GPU

[Nitogreen]

How bad is my R9 280X OC and what could fgo well with my i5 6600

Edited September 9, 2019 by Nitogreen

[Tower01]

Your ~$680(yesterday's price) R9 280X was a fast card in 2013 but has only 3GB of DDR5 memory. No doubt the video memory size is a bottleneck when playing Skyrim. For what it cost in 2013, today you could get an ~$510* Radeon Pulse RX 5700 XT with 8GB DDR6 memory, about 2x the base clock speed, and around 3x better performance.

 

If your question is how much faster can the video card be, before your i5-6600K 4ch/4thr 3.5GHz CPU becomes a noticeable bottleneck? Then, by that logic, the RX 5700RT may be too much card.

 

However, know that in Skyrim 32/SE the CPU works hardest in shader-intensive situations, regardless of GPU. The game favours single core, and is limited to 60 fps for stability. So, if you are keeping the 6600K, there will always be situations where its a bottleneck, regardless of GPU.

 

Moving on: The R9 280X has a direct 5-year lineage ending with ~$200* RX 580 which comes in an 8GB DDR5 version and is about 55% faster. Also its newer brother, the ~$250* RX 590 with 8 GB DDR5 is about 65% faster. A better jump up would be to the ~$300* VEGA 56 with 8 GB HBM2 as the newer architecture pushes over 2x performance compared to an R9 280X. All of these cards are still readily available. Skyrim SE seems to utilize any extra memory you give it, hence 8GB. Also, the better the card, expect smoother frame rate, less heat and fan noise, and more card longevity.

 

*Today's prices in USD, which may differ in your area

 

P.S. I'm in a very similar situation, with an i5-3570K at 3.4GHz and a GTX 970 4GB video card. My card has stopped working and my CPU uses an outdated LGA 1155 socket, so an upgrade/replacement means a new PC. I've been doing lots of research on this very topic.

Edited September 12, 2019 by Tower01

[goranpaa]

I run a non overclocked AMD Ryzen 2600 CPU + a Sapphire Nitro RX 580 4 gb on a heavy modded Skyrim SE. As my monitor are 1920 x 1080, I mostly run 2K mods. But after running MSI Afterburner, I realized that 4 gb of video RAM is a bit on the weak side. According to Afterburner, my card use up about 3700 - just over 3900 mb of video RAM at exteriours. But on the other hand stays at around 61 Celsius under load and still beeing o.k. quiet.

But as you can get a 8 gb RX 580 pretty cheap nowadays, I wiil get such a card instead. Though beeing an older video card, I still think it hold up well. The RX 590 may be a bit faster. But to pay up those extra money for about a 10 -15 fps difference average compaired to the 580 in most games doesn't appeal to me. I get an average FPS in Skyrim Se exteriours at 48 - 55 fps without any noticeable stutter and still runniing smooth so that is good enough for me. Just need some more VRAM on the RX 580 as said.

Edited October 16, 2019 by goranpaa

[goranpaa]

I have to say that the best bargain card you can get for upper mid to almost high end gaming at 1080 P and 1440 P resoloution are the Geforce GTX 1660TI. A friend of mine bought such a card a couple of days ago for his PC with the same specs as mine. And man does this card fly!

 

As fast as a GTX 1070 and in some games even a thad bit faster, but to a much nicer price tag. The MSI Armor OC 1660TI or the MSI Gaming X version are a nice pick.

 

The GTX 1660TI doesnt trail that far behind the Geforce RTX 2060 either performance vice. Though the GTX 1660Ti lack the Ray Tracing capability. But as there are very few games out that support this feature. And by the time there will be more such games, there likely will be a new generation of video cards out too.

Besides, enable Ray Tracing and you loose at least a third of your FPS.

 

I have ordered the MSI Armor OC version myself today. :- D

Edited October 16, 2019 by goranpaa

[goranpaa]

I got the GTX MSI GTX 1660 TI Armor OC yesterday.

And I must say I'm very pleased with it. I get 10 - 15 better FPS average than with the RX 580 in Skyrim ( SE ) on high / ultra settings via Beth Ini. The temperature stays at max 61 Celsius.

So this or any GTX 1660 TI is well worth considering if you are on a tighter budget for an upgrade?

Edited October 30, 2019 by goranpaa