Hi all,

This will be my first post, but through the years, I’ve always found such a great amount of info and knowledge in the forums, so hopefully you can help me out here.

I’m a bit of a dilemma regarding if I should upgrade my system or not, and I know there’s far more technical people here than myself and also people who have used the components that intend to upgrade to, so any tips you guys can offer would be of great help.

 

Current system:

• i7 6700K running at OC 4.6MHZ
• Asus Maximus Hero VI
• 64Gb Ram Corsair Vengeance DDR4 2133Mhz (4x16Gb sticks)
• MSI Gaming X GTX 1080 TI (11Gb)
• SATA SSD - 250 GB (OS)
• SATA SSD - 500 GB (P3D)
• HDD 4 TB Storage

 

Potential upgrades:

• i7 9700K (Which I plan to overclock, hopefully to 5GHZ)
• Asus Maximus Hero XI z390
• 32Gb Ram Corsair Vengeance DDR4 3200Mhz (2x16Gb sticks)

my sim usage usually consists of European airline operations with these addons installed: ORBX Global, Vector, OpenLC - Aerosoft, UK2000, etc. Airport Addons, ENVTEX, PTA, AS, ASCA, UTLive, GSX.

 

So my questions are the following:

1. Would I see a significant improvement on P3D by upgrading the CPU and motherboard at this stage? Is it worth the money? or should I wait for another generation maybe?
2. Regardless of if I upgrade the CPU or not, would it be worthy money wise to upgrade to a higher freq RAM(from 2133 to 3200), how would the impact be on P3D?
3. If I upgrade the RAM, can I still add 2 of the old sticks  to the mix, so it is: 2x16Gb at 3200GHZ + 2x16Gb at 2133GHZ, or would this cause problems?
4. Would I see any improvements other than loading times if I upgrade to NVMe SSDs?

 

I know these are quite suggestive, broad questions, but any guidance you can offer I would really appreciate. 

Once again thanks for your time,

Christian

Edited March 19, 20197 yr by lugard

1 hour ago, lugard said:

So my questions are the following:

1. Would I see a significant improvement on P3D by upgrading the CPU and motherboard at this stage? Is it worth the money? or should I wait for another generation maybe?
2. Regardless of if I upgrade the CPU or not, would it be worthy money wise to upgrade to a higher freq RAM(from 2133 to 3200), how would the impact be on P3D?
3. If I upgrade the RAM, can I still add 2 of the old sticks  to the mix, so it is: 2x16Gb at 3200GHZ + 2x16Gb at 2133GHZ, or would this cause problems?
4. Would I see any improvements other than loading times if I upgrade to NVMe SSDs?

1. I'm assuming you meant the 9700K?  You would not see a significant increase in performance but it would be noticeable.  Improved load times and scenery rendering.

2. 3000-3200 RAM minimum

3. Do not mix RAM.  Your 3200 RAM would run at the same speed as the slowest sticks.

4. After using M2 drives I'm not totally sold.  A good SATA SDD is plenty adequate.

1 hour ago, lugard said:

Potential upgrades:

• i7 7900K (Which I plan to overclock, hopefully to 5GHZ)
• Asus Maximus Hero XI z390
• 32Gb Ram Corsair Vengeance DDR4 3200Mhz (2x16Gb sticks)

my sim usage usually consists of European airline operations with these addons installed: ORBX Global, Vector, OpenLC - Aerosoft, UK2000, etc. Airport Addons, ENVTEX, PTA, AS, ASCA, UTLive, GSX.

 

So my questions are the following:

1. Would I see a significant improvement on P3D by upgrading the CPU and motherboard at this stage? Is it worth the money? or should I wait for another generation maybe?
2. Regardless of if I upgrade the CPU or not, would it be worthy money wise to upgrade to a higher freq RAM(from 2133 to 3200), how would the impact be on P3D?
3. If I upgrade the RAM, can I still add 2 of the old sticks  to the mix, so it is: 2x16Gb at 3200GHZ + 2x16Gb at 2133GHZ, or would this cause problems?
4. Would I see any improvements other than loading times if I upgrade to NVMe SSDs?

I presume the 7900K is a typo and you mean the 9700K

Short answer is yes, upgrading from a quad-core at 4.5 to an octocore at 5.0 is going to be worth it.  I upgraded from the 7700K quad at 5 GHz to an 8086K hexacore at 5.3GHz (same Hero XI mobo) and am very happy.

I would not use your old RAM...I built my system with 3600 MHz CAS 15 RAM, and it does make a difference in some scenarios.  Search for my posts elsewhere here on RAM speed vs CAS latency for more insight into RAM performance...memory frequency (in MHz) is only part of the story when it comes to RAM performance.

Do NOT mix memory DIMMs.

Other than loading times, an NVMe SSD will not significantly improve performance, unless you have a large amount of photoscenery, in which case faster storage system throughput can matter.

Regards

 

@w6kd and @mpw8679. Thank you very much for your input, very helpful.

I'll wait until pay day to decide where to put the money, I'll be reporting back, once I set the upgrade up with the results.

Thanks once again

Regards

Is there that much of a gain going from a 7700k @ 5.0 to the 8086K. I currently run the 7700K @ 5.0 with HT on and was wondering if upgrading will give me that extra performance. I plan on getting 3600 CL15 and using my EVGA 1080ti FTW3 and M.2 1tb 970.

20 minutes ago, Wise87 said:

Is there that much of a gain going from a 7700k @ 5.0 to the 8086K.

See this: https: https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i7-8086K-vs-Intel-Core-i7-7700K/m516988vs3647

Keep in mind too that it's relatively easy to get the 8086K to 5.2-5.3GHz with good cooling (and delidding is always a good idea).  It has noticeably better multi-core performance than the 7700K, and as well will probably do quite well for you running with HT off (I ran my previous two quad cores, 4790K and 3770K before it, with HT on... HT on is how they performed best in FSX and P3Dv4).  I have found no advantage or disadvantage to using HT while simming with my 8086K, so I run HT off simply because it requires a bit less power.

Whether or not the 8086K is worth the premium price is a value judgement...  I was lucky to get mine for $5 more than an 8700K, so it was an easy (and quick) decision.

HTH and good luck,

Greg

I've order the i7-8086k and the G.Skill 16GB 3600 Trident Z 15-15-15. Now I'm deciding if I want the ASUS ROG Maximus XI Hero or the ASUS ROG Maximus XI Code.

If I get the Hero I will need a USB hub as my current 7700K on a code, I am using all my USB ports on the back. 

Decisions, decisions. 

4 hours ago, Wise87 said:

Now I'm deciding if I want the ASUS ROG Maximus XI Hero or the ASUS ROG Maximus XI Code.

I've built many systems over the last 20+ years using ASUS motherboards... but I'm not happy at all with their XI Hero boards.  Last month I built a 9900K based system (for photo post processing) using an ASRock Z390 Phantom Gaming 9, and the owner is tickled pink with it.  Build went easy-peasy too.  Good motherboards, and the BIOS is fine too.  Not sure about ASRock support... like many, I know all about ASUS support (or lack thereof ).

https://www.amazon.com/ASRock-Motherboard-Z390-Phantom-Gaming/dp/B07HYQ4K87/ref=sr_1_4?crid=1CDE8ZAYJ50IY&keywords=asrock+z390&qid=1554923348&s=gateway&sprefix=asrock%2Caps%2C200&sr=8-4

Those Z390 boards from ASUS aren't that great actually worse lol 😉 With for example gigabyte and the Z370 (worse) and now the Z390 (great) is the opposite and great VRM 🙂

At the point to upgrade my I7-6700K build to a new build with an I9-9900K. Of course build that stuff always myself...

Now to make the choice 2080 or 2080TI?

Edited April 11, 20197 yr by awf

9 hours ago, awf said:

Those Z390 boards from ASUS aren't that great actually worse lol 😉 With for example gigabyte and the Z370 (worse) and now the Z390 (great) is the opposite and great VRM 🙂

At the point to upgrade my I7-6700K build to a new build with an I9-9900K. Of course build that stuff always myself...

Now to make the choice 2080 or 2080TI?

I agree the Asus Z390 VRM has negative reviews all over the place. Only the $$$ Z390 are getting positive VRM reviews. I was actually looking at GIGABYTE Z390 AORUS Master.

Edited April 12, 20197 yr by Wise87

9 hours ago, Wise87 said:

I agree the Asus Z390 VRM has negative reviews all over the place. Only the $$$ Z390 are getting positive VRM reviews. I was actually looking at GIGABYTE Z390 AORUS Master.

Same here the master has great VRM since I'm going to OC