New graphics card in old system?

[BlackBriar]

I have been looking to upgrade my entire system with the release of Haswell / Nvidia 780, but have thus far been unable to get a decent price for my entire system.

My back-up is to replace my graphics card (AMD 5970) with either one or two 780s or a 7990. My other system specs are below, and I am just wondering how much my gaming performance is likely to be hindered by the older components in my current system:

i7 920
Asus P6T Deluxe V2 (X58)
6gb DDR 3 @ 1600
HX750w Corsair Power supply.

Would Haswell / new mobo make an enormous difference in gaming? Grateful for any thoughts.....

 

[NinjaGnat]

What resolution do you game at?

If you're on an 1920x1080 monitor, don't bother upgrading. At higher resolutions or multiple monitors, a 780 could really show it's worth, but otherwise you're talking spending $650 to just get higher grained anti-aliasing.

 

[Araxie]

Your 920 at stock speed will not even bottleneck those cards.. But you will increase noticeable the performance running your 920 at moderate OC... Do not worry too much for slow down the performance on any new cards... Go with the GTX780 for single monitor setup.. Or GTX680SLI for multi monitor... Why 680..? Cuz now with the release of 780 the price will drop nicely...

 

[Joseph F]

If you overclock that 920 to 3.5+ GHZ, you should be just fine when it comes to CPU bottlenecks. Haswell probably won't be a major improvement in performance over Ivy Bridge with most programs, so if you don't think it's worth upgrading to IVB, it's probably not going to be worth upgrading to Haswell.

 

[BlackBriar]

Many thanks for all the comments. My main concern was whether PCI Express 2.0 and the older chipset would hold back the 780 (or two 780s if I decide to go wild) significantly when compared to the PCI Express 3.0 of the newer motherboards?

I haven't overclocked my 920 yet (know idea why not), so in the meantime I will get cracking on that.

 

[Joseph F]

A full 16-lane PCI Express 2.0 bus probably won't reduce a single GTX 780's performance more than 3% under that of a 16-lane PCI Express 3.0 bus. I would imagine that if you were to get two of them, you wouldn't have any significant bus bottlenecks if both of them would be connected to the northbridge via 16-lane buses. If one of them is going to be connected via an 8-lane bus, it's probably time to switch to a newer platform.

 

[Araxie]

Many thanks for all the comments. My main concern was whether PCI Express 2.0 and the older chipset would hold back the 780 (or two 780s if I decide to go wild) significantly when compared to the PCI Express 3.0 of the newer motherboards?

I haven't overclocked my 920 yet (know idea why not), so in the meantime I will get cracking on that.

Be relax... You won't receive any bottleneck issue or. A badly performance hit issue for run those card on pci-e 2.0. As i said above, you will notice a increment on the performance by oc'ing your chip, but even at stock speed you will not bottleneck those cards...

A full 16-lane PCI Express 2.0 bus probably won't reduce a single GTX 780's performance more than 3% under that of a 16-lane PCI Express 3.0 bus. I would imagine that if you were to get two of them, you wouldn't have any significant bus bottlenecks if both of them would be connected to the northbridge via 16-lane buses. If one of them is going to be connected via an 8-lane bus, it's probably time to switch to a newer platform.

I think nor even reduce the performance more than 1%. The extra bus width of the PCI-E 3.0 show his beneffits when 3 cards or more with a pretty width bus and high bandwidth.. But even at pci-e 2.0 x8 those card will be fine.. In any platform that he move we will get dual pcie2.0/3.0 x8 when connecting both cards... At most, in most expensives motherboards that will allow to receive a x16x8x8 with tri-sli or tri-Fire and that thanks to PCI-3.0.. But always on dual cards SLI or Xfire he will receive x8-x8. So do not tell he have to move to another platform..

 

[cannondale06]

sorry but a stock 920 would be huge bottleneck neck for 780 sli at 1920. even a single 780 would be held back in some games without overclocking that cpu. heck even my 2500k could not keep framerates above 60fps in all games. I would just get a single 780 and oc that 920 if at 1920.

 

[Araxie]

sorry but a stock 920 would be huge bottleneck neck for 780 sli at 1920. even a single 780 would be held back in some games without overclocking that cpu. heck even my 2500k could not keep framerates above 60fps in all games. I would just get a single 780 and oc that 920 if at 1920.

yes you cant get above 60FPS in all games but remember you are pairing your 2500k with a GTX660TI.. pair it with a 680 and the history will be totally different, and still you will not bottleneck a single or dual 680... we have to be clear, in the games that you are not able to reach 60FPS, maintain or go above 60FPS are games that are really CRAPPY optimized and games where even a GTX680 got hard to max out and keep the 60FPS.... a bottleneck happen when in fact your CPU hampers the video card... we are agree that for 780SLI he will have to OC their 920.. to get a performance jump.. however even a stock he will not make a single 780 to perform bad... actually i can't think in game that push 100% usage on their 920 on the 8 threads.. and keep the 780 weighted to less than 75% usage... (where typical Bottleneck happen)...

