Looking for best bang for my buck on upgrade

[MichaelMarkham]

My system doesn't feel as speedy as it should, I'm wondering where the bottle neck might be.

I'm running:

Processor - Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-7800X CPU @ 3.50GHz
Video Card - NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 (27.21.14.5206)
Memory - 64GB (4x16GB) 2133MHz
Motherboard - Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. X299 RAIDER (MS-7A94) (1.60)
Operating System - Microsoft Windows 10 Pro (19041)
System - Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. MS-7A94

OS and Software is in a 500GB SATA SSD

Projects & Footage are on a 1 TB PCI Express M.2 SSD

I recently ran my first Puget Bench in Premere and got a 555

I'm interested in the new RTX 3000 series GPUs but don't want to spend money on something if it's not my graphics card slowing this system down. I don't really have time for a clean windows re-install right now. And I don't overclock. I buy components and run them stock I don't have time or energy to dance with breakdowns just to gain a few seconds here and there.

I have thought of upgrading to the i9-10920X process or get extra cores and speed. Do you think that's my issue? Or is it possible I have a setting or 2 that I can change that will better unlock the potential of the system I have?

[MyerPj]

Your system looks pretty balanced. I would actually say your GPU is the only thing 'out of place' ie: being better than the rest.

It's tough cause our systems are not that old, but things have moved on. I think when you are ready, it's time to move that rig down the line and build a new one. I'm in a similar position, from my 2017 build, I think out of principal I'll wait one more year.

You might ask this in the Hardware Forum.

https://community.adobe.com/t5/video-hardware/bd-p/video-hardware

[MichaelMarkham]

So you think, rather than spending money on the newer processor, I should rid this as long as I can and then just get a new Processor/Motherboard/Ram combo and upgrade the computer?

[MyerPj]

Yes, a few more items and you don't have to take the current one apart. Clean it up and you have a good test machine, or give it to someone, etc...

[Peru Bob]

I moved this to the Hardware forum.

[RjL190365]

That CPU is only a 6-core/12-thread CPU that's now past its glory days (and the very last 6-core/12-thread CPU outside of certain Xeon models to ever see release on any Intel HEDT socket). Even today's mainstream-platform (as opposed to HEDT-platform) 6-core/12-thread CPUs beat that i7-7800X by a significant margin in overall multithreaded performance these days.

As for your planned i9-10920X, forget about it. It will not be a sufficient upgrade over your current i7-7800X to justify paying $700 to $800 for it (as in, the performance improvement, although significant, is still not sufficient enough considering other cheaper options equal or beat it on a performance-per-total-parts-upgrade cost basis). In fact, it actually costs more money than an i9-10850K (which will not fit your current motherboard's socket) plus a decent budget Z490 motherboard combined. As such, I would dare say that the only CPU that delivers a worthwhile enough performance increase over your 7800X, the i9-10980XE, costs more money than a completely different CPU platform (CPU and motherboard combined) that comes close to or equals it in overall performance.

And this is all because Cascade Lake-X is not really a new CPU architecture, but instead is a tweaked-twice variant of the Skylake-X architecture that your current 7800X is based on. In other words, Intel's recent HEDT (X299) platform is largely a waste of money to begin with: You're stuck between a rock and a hard place with regards to a CPU upgrade regardless of which CPU you originally went with. There is absolutely no economically worthwhile CPU upgrade for that platform: You either spend a ton of money and still fall behind in performance, or stay put and fall even further behind.

Even more unfortunate, the i7-7800X and the X299 chipset came out just after AMD released its first-generation 8-core Ryzen CPUs along with its accompanying AMD 300-series chipsets. The i7-7800X still falls behind the most powerful of the first-gen 8-core Ryzen CPUs in multi-threaded performance (although Intel CPUs still had better single-threaded performance versus the first-gen Ryzen CPUs). Plus, unlike the higher-end Intel HEDT CPUs, both of the i7-78xx CPUs that were released (the 7800X and the 8-core/16-thread i7-7820X) have only 28 on-CPU PCI-e 3.0 lanes (versus 44 on the others). In comparison, AMD's Ryzen (mainstream) CPUs have always had 24 on-CPU PCI-e lanes, where in a typical motherboard setup 16 of those go to the GPU (or GPU slots), four to an m.2 SSD and another four to a USB 3.2 hub.

Now, had you gone with an i9-7960X or i9-7980XE instead of that i7-7800X as your HEDT CPU choice, then I would have told you to stay put. As it stands right now, you're trapped in no-man's land, especially since that 7800X is barely more powerful than the best quad-core CPU to justify the cost of HEDT entry.

[MichaelMarkham]

Darn it! I built a computer about 10 years ago now that I replaced with this one about 2 years ago. It seems that both times I picked a socket/platform that was a dead end for upgrading from the mid-level CPU I began with. So I was stuck with going for a "extreme edition" sku which never seem to come down in price or upgrading the whole MoBo/CPU/RAM combo.

How do I avoid that in the future? I can never make sense of Intel's roadmaps enough to find that path that will have the best (moderately priced) upgrade options in the future.

[RjL190365]

I have been down this road before. Intel tends to keep its socket and electrical compatibility for only two CPU generations before changing it (although the current HEDT LGA 2066 socket lasted for three "generations" now), regardless of the type of platform. Your last system was based on LGA 1366, which only lasted until Westmere. Then, Sandy Bridge-E came out, which introduced the first revision of LGA 2011. That lasted until the introduction of Haswell-E, which introduced LGA 2011-v3, which is physically similar but has different electrical pin assignments and different socket keying. Then, with the introduction of Skylake-X, HEDT CPUs moved to LGA 2066.

Same thing with the mainstream platforms: LGA 1155 was used for Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge. Haswell brought a change to the physically incompatible LGA 1150. Skylake changed sockets again, to the first revision of LGA 1151. Coffee lake used LGA 1151 v2, which is physically identical but with different electrical pin assignments, so that a 9th-Gen Intel i5 or i7 CPU would mount into a Skylake board but the system would not work properly or at all. The current 10th-gen mainstream desktop CPUs require LGA 1200. The forthcoming 11th-Gen desktop CPUs will keep the same LGA 1200 socket and electrical assignments, but the level of compatibility will vary with the motherboard makers' implementation of features (as in, most early Z490 motherboards run all of their m.2 slots entirely off of the chipset and thus will not take any advantage of the four extra PCI-e lanes on the 11th-Gen CPUs).

[MichaelMarkham]

So when I upgrade next, I should just get the best thing I can afford and hope for the best, that I might be able to upgrade just the CPU someday rather than the whole thing.

[RjL190365]

I am sorry to tell you this, but future-proofing does not exist any more. If you wait more than about two years, every new worthwhile CPU upgrade will require a new motherboard, and likely new RAM, no matter what.

[MyerPj]

Like I said! 🙂