With so many people asking questions about what to expect from video card upgrades, I felt it would be useful to share my experience.  After a CPU failure back in the fall I was forced into building a new system.  The price of the video cards led me to continue using my EVGA GTX970 in my new system.  My new system specs are as follows:

• Asus Maximus Hero XI Z390
• Intel Core I9 9900K (OC to 5.1 Liquid Cooled)
• 32 GB Ram (DDR4 3200)
• M.2 SSD
• Win 10
• P3D V4.4

This system was initially a disappointment.  P3D ran very smooth at high frame rates out of the box.  After installing ORBX Global, Vector, OpenLC NA, and SoCal it all went south.  The PC was struggling with these add-ons.  Of course the system was not very balanced.  The video card was just too old.  So this week I decided to take the plunge a buy a new RTX2080 (MSI OC'd).  I just couldn't justify the "ti" price tag.  My other dilemma was my old monitor (1080P 22").  I decided I should be pairing these items.  I decided to also purchase a ACER Predator 27" 1440P 144hz G Sync monitor.  

Results with sliders mostly maxed out except shadows (I need to experiment more on the shadow settings):

At ORBX Big Bear City in A2A 172 in clouds and rain: frame rates went from a stuttering 14 FPS to a smooth as can be 45 FPS.

At ORBX Catalina Island in fair skies (some cumulus clouds) same plane: Frame rates went from 17 to 55+ FPS.

My take away here is that for all the talk about P3D being CPU bound, graphics cards matter and they matter big time.  Hopefully this will help others making the decision to upgrade their weak link.  The biggest improvement was the elimination of any stuttering whatsoever.  I couldn't be happier right now.

Welcome to the forums and thanks for the review.  Our systems are very similar and I'm wondering if after the GPU upgrade you saw a difference in the pauses some folks experience as they approach an ORBX airport?

Thanks,

Greg

FSX and P3D are CPU bound, it is the graphics card that helps with higher resolution and increased amounts of anti-aliasing and anistropic filtering.  A high end graphics card combined with a low end CPU will result in lagging because the CPU cannot feed information fast enough to the graphics card.

35 minutes ago, stans said:

FSX and P3D are CPU bound, it is the graphics card that helps with higher resolution and increased amounts of anti-aliasing and anistropic filtering.  A high end graphics card combined with a low end CPU will result in lagging because the CPU cannot feed information fast enough to the graphics card.

Well, OK, but I don't understand what you're getting at here.  The OP's i9-9900K is a cutting-edge CPU, not low end.  He's comparing performance with a several generations old GTX970 and an RTX2080, both running with a very fast high-end CPU.

As has been said many times before, balance is the key...with P3D especially, a fast CPU with a sluggish GPU, or a slow CPU with a top of the line GPU are both likely to produce underwhelming results.

Regards

I think Stans mean that it won't help to upgrade a video card, if the rest of the system isn't up to par. I have an old system with an I7 4790 Cpu and a Geforce gtx 970, but I have no illusion in that upgrading the 970 to a 2080 will do any good if the CPU can't cope. So until I upgrade my Motherboard and CPU, I stick with my GTX 970 and live with turning down the sliders to get a stutter free and still aceptable look.

16 hours ago, lownslo said:

Welcome to the forums and thanks for the review.  Our systems are very similar and I'm wondering if after the GPU upgrade you saw a difference in the pauses some folks experience as they approach an ORBX airport?

Thanks!  I was pretty active here years and years ago but my old account has long since been purged.  I've recently been getting back into simming after spending all that sim cash on real world flying.  This is more relaxing and its more forgiving if I mess up!  It's good to be back and know that this site is alive and well.

 

Edit:  I forgot to answer your question!  I don't recall having pauses per se but more quick stutters.  What I was getting was a lot of scenery and texture popping before.  ORBX airports would go black and then regenerate as I looked away and then looked back at the airport.  This would be accompanied by stutters.  This all seems to be gone!  I would also sometimes get some blurries too.  That is also gone and the sim looks amazing now.  I fly all GA and I navigate visually without GPS, as I do in the real world, so I really need that scenery to work and be realistic.  The ORBX products really bring the sim to life and give me a sense a speed and depth.  I couldn't live with turning sliders down and now I don't have to.

Edited March 3, 20197 yr by jsanford82

What resolution are you running at?

3 hours ago, pgde said:

What resolution are you running at?

I should have mentioned that the new card is running at 2560x1440.  Old card was 1920x1080.  So even with the increase in resolution, I have seen this big improvement.  I just had a great flight around Catalina Island and was hitting mid 70s FPS.  Although that is certainly not the most taxing ORBX product.  I'll have to take a run down the Mini Route over LAX and see how it does.