 

[cannondale06]

yes you cant get above 60FPS in all games but remember you are pairing your 2500k with a GTX660TI.. pair it with a 680 and the history will be totally different, and still you will not bottleneck a single or dual 680... we have to be clear, in the games that you are not able to reach 60FPS, maintain or go above 60FPS are games that are really CRAPPY optimized and games where even a GTX680 got hard to max out and keep the 60FPS.... a bottleneck happen when in fact your CPU hampers the video card... we are agree that for 780SLI he will have to OC their 920.. to get a performance jump.. however even a stock he will not make a single 780 to perform bad... actually i can't think in game that push 100% usage on their 920 on the 8 threads.. and keep the 780 weighted to less than 75% usage... (where typical Bottleneck happen)...

my gpu has nothing to do with the specific cpu limitations I am referring to. again a 780 will not be fully utilized at 1920 with a stock 920 and that is a fact. if you are looking at cpu usage then you are doing it wrong as that tells you almost nothing. a game can be completely cpu limited using only 25% of an i7 because that game only needs 2 cores. a game does not magically use all the other resources of a cpu if that game is not coded to do so.

a simple example here. http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1645892

 

[jinhur]

ur performance will still be greatly upgraded, and the card will not suffer from your components greatly. ur card may not meet the maximum potential due to VERY slight differences in ur components, but as far as gaming and entertainment goes, those differences in maximum performance and great performance might only benefit u when rendering huge files n the sort that takes a great amount of time to do. in these situations minuscule difference surmount to a substantial amount of time.

and im stating this with what card u have now and will/might have.

 

[Araxie]

my gpu has nothing to do with the specific cpu limitations I am referring to. again a 780 will not be fully utilized at 1920 with a stock 920 and that is a fact. if you are looking at cpu usage then you are doing it wrong as that tells you almost nothing. a game can be completely cpu limited using only 25% of an i7 because that game only needs 2 cores. a game does not magically use all the other resources of a cpu if that game is not coded to do so.

a simple example here. http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1645892

that its a specific and sporadic case where the game have CPU limitations...... how much actual games you know that are CPU limited?.. or can just use max 2 cores of a CPU? when mostly recommend lastest quad core or CPU?.... yes i got your point and you are right but up to certain point..... not to the point that the 780 will perform badly cause of the CPU... and i told to the OP. he will notice a noticeable jump of performance by oc their 920.. by exactly your point..

 

[cannondale06]

that its a specific and sporadic case where the game have CPU limitations...... how much actual games you know that are CPU limited?.. or can just use max 2 cores of a CPU? when mostly recommend lastest quad core or CPU?.... yes i got your point and you are right but up to certain point..... not to the point that the 780 will perform badly cause of the CPU... and i told to the OP. he will notice a noticeable jump of performance by oc their 920.. by exactly your point..

okay lets take a multi threaded game like Hitman Absoltion that uses 4 cores. even with my cpu at 4.4 there are parts of the game that dip below 60 fps. and yes those are cpu limited and/or poorly optimized areas but it happens. yes I agree that its rare but then again my 2500k 4.4 potentially has 70% more cpu power if his HT is not taken advantage of. and considering only 3 or 4 games utilize HT on a 4 core cpu that leaves him holding back that 780 a bit and some cases by a lot. 780 sli would be laughably held back in most cases at 1920 with a stock 920.

 

[Araxie]

okay lets take a multi threaded game like Hitman Absoltion that uses 4 cores. even with my cpu at 4.4 there are parts of the game that dip below 60 fps. and yes those are cpu limited and/or poorly optimized areas but it happens. yes I agree that its rare but then again my 2500k 4.4 potentially has 70% more cpu power if his HT is not taken advantage of. and considering only 3 or 4 games utilize HT on a 4 core cpu that leaves him holding back that 780 a bit and some cases by a lot. 780 sli would be laughably held back in most cases at 1920 with a stock 920.

well thats an agreed...

 

[fanboy]

I run my i7-930 in Eyefinity with a single HD7950 and it runs great but i play iRacing with it and have run Crysis 3 also.. the x58 is true 16x/16x so if you overclock it should not limit the cards like 8x/8x..

Intel dropped surport for 1366 for some odd reason but the cpu's really scale well with mild overclocks and really don't need the clock speeds of sandybridge unless your going for benchmark records..

Here at stock cpu speed and 5760 x 1080 .. does it look bottlenecked?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3e11mkEs_o

 

[cannondale06]

I run my i7-930 in Eyefinity with a single HD7950 and it runs great but i play iRacing with it and have run Crysis 3 also.. the x58 is true 16x/16x so if you overclock it should not limit the cards like 8x/8x..

