I'm starting to notice stuttering, hitching, and occasional FPS drops in games. I suspect the CPU may be throttling or creating a bottleneck. My current system has an ASUS PRIME Z390-P motherboard, an Intel i7-9700 running at 3.6 GHz, an Nvidia RTX 2070 Super with 8 GB of VRAM, and 32 GB of RAM. What would be the most sensible low- to mid-range upgrade for smoother gaming?
2 Answers
The CPU and motherboard are the parts most likely to need upgrading together. Before spending money, check CPU and GPU usage while gaming. If the CPU is near 100% while the GPU has unused capacity, that confirms a CPU bottleneck. Also, if the processor has never been repasted, replacing the thermal paste and checking temperatures could help it maintain boost clocks.
Your i7-9700 is getting old enough that a platform upgrade may be worthwhile, but first rule out overheating and throttling with a hardware monitor. Since newer CPUs generally require a different motherboard, this would be a CPU-and-motherboard upgrade. An AMD AM4 setup could let you keep your existing DDR4 memory; a Ryzen 7 5800X3D is a strong gaming option, while a less expensive gaming-focused chip could also make sense if the budget is tighter.
So if repasting doesn’t solve it, you’re recommending replacing both the motherboard and CPU rather than upgrading just one of them?