20 hours ago, w6kd said:

Well, OK, but I don't understand what you're getting at here.  The OP's i9-9900K is a cutting-edge CPU, not low end.  He's comparing performance with a several generations old GTX970 and an RTX2080, both running with a very fast high-end CPU.

As has been said many times before, balance is the key...with P3D especially, a fast CPU with a sluggish GPU, or a slow CPU with a top of the line GPU are both likely to produce underwhelming results.

Regards

 

18 hours ago, jlund said:

I think Stans mean that it won't help to upgrade a video card, if the rest of the system isn't up to par. I have an old system with an I7 4790 Cpu and a Geforce gtx 970, but I have no illusion in that upgrading the 970 to a 2080 will do any good if the CPU can't cope. So until I upgrade my Motherboard and CPU, I stick with my GTX 970 and live with turning down the sliders to get a stutter free and still aceptable look.

 

That's exactly what I was getting at.  A fantastic video card is not the solution to a poor CPU. 

Evidently it is not but how is this relevant to a report of how two

graphics cards perform with the same top level CPU?

You might too have made the point that a top level CPU is not the solution to an 

inadequate graphics card, also obvious.

The comparison made here is indeed of value exactly because

it uses the same CPU.

It also shows how the only true tweak for these simulators is to throw

money at the hardware.

Edited March 4, 20197 yr by nolonger

On 3/3/2019 at 8:45 AM, jsanford82 said:

With so many people asking questions about what to expect from video card upgrades, I felt it would be useful to share my experience.  After a CPU failure back in the fall I was forced into building a new system.  The price of the video cards led me to continue using my EVGA GTX970 in my new system.  My new system specs are as follows:

• Asus Maximus Hero XI Z390
• Intel Core I9 9900K (OC to 5.1 Liquid Cooled)
• 32 GB Ram (DDR4 3200)
• M.2 SSD
• Win 10
• P3D V4.4

This system was initially a disappointment.  P3D ran very smooth at high frame rates out of the box.  After installing ORBX Global, Vector, OpenLC NA, and SoCal it all went south.  The PC was struggling with these add-ons.  Of course the system was not very balanced.  The video card was just too old.  So this week I decided to take the plunge a buy a new RTX2080 (MSI OC'd).  I just couldn't justify the "ti" price tag.  My other dilemma was my old monitor (1080P 22").  I decided I should be pairing these items.  I decided to also purchase a ACER Predator 27" 1440P 144hz G Sync monitor.  

Results with sliders mostly maxed out except shadows (I need to experiment more on the shadow settings):

At ORBX Big Bear City in A2A 172 in clouds and rain: frame rates went from a stuttering 14 FPS to a smooth as can be 45 FPS.

At ORBX Catalina Island in fair skies (some cumulus clouds) same plane: Frame rates went from 17 to 55+ FPS.

My take away here is that for all the talk about P3D being CPU bound, graphics cards matter and they matter big time.  Hopefully this will help others making the decision to upgrade their weak link.  The biggest improvement was the elimination of any stuttering whatsoever.  I couldn't be happier right now.

Hi wanted to know if upgrading the made a difference?

Thanks

8 hours ago, shafs67 said:

Hi wanted to know if upgrading the made a difference?

Thanks

Sorry that was upgrading to a gamming monitor.

Would I see a big difference if I upgraded my GTX 970 to RTX 2070 or 2080?  I have a I7 4790 cpu @ 4.00 ghz 3.60 ghz.  16 gb of Ram 2560x1440 benq monitor (60hz).  Medium settings.

I run okay but would love to pick up some more fps in add on scenery.  

 

Thanks for input

Darcy

8 hours ago, shafs67 said:

Sorry that was upgrading to a gamming monitor.

It’s tough to say what difference the gaming monitor made vs the card.  The reality is I upgraded them at the same time so I changed two variables and didn’t control for them.  My gut says it was the card that made the difference and the monitor just makes it look better.  

1 hour ago, Darcy said:

Would I see a big difference if I upgraded my GTX 970 to RTX 2070 or 2080?  I have a I7 4790 cpu @ 4.00 ghz 3.60 ghz.  16 gb of Ram 2560x1440 benq monitor (60hz).  Medium settings.

I run okay but would love to pick up some more fps in add on scenery.  

 

Thanks for input

Darcy

I don’t think I can answer that.  The processor I fried was a 4790k but I was still on FSX.  When I built the new machine, the time was ripe for moving to P3D.  The 4790 was awesome with FSX.  I had a very smooth experience.  Moving to P3D with the new 9900k was supposed to be a huge move but the reality is the FPS just plummeted in the same ORBX sceneries.  That was a bummer.  Then the card upgrade brought me right back to life.  I’d be skeptical that a video card upgrade would give you great results when you are on an older processor.  As so many have said, you need a balanced system.  A 4 year old CPU paired with the latest video card is not very balanced.