I'm planning a PC upgrade and would appreciate some advice on where the money would be best spent. My current system has a Ryzen 7 5800X3D, 64GB of RAM, and an RTX 4070. I'm considering either a Ryzen 7 9800X3D bundle with 32GB of RAM for about $870, or a Radeon RX 9070 XT for around $700. I recently switched to Linux, so AMD's driver support is also a factor. My current monitors are two Acer Nitro XV271U 1440p displays. Are either of these upgrades worthwhile, or would I be better off investing in a different component or a 4K OLED monitor?
3 Answers
What resolution and refresh rate are you using? Your current hardware is still quite strong, so the best upgrade might be a display rather than replacing the CPU or GPU. A 4K OLED could make a much bigger difference in image quality and overall experience than either proposed component upgrade.
I’d keep the 5800X3D and RTX 4070 for now. Neither the 9800X3D bundle nor the 9070 XT is a particularly compelling upgrade at those prices unless you have a specific performance problem. The 9070 XT should integrate nicely with Linux, but the improvement over a 4070 may not justify spending $700.
The 9070 XT is about $700, while the CPU, motherboard, and RAM bundle would cost roughly $870.
Since you’re already on a 1440p setup, I’d seriously consider moving to a 4K OLED instead. Your system should handle the transition reasonably well, and the jump in contrast, HDR, and motion clarity would be immediately noticeable. Linux works well with modern OLED displays, so you don’t necessarily need to replace your current hardware just because you changed operating systems.
I’m using two Acer Nitro XV271U monitors, both at 1440p.