Intel dropped surport for 1366 for some odd reason but the cpu's really scale well with mild overclocks and really don't need the clock speeds of sandybridge unless your going for benchmark records..

Here at stock cpu speed and 5760 x 1080 .. does it look bottlenecked?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3e11mkEs_o

5760x1080 is a massive resolution for one thing. and do you think a game will just slow down to a crawl just because you are are not getting full use out of a gpu setup? all I am saying is that stock 920 will not even give him full use of a 780 nevermind two 780 cards in sli.

 

[EquaLiZr]

Still rocking my 920 @ 3.6ghz with 2x 7970's

 

[fanboy]

The only reason i would want a card like the 780GTX is to play massive resolution and what all that onboard ram was placed there for as AMD learned a hard leason with the HD58XX not having enough ram for massive resolution and why the HD69XX had 2Gb.. once you place the load on the gpu then the cpu will not bottleneck it as it's not waiting for info anymore from the cpu that you see in lower stuff like 1920x1080 as that works the cpu more then the gpu and the higher you go the role switchs.

 

[cannondale06]

The only reason i would want a card like the 780GTX is to play massive resolution and what all that onboard ram was placed there for as AMD learned a hard leason with the HD58XX not having enough ram for massive resolution and why the HD69XX had 2Gb.. once you place the load on the gpu then the cpu will not bottleneck it as it's not waiting for info anymore from the cpu that you see in lower stuff like 1920x1080 as that works the cpu more then the gpu and the higher you go the role switchs.

I know how things work. if the cpu is a general limitation and your goal is too stay above 60 fps in all games then that is not going to happen with stock 920. his minimum framerate with a 780 will be lower than mine with just a 660ti. I can lower settings that just impact the gpu and keep my framerate up but good luck trying to do that if the cpu is holding you back.

 

[ccityinstaller]

I know how things work. if the cpu is a general limitation and your goal is too stay above 60 fps in all games then that is not going to happen with stock 920. his minimum framerate with a 780 will be lower than mine with just a 660ti. I can lower settings that just impact the gpu and keep my framerate up but good luck trying to do that if the cpu is holding you back.

This might be an exception, or maybe CC turning over a new leaf, but I ACTUALLY AGREE with Cannondale06 100% on this..A stock 920 will bottleneck any card faster then the upper mid range (o/c'd 7950/670) and higher..A simple google will give you plenty of scenarios where this is true...

Araxie, I am not sure if English is you native language (I am assuming not, or yikes!), but you tend to write confusing and conflicting statements that are often not true with regard to GPU questions..

OP, The system you have still have a great deal of life left in it, especially if you add a decent SSD to the mix..The SSD along with a moderate o/c on your cpu will make it feel like a brand new system..Depending on the stepping of your cpu, an easy 4Ghz+ can be had (the D0 steppings are the best for 4Ghz and higher with little Vcore)...

 

[cannondale06]

those 920 cpus can use quite a bit of power when clocked higher than 3.8 though. I would just shoot for 3.8 or even just 3.6 for now as that will be a massive improvement and will help get the best use out of a gpu upgrade.

 

[ccityinstaller]

those 920 cpus can use quite a bit of power when clocked higher than 3.8 though. I would just shoot for 3.8 or even just 3.6 for now as that will be a massive improvement and will help get the best use out of a gpu upgrade.

True, but if it is a D0 stepping, it should require very little voltage to reach 4Ghz..Some were able to do it on just a notch about the stock Vcore..4Ghz will also work perfectly with his ram @ 1600mhz (20x200) so he doesn't have to run a divider..Not a big deal, but makes it easier if you have picky ram..

 

[Araxie]

True, but if it is a D0 stepping, it should require very little voltage to reach 4Ghz..Some were able to do it on just a notch about the stock Vcore..4Ghz will also work perfectly with his ram @ 1600mhz (20x200) so he doesn't have to run a divider..Not a big deal, but makes it easier if you have picky ram..

I would prefer to keep lower voltage, speed temps and keep relax.. than push that chip to that number and then be concerned with stability temps, etc.. as cannondale06 said.. better to go secure with 3.6-3.8ghz

 

[cannondale06]

I would prefer to keep lower voltage, speed temps and keep relax.. than push that chip to that number and then be concerned with stability temps, etc.. as cannondale06 said.. better to go secure with 3.6-3.8ghz

yeah some people like to push things as far as they can go but I like to take a balanced approach. I always prefer to stick with stock voltage too.

 

[ryuen]

Agreed on OC'ing that 920, it makes a lot of difference compared to stock speeds.

I bought mine when they came out years ago and it has been running at 3.8ghz rock stable ever since, cooling is just an old true 120 with single fan.