Currently with a 12900K/Z690 setup (see signature) I'm thinking about to upgrade to a 13900 CPU. The Z690 chipset would allow this after a BIOS update. So no motherboard change necessary and of course I'll keep my 3090 video card. So my question is, would MSFS benefit from only upgrading the CPU? I can afford it, but I also don't want to throw my money out of the window.

Easy answer: turn on dev mode and check if the graph tells you whether or not you are mostly «limited by main thread» or «limited by GPU». If it is the latter, a CPU upgrade will help you nothing. If it is the main thread, it MIGHT help you to upgrade. But for sure do not expect wonders if you do an upgrade from just one generation to the other... besides that, you will most probably find some benchmarks online to answer your question...

Not worth it. 

In my opinion I wouldn't upgrade to any CPU until AMD releases the Ryzen 7000 with 3D V-cache, which should be announced next month at CES.

We know that this technology is extremely beneficial in MSFS with the results of the Ryzen 5800X3D.

Since we're likely less than 3 months away from the release of the Ryzen 7000 with 3D V-cache, I would wait to see their results before upgrading.

And the 13900KS released in a few weeks too in the same event.

Thanks for your comments. I see the bias to not to upgrade. On the other side I will keep my current Intel setup at least for another year or two until I will switch to AMD probably.

I don’t think you will notice much of an improvement. Just wait for AMD. 

1 hour ago, AndreMP said:

In my opinion I wouldn't upgrade to any CPU until AMD releases the Ryzen 7000 with 3D V-cache, which should be announced next month at CES.

This 100%.  If it wasn’t for this chip coming I would have done a 13900 upgrade already but better to wait and see some performance comparisons.

 

3 hours ago, Nemo said:

I also don't want to throw my money out of the window.

I believe you will be doing exactly that.

Edited December 22, 20223 yr by CarlosF