Build Update - Gaming Rig - Suggestions Please

[one swell foop]

Folks, I'm out of the loop as far as new hardware goes, but am looking to upgrade my PC for the upcoming Half Life Alyx and Cyberpunk 2077 releases. I also play a fair amount of PUBG, but that game is so buggy and error ridden that I know there's no way to guarantee good performance on any build. I'd appreciate suggestions, particularly on Motherboard, RAM, Processor, air cooling, and video card.

Budget: around $1,250 with room to wiggle. If this is unreasonable, please let me know.

What's Staying:
Silverstone FT-02 case (it's a large case, for those not familiar, will support full ATX mobo size)
PSU - Seasonic X750
Hard Drives
27" Catleap 1440p monitor (possibly upgraded to a 4k in the next year or two)

What I Need:
Video Card: Looking at an RTX 2070 Super, but open to other possibilities. May do VR in the future, so want a card capable of that.
Processor/Mobo: On an Intel setup now, I could go Intel or AMD. I want speed and stability. I'm fine with manually overclocking (if that's still a thing, I think there's all sorts of built in turbo-boost stuff built in these days.) Needs to have onboard LAN and soundcard.
Cooling: My case should be able to handle any of the major air coolers. Water Cooling not really an option because there's not a place to mount the radiator.
RAM: What's the standard for a gaming PC these days? I assume 16 gig minimum, but, if 32 gigs is the standard, then I'm fine with that.

I don't really care about RGB or other lighting on any of the needed components as my case doesn't have a window. If you were looking at upgrading under these circumstances, what hardware would you go with?

 

[rhansen5_99]

There is a 32gb kit for $100 right now in the hot deals section. I would think 16gb is pretty much a good amount for a purely gaming right though. If you decide to go AMD 3600MHZ ram will help a bit over the std 3200 or lower. Easy way for cooling is a solid AIO that fits your case. The CPU might be a driver in the discussion, although I am curious why you are jumping away from the haswell chip in your sig, at the 4670k I am thinking was able to get in the high 4.8ghz when overclocking and heat spreader re-lid.

To give you an idea about the first gen ryzen like the 1700x, I went from an i7 4790 and honestly on stock it was almost equal core for core. Now it was nice getting an extra 4c and 8t out of the chip, and that is without OC. So if you could OC, I would think that the 2xxx series would have about the same IPC. Where it gets interesting is the Zen 3 and you might be able to get a bit of IPC gain there. Also newer game engines are starting to eclipse the 4 core requirements. So long story short if you have cash to burn the 9900k is a monster but the 8 core 3700x or the 3600 are good competitors in a price / performance aspect. I would almost stay away from the 12c or 16c chips unless you have other workstation needs.

Finally for VR this is tricky as games are actually coming out to use good in game graphics. It also depends on what headset resolution and refresh you get. The trick here is to get the minimum fps at the resolution of the head set above the refresh rate of the headset. Reprojection in games is not really fun. While the 2070 is a beast going up could help in that area depending on the headset stuff.