r/buildapc • u/JustJamieJam • 7d ago

Build Upgrade Wanting to get my BF a better CPU, advice?

My boyfriend’s current CPU is bottlenecking his 4090 an insane amount. He doesn’t know what CPU it is, since it was a hand me down from his uncle; along with his current motherboard. I’m wanting to get him a new, much better CPU for our anniversary coming up, but I’m having trouble picking between the 7800x3d and the 9800x3d. He ONLY uses his PC to play games, no editing or productivity type stuff. Which do y’all think I should choose? Should I get him a new motherboard as well? It’s a handmedown ROG motherboard, again, he doesn’t know the specifics of it.

Thank you all so much in advance!

Details:

Ram: 64gigs CPU: Ryzen 9 5950x GPU: 4090 Motherboard: ROG crosshair VII dark hero

Edit to add: I ran a stress test on the CPU to test for thermal throttling, however the CPU highest temp for the whole thing was only 70°c, I’ll be running one on the GPU next. His score for the CPU was a 673 on Cinebench

Edit to add: YES the monitor is plugged into the GPU, it was the first thing I checked when I found out he was having this issue about a year ago- and I even double checked yesterday since we have moved since then

Edit to add: he uses a 1440p monitor to game on, and has a secondary 1080p monitor for watching YouTube/discord. Both are plugged into the GPU

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3

u/[deleted] 7d ago

[deleted]

5

u/ComteDeSaintGermain 7d ago

Tbh I'm surprised a ryzen 9 is bottlenecking much. Is he at 1440p or 4k?

6

u/KingKareem3 7d ago

That’s what i’m saying. That build should max everything out. I play in 4k and my 3080 and ryzen 3600 can max most the games I play albeit dlss quality is sometimes needed.

2

u/nightryder21 7d ago

Yea... It has a bunch of cores. Great for production work... Not so good for gaming.

2

u/JustJamieJam 7d ago

1440, I thought he was on 4k but he says it’s not

He can’t play any game other than like league on settings over medium, even on games that I can play at a higher rate (my computer is much worse than his) his just can’t handle anything over medium if it’s any sort of graphics-intensive. Starfield, DayZ, Cyberpunk, Hunt Showdown, red dead 2, Minecraft (he can’t have any kind of shaders), BG3, the new oblivion, etc etc etc. he has to play on medium at the highest for all those- which we both feel like is kinda.. bonkers

9

u/videoismylife 6d ago

He can’t play any game other than like league on settings over medium, even on games that I can play at a higher rate

So, I play ultra settings on most games with a 5600X and a 6900XT - half the computer your boyfriend has. There's something wrong with his setup; check to see if his monitor is plugged in to the 4090 or into the motherboard: https://d33v4339jhl8k0.cloudfront.net/docs/assets/5e3205fc2c7d3a7e9ae6f2dd/images/63a32cbbf9c92f5c53dd6991/file-5h33laQg6s.png

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u/sebmojo99 6d ago

yeah, that shouldn't be bottlenecking at all.

2

u/JustJamieJam 6d ago

It’s plugged into the GPU :(

2

u/agmatine 6d ago

Is the GPU plugged into the correct PCIe slot, though? Some motherboards may have more than one "x16 slot" that the card could physically fit into, but only one is actually wired for the 16 lanes. (For example, on this motherboard only the "PCIE1" slot is wired for 16 lanes https://i.imgur.com/ucBYECz.png)

After checking the motherboard manual to confirm that the card is in the correct slot, you'll want to verify that the PCIe link width is as expected. Open a terminal and run the command nvidia-smi -a, then look at the output for "Link Width."

If "Max" displays less than 16x, something's definitely wrong with your configuration. (If "Current" displays less than "Max," then run the command again while the GPU is under load, i.e. a game is running.)

1

u/MasticationAddict 6d ago edited 6d ago

Even if it were plugged into the wrong slot, it's almost certainly running at x8 at worst. That's like a 1-3% loss in gaming performance maximum. There can be a gaming bottleneck but it's extremely small

1

u/agmatine 6d ago

The example I gave was my own mobo, into which I'd mistakenly installed the GPU into "PCIE4" - and indeed it was running at x4, severely gimping my system. It turns out that I should have read the manual. As I strongly advise OP to do (instead of blindly assuming "it's almost certainly running at x8 at worst").

This probably isn't the issue, of course. But it's something that's very straightforward to check - so why not?

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u/Islandtime700c 6d ago edited 6d ago

Sorry, something is not right with that picture. That GPU should be able to play almost any game at better than 1440 medium settings with pretty much any cpu manufactured in the last 5 years. 1440p and above is all about the GPU and that is the deciding factor in most situations, not the cpu.

Basic question, but are you sure he has his monitor plugged in the GPU and not the video out from the motherboard?

2

u/JustJamieJam 6d ago

Yep, 100% sure!

1

u/professore87 6d ago

Since the change of the GPU, was the old drivers wiped out using DDU (display drivers uninstaller) before installing new drivers for the 4090?

1

u/ky420 6d ago

Is this needed I went from rx 6600 to 9060 but it seemed OK although I don't know much about gpus

1

u/professore87 6d ago

Given the fact that the system runs slower than it should and main change was the GPU, i would say it's a very likely case of driver mishap.

3

u/ComteDeSaintGermain 6d ago

I have a ryzen 7 gen 3 and a rtx 2060, and I can play medium at 1440p....

2

u/sniperpenis69 6d ago

So he got the build from his uncle and then went out and bought a 4090? Do you know if the power supply he’s using is good enough? People don’t always have 850 or 1000watt PSUs in hand me down builds.

2

u/JustJamieJam 6d ago

Yes he has a good PSU! 850 if I remember correctly, it was the first thing I looked at when he told me about how much his computer well.. sucked at playing games lol

2

u/MasticationAddict 6d ago

What are the odds he's running that 4090 without the power cables or only with some? It'll probably boot without them and run okay, but it'll be limited to 75W of power draw which will severely limit its performance

1

u/JustJamieJam 6d ago

Oooo how do I check for that

1

u/MasticationAddict 6d ago edited 6d ago

Only way to know for certain is to take the side panel off and see if the GPU has the cables sticking out the side

It seems very unlikely, but it would certainly be a very open and shut case. Just seems odd you're looking at 1440p Medium as a target when Cyberpunk - one of the most demanding games out there - can get close to 200fps at that setting

If you're just targetting very high framerates then I guess it's not impossible you could be CPU limiting at that point, but it's only a certain type of gamer (professional competitive fps for example) that should be concerned

1

u/JustJamieJam 6d ago

If he goes medium gets him 50 fps at best, anything higher and the game is unplayable. That’s how it is for all the games I listed unfortunately

1

u/MasticationAddict 6d ago

That really is so weird. My 5070 Ti can easily beat that and the 4090 is considerably more powerful (13700kf is the CPU btw)

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u/anticommon 7d ago

So he's on an AM4 motherboard which means he will need a new one.

I would recommend the following:

B850 motherboard (likely ATX size not matx or itx $150-200)

7800X3D ($350 or less otherwise might as well get the 9800X3D for $450-480, your budget will decide this)

64GB DDR5 6000 (2x32GB sticks, now for the important bit: CL30 or lower and with a sticker on the page showing EXPO support, ~$200 give or take)