Looking to upgrade

[frankmite]

Hi

I am looking to upgrade my PC to get it up to todays standards and to increase overall performance. I mainly play Csgo and would ideally like to remain above 300 FPS at all times (on low settings) and possibly while streaming as well. I have a budget of around £1000 (can go higher).

My current specs are attached. Pleas note I have previously upgraded the gfx card to a 3gb 1060 and the psu to 650w.

Thanks

 

[SpyderTracks]

What monitor are you using? What resolution and refresh?

If you don't know then what make and model?

 

[frankmite]

I am using a zowie 144hz. Not sure on the model.

 

[frankmite]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01H07FVBI/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_W7waDbT4439SQ

 

[SpyderTracks]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01H07FVBI/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_W7waDbT4439SQ

So that's a 144hz monitor, so the max fps you can produce is 144fps.

Even if you're able to drive 300 from the gpu, the display will only ever show 144fps, so there's absolutely no point in trying to drive more.

There is no upgrade that's going to provide any beneficial improvement whilst you're on a 1080p screen even at 144hz.

If you did want a major upgrade, I'd suggest looking at a good 144hz 1440p IPS Freesync monitor for around £500, and then consider an RTX2070 to push the higher resolutions.

As an example of a decent monitor something like the:
Asus MG279Q FreeSync Monitor

Asus MG279Q FreeSync Monitor

Bringing FreeSync to a high refresh rate, 1440p and IPS panel.

www.hexus.net

 

[Oussebon]

300 fps has a mythic status in CSGO.

I'm not sure why and I have no real interest in CSGO so the research is limited but apparently it has something to do with

1) higher framerates reducing input lag

2) the source engine used to be capped to 300fps (but apparently you can uncap it now).

Most topics discussing this that I found just take 300fps as a given with about the same level of intelligence as people who buy an RTX 2080 ti SLI for "futureproof gaming" on a 1080p monitor worth £80.

But apparently there's some validity to the input lag thing:

CS:GO Input Lag | The Official Site of 1337 Pwnage

eliteownage.com

In that on a 144hz monitor, capping fps at 1000 instead of 144 yielded an average of 0.8ms improvement in input lag, sometimes ranging as high as 2ms.

A whole 500th of a second can be eliminated from input lag it seems.

Though some people in the topics I read talk about the point of 300fps being that if there are drops to 150fps, you don't take as big a hit with input lag as if it were 144fps dropping down closer to 60fps.

Although that does smack a bit of 300fps having legacy legendary status due to being the old framerate cap, and people finding all kinds of reasons to keep justifying why it's still the magic number. If 300fps were genuinely desirable from an input lag point of view, you'd target 600fps so that if you got drops down to 300fps, you'd still be better off than 300 dropping down to 144... and so on.

How much of an advantage this actually provides to anyone other than world-class players.. I've no idea.

mainly play Csgo and would ideally like to remain above 300 FPS at all times (on low settings) and possibly while streaming as well.

In general I'd agree with Spydertracks' advice about a new GPU and a nice monitor being a far better experience for most gaming.

If the main focus is CSGO and streaming however, a system with a faster CPU (and all the trappings that come with it like DDR4 RAM) could be worth considering.

I'll now say what I say in nearly every topic and suggest waiting for AMD's Zen 2 CPUs to be out from July 7th. The increased single-threaded performance versus current Ryzen offerings could make sense for CSGO, while a Ryzen 3600x with 6 cores and 12 threads (versus the 4C/4T of the OP's current CPU) would likely be a big help for streaming. Maybe even a 3700x (8C/16T).

 

[frankmite]

So that's a 144hz monitor, so the max fps you can produce is 144fps.

Even if you're able to drive 300 from the gpu, the display will only ever show 144fps, so there's absolutely no point in trying to drive more.

There is no upgrade that's going to provide any beneficial improvement whilst you're on a 1080p screen even at 144hz.

If you did want a major upgrade, I'd suggest looking at a good 144hz 1440p IPS Freesync monitor for around £500, and then consider an RTX2070 to push the higher resolutions.

As an example of a decent monitor something like the:
Asus MG279Q FreeSync Monitor

Asus MG279Q FreeSync Monitor

Bringing FreeSync to a high refresh rate, 1440p and IPS panel.

www.hexus.net

I am aware that a 144hz screen has a cap of 144hz. However, the higher FPS you get helps to increase smoothness and reduce the impact of frame drops.

Also I don’t really care about resolution as in Csgo I already play on 4:3 stretched at 1280x960.

 

[SpyderTracks]

I am aware that a 144hz screen has a cap of 144hz. However, the higher FPS you get helps to increase smoothness and reduce the impact of frame drops.

Also I don’t really care about resolution as in Csgo I already play on 4:3 stretched at 1280x960.

In that case, I'd go with Oussebon's advice and look to upgrade the platform to Zen 2 Ryzen 3000's once they're out in July.

Then you could upgrade the Mobo, CPU and RAM and I would add one of the new NVME PCIe 4 SSD's for massive throughput.

That may well exceed your current budget though if done well but hopefully not by much, but all remains to be seen with pricing and benchmarks.