objectively. You could make the argument "future proof platform" but that only makes sense when the whole build is high end. If you're doing a mid range build, you don't waste money on "future proof" and frivolities.
I agree, the RTX 4070 Ti Super is expensive at $800. But I guarantee for the budget this build cost, I could make something with a 4070 Ti Super that didn't do any stupid compromises like a quad core i3 or anything. -
While it's true everyone has different requirements for gaming. I.e. some people are happy at 45 FPS, others want to be above 200 all the time. In a discussion about RAM performance, it's completely irrelevant to talk about the 45 FPS scenario, because a literal DDR3 platform would happily chug away at those frame rates in modern games. The criteria for discussing RAM, is the high FPS arena. It's also important to mention that RAM tuning is literally free. It costs nothing.
You can make the efficiency argument for the 7800X3D, but again, just buy a non X3D chip and lower the voltage/frequency, you'll get the same results. After all it's the same silicon just with a different voltage curve that the cache can tolerate.
AusWolf said:
I'm with you on that. The thing is that hardware is my hobby. I tend to massively overspend on stuff that I'm curious about, but have no need for. I would never recommend anyone else to do the same.
This encapsulates my point. I have no issue with AusWolf, because he's clear that he's made these purchasing decisions based on hobbyist interests, rather than logical routes to performance within a set budget.
This is what I'm talking about.
You could literally be using a Zen 2 platform and getting ~95 FPS averages, more than twice the 45 FPS AusWolf is getting.
This is the 2024 test bench, so these averages are based off new games too, not the ones released when Zen 2 was introduced.
This base would give a 125 FPS average in modern games at 1440p, while costing 2/3 the price of just the 7800X3D CPU only.
The rest of the saved money could go straight to GPU.
That's buying new too, I'm sure there's plenty of 10th gen combos kicking around on the second hand market for ~$150.
Even if you want to be safe and base your CPU off Minimum FPS, Skylake/Zen 2 still provide well over 60 FPS.
And what is the sensible limit of the IF? Did I read right that CPUs with only one CCD are limited in max bandwith, too?
Dual CCD chips have identical per core bandwidth. The difference is measurable in benchmarks which are using all cores to write data. Because there are two connections to the IMC, one from each CCD, there is double the write bandwidth. But this does not affect games, because as stated,
per core bandwidth is identical, it's just dual CCD chips have more cores. There's also the inter core latency issue that dual CCD (especially dual six core CCD vs single eight core CCD) chips have, so the bandwidth "reason" isn't really signficant.
The dual CCD X3D chips also post better synthetic RAM benchmarks, because those benchmarks make use of the frequency CCD (which doesn't have VCache). Higher frequency CPUs operate with lower latency to the system memory. However, because the VCache CCD is practically identically clocked (5.05GHz on 7800X3D, 5.15 on 7900 (but six cores not eight), and 5.25 Ghz max boost on 7950X3D for the VCache CCD), in gaming, this is practically meaningless.
