Computer upgrade

[Christopher Davis]

Planning on building a new budget gaming rig for P3D and a few others. My question is that are flight sims still traditionally CPU dependent or have they required the use of a good GPU as well? Planning on upgrading my i7-4790k to an i7-8700k or i9-9900k (mostly to get the DDR4 memory from moving to the LGA1151 socket). My main issue is the GPU. A quick search on ebay provided me with 1080ti's selling for their original retail price or higher, and the same story for 2070's and 2080's. There's no way I'm spending those prices on used GPU's. I have a 1060 6GB in my current rig i can use but that will bottleneck any newer i7's. Will P3D suffer with the 1060 in the new build? Would it be more logical to pair it with an i5-8600k or similar? Or should i just keep my current rig? I sim on a 1080p monitor and little to no payware scenery like ORBX and stuff.

[Matthew Denton]

Hey Christopher,

So P3D is GPU intensive, My last build; AMD Ryzen 3600 and RTX-2070 Super ran at High settings. My current build with an AMD Ryzen 5950X and RTX 3090 can run at Ultra Settings. MFS2020 on the other hand is CPU intensive.

CPU bottle neck will be an issue if you are expecting High settings with a 1060 6GB, but on the bright side, if you can afford to hold out a little longer GPU prices will come down... I wouldn't suggest dropping 2K on a 3090, but getting yourself a 2060 or 2070 is feasible. Average is $550 on ebay and should do you some good. Just inspect the card before you give over any cash. Even mining rig GPU's will work, and because of the changes happening here pretty soon, you will see an influx of those hitting the market sooner than later. Again inspect these cards. Make sure they are clean and free of dust. And before anyone says that GPU used for Mining are degraded units, studies have shown that mining cards (as long as they haven't been abused,) loose no more performance than that of a brand new card. Wish you well in your upgrade endeavor.

[Ryan Parry]

P3D is still dependent on the CPU, but v4 and v5 lean on the GPU a lot more than it did in the previous versions (that's not saying much). I have a 9900KF overclocked at 4.9Ghz all core and recently upgraded from a RTX 2070 Super to an RTX 3070Ti and it didn't really help my FPS at all in P3D although it did clean up some specific situations that would be hard on the 2070S. MSFS on the other hand it helped a lot, it got me from the low 50fps range to 80 FPS at 1440p in MSFS.

The GPU market is in shambles right now so getting one is going to be hard. I had to work a deal with a co-worker to get my 3070Ti and I still paid $100 over MSRP for his trouble, but I'd rather pay $100 over and not $300-400+ over MSRP. Upgrading to a 9900K will run P3D or XP11 well, and a 1060 will be "fine" if you temper expectations and set your settings appropriately.

Most of the developers for P3D seem to be headed in the direction of MSFS exclusivity, so that is something to consider if you want to sim long term. You could always upgrade the CPU and run lower settings in MSFS until you are able to snag a GPU.

You could always consider a pre-built if you really want the CPU/GPU combo. Something like NZXT BLD will get you a modern CPU, 30 series GPU, DDR4 etc for a reasonable price.

Good luck!