Upgrading PC to GTX 1070 and 4k.... Advice?

[Eroginous]

Thanks for taking some time to right such an in depth post Eroginous.

I'm curious about a few things.

The biggest issue I'm having right now is the cost for a 2k monitor vs. the cost for a 4k monitor. They are relatively the same which just seems silly to purchase a 2k monitor when if you want to you can simply run games at a 2k resolution if necessary reducing the strain on your PC. So even though I could purchase a 2k, I think its smarter to simply get the 4k because it will last longer than a 4k when the tech catches up to push out the resolution. So I'm not sure the benefit of buying a 2k monitor... unless the increased refresh rate actually makes a bigger difference than I thought...which leads me to my next question...

In regards of refresh rate. I'm looking at a 27 inch 2k monitor with a 144 Hz rate compared to a 28 inch 4k monitor with a 60 Hz rate. You think the difference of the 2k 144 Hz will be a greater improvement than a 4k at 60 Hz? (price is the same so its negligible) I don't really know the difference as I don't think I've ever had a monitor with a higher than 60 Hz rate.

Thanks for answering in advance.

Yes, I think you will notice an improvement in your gaming experience if you're getting a card that can push higher than 60fps gaming (consistently) at 2k resolution. The people who have actually bought and use 144hz monitors seem to love the shit out of them, despite all the claims of 'people not being able to see anything above 60fps.' It's like the difference between watching a movie at 25 fps or 60 fps. You can see the difference, and you'll notice a difference with games too. However, I'd see if you can find a place with 144hz monitors on demo with games, just to see how it looks and feels before you commit.

Also, you could see if there's a 4k monitor that will run at higher than 60hz at lower resolutions, and use it at a more comfortable resolution until 4k gaming support gets better.

[Aeriedk]

Yes, I think you will notice an improvement in your gaming experience if you're getting a card that can push higher than 60fps gaming (consistently) at 2k resolution. The people who have actually bought and use 144hz monitors seem to love the shit out of them, despite all the claims of 'people not being able to see anything above 60fps.' It's like the difference between watching a movie at 25 fps or 60 fps. You can see the difference, and you'll notice a difference with games too. However, I'd see if you can find a place with 144hz monitors on demo with games, just to see how it looks and feels before you commit.

Also, you could see if there's a 4k monitor that will run at higher than 60hz at lower resolutions, and use it at a more comfortable resolution until 4k gaming support gets better.

Very interesting. It seems after doing additional research and taking into consideration what you and a few others have said I would say that the 4k is out. A 4k monitor that could produce higher than 60 Hz when on lower resolutions would be nice, but it seems it doesn't exist.

With that said it comes down to a balancing act of budget and features. Strictly speaking about 2k monitors now. I can get a 144 Hz 1 ms response time 27" TN Monitor for $400.00 vs. a 144 Hz 4 ms response time 27" IPS monitor w/ G-Sync for $600.00 OR theres also a 27" 144 hz 4 ms IPS (no gsync) for $500. It seems like from the research I've gone the G-Sync really isn't necessary if your game isn't producing more frames that what your display can handle and at 2k resolution with a 144 Hz monitor is becomes less of a concern as most modern games won't be able to played a 144 FPS with current tech (although with the latest set of cards thats less true), I guess theres also V-sync as well if I don't get GSync Also I've personally never had an IPS monitor but it seems like the general thought is that IPS is nice for the eyes and photography, but not a big deal for gaming and that it generally reduces the response time (like above 1 ms->4ms response time) which is considered bad for gaming, but on that same token it seems like unless you are a professional playing FPShooters its probably not much of a concern. I have quite the dilemma on my hands wanting the best picture and performance for the cheapest cost, of course thats what we all want.

Thanks to all that have responded to this thread. It has encouraged for the most part cordial discussion and really helped me zero in on a decision. Now I really have to try and get a few of those cards.

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I know the mother board and such but how to do I get full spec and such like how people post? o.O

Uh this really depends. If you bought the computer pre-built at a store or online then look at the box or the description online and post that... if you build it yourself you should know the specs but I know sometimes they can get lost. So if you built it you can look up your order history of where you bought the parts and post those...

If you built it and no longer know/can access your part info or bought it prebuilt and don't have a box/online info try checking out this page

http://www.wikihow.com/Check-Computer-Specifications

I don't really know how to specifically look up your hardware components, the above may be the best way. Outside of looking under the hood and they may not necessarily tell you much.

[Grym]

Found my order history:

CoolerMaster HAFX Gaming Case 2x Front USB 3.0 2x Front USB 2.0 Front Audio
CoolerMaster 700W Silent Pro M700 Modular PSU
ASUS P8Z77-V PRO: 4x Rear USB3.0/2.0: 4x USB2.0: Built In Wireless N::
Intel® Core™ i5 3570K Quad Core 4x 3.4GHz (Overclocked to 4.6GHz) 6MB Cache (4 Threads)
Corsair H60 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler - *OVERCLOCK PC*
Corsair XMS3 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600MHz
Corsair Force 3 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive SATA 3 550MB/s Read 510MB/s Write
2TB 7200RPM SATA 3
22x DVD RW Black SATA
Internal Blu-ray Re-Writer Disc/DVD/CD Combo Drive
nVidia GeForce GTX 680 2GB
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio
Built-in Wireless N included with Asus P8Z77V-Pro
Microsoft Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit


I am thinking upgrading the graphics card to the GTX1080 should be sufficient?

And this is the monitor I am thinking of getting:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00WUACE...43E1VNVK&psc=1

[noladrew]

Don't buy what the some people are saying. If you just want WoW at 60 FPS on Ultra, then a 1070 will do just fine.

My current setup has a crappy GTX 970 that I will be upgrading to a 1080 when they become available.

https://gyazo.com/f8635191e6e9aa376c0f3132f89f6e87

As you can see I'm at 45 with a shitty GPU. I wouldn't excect 60FPS in raid settings and such, but questing and walking around, sure.

bothers me soooo SOOO much that the FPS indicator isnt centered in the screen region. idk how the hell that happens

[Artorius]

Wait for the HDR DCI-P3 4K monitors, the last thing you want is to buy an expensive current 4K monitor that doesn't support the things that make 4K meaningful. HDR will be supported on Doom soon for example, those new things are slowly coming with the adoption of Dx12 and Vulkan.

[Grym]

Wait for the HDR DCI-P3 4K monitors, the last thing you want is to buy an expensive current 4K monitor that doesn't support the things that make 4K meaningful. HDR will be supported on Doom soon for example, those new things are slowly coming with the adoption of Dx12 and Vulkan.

What is HDR?

The one I am looking at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00WUACE...43E1VNVK&psc=1

is not good?

[Aeriedk]

Wait for the HDR DCI-P3 4K monitors, the last thing you want is to buy an expensive current 4K monitor that doesn't support the things that make 4K meaningful. HDR will be supported on Doom soon for example, those new things are slowly coming with the adoption of Dx12 and Vulkan.

Honestly at this point I'm leaning more towards a 2k monitor. Regardless of how amazing (!!!) the HDR 4k displays will be, it will be a long while before they affordable for me.

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What is HDR?

The one I am looking at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00WUACE...43E1VNVK&psc=1

is not good?

HDR - High Dynamic Range. It gives a much wider color and brightness range. It just makes everything look richer and more "real".

The GTX 1080 will be able to run most games fine on 4k(30-60 FPS depending on the age of the game, 60+ if its older). The rest of your PC looks fine IMO. CPU is "outdated", but not really. its an i5 OC'ed to 4.6 its fine. You could upgrade it but I wouldn't say you need to.

In regards of your monitor choice it looks fine. Make sure you have a DP cord and understand that it has freesync not Gsync so you won't be able to use the freesync feature with your Nvidia card.

[Eroginous]

Very interesting. It seems after doing additional research and taking into consideration what you and a few others have said I would say that the 4k is out. A 4k monitor that could produce higher than 60 Hz when on lower resolutions would be nice, but it seems it doesn't exist.

With that said it comes down to a balancing act of budget and features. Strictly speaking about 2k monitors now. I can get a 144 Hz 1 ms response time 27" TN Monitor for $400.00 vs. a 144 Hz 4 ms response time 27" IPS monitor w/ G-Sync for $600.00 OR theres also a 27" 144 hz 4 ms IPS (no gsync) for $500. It seems like from the research I've gone the G-Sync really isn't necessary if your game isn't producing more frames that what your display can handle and at 2k resolution with a 144 Hz monitor is becomes less of a concern as most modern games won't be able to played a 144 FPS with current tech (although with the latest set of cards thats less true), I guess theres also V-sync as well if I don't get GSync Also I've personally never had an IPS monitor but it seems like the general thought is that IPS is nice for the eyes and photography, but not a big deal for gaming and that it generally reduces the response time (like above 1 ms->4ms response time) which is considered bad for gaming, but on that same token it seems like unless you are a professional playing FPShooters its probably not much of a concern. I have quite the dilemma on my hands wanting the best picture and performance for the cheapest cost, of course thats what we all want.

Thanks to all that have responded to this thread. It has encouraged for the most part cordial discussion and really helped me zero in on a decision. Now I really have to try and get a few of those cards.

G-Sync is a great feature that helps provide a quality gaming experience while working to eliminate screen tearing (Vsync disabled) and input lag (Vsync enabled). Without getting into a huge long post about the benefits/drawbacks of Vsync, just know that Gsync is one of a few different techs developed to fix Vsync. The downside? Unless you buy a monitor that is G-Sync enabled, you cannot utilize the feature, since it's proprietary to the monitor. Additionally, G-Sync is Nvidia only, so the tech is not compatible with Team Red (AMD). From what people have said, G-Sync is a great feature and works as advertised - if you embrace the proprietary nature of it and understand they may suddenly stop support for G-Sync before monitors have widely adopted the standard.

For a time, AMD was working on their own form of adaptive sync tech called 'Free Sync,' meant to be a semi-open source tech (works with any monitor) widely available as long as you had graphics card support, but was not ready for market by the time Nvidia went all-in with G-Sync. Now, Nvidia has another tech called Fast Sync, which is debuting on 10 series cards. Instead of dynamically adapting to enable/disable Vsync to remedy screen tearing or input lag, Fast Sync works by scanning individual frames as they are buffered, intelligently selecting and displaying only the ones that are tear-free, at a rate as fast as the monitor will display. This is one of the reasons I suggested a 144hz panel instead of a 4k, since you'll be able to leverage Adaptive Sync technologies more than you can leverage higher resolution ATM.

If you do decide to spend the extra money for G-Sync, it will work in tandem with Fast Sync to give you a buttery smooth gaming experience, even if you're not always getting 144 FPS or more. Keep in mind that without G-Sync, you'll still experience performance issues in games when you're below the refresh rate of the monitor, but it's unclear how that affects 144hz panels at this time. I don't have one to test so I can't really suggest which way to go on that.

As for the rest of your PC, it looks great (a lot more current than my build and I do fine with lower specced hardware @ 1080p), I don't think you need to do anything more than upgrade monitor/GPU. If you were setting aside a larger budget, that means you can do stuff like consider a multi monitor setup or picking a higher end option like the 1080 if the 1070 was your original plan.

[Aeriedk]

G-Sync is a great feature that helps provide a quality gaming experience while working to eliminate screen tearing (Vsync disabled) and input lag (Vsync enabled). Without getting into a huge long post about the benefits/drawbacks of Vsync, just know that Gsync is one of a few different techs developed to fix Vsync. The downside? Unless you buy a monitor that is G-Sync enabled, you cannot utilize the feature, since it's proprietary to the monitor. Additionally, G-Sync is Nvidia only, so the tech is not compatible with Team Red (AMD). From what people have said, G-Sync is a great feature and works as advertised - if you embrace the proprietary nature of it and understand they may suddenly stop support for G-Sync before monitors have widely adopted the standard.

For a time, AMD was working on their own form of adaptive sync tech called 'Free Sync,' meant to be a semi-open source tech (works with any monitor) widely available as long as you had graphics card support, but was not ready for market by the time Nvidia went all-in with G-Sync. Now, Nvidia has another tech called Fast Sync, which is debuting on 10 series cards. Instead of dynamically adapting to enable/disable Vsync to remedy screen tearing or input lag, Fast Sync works by scanning individual frames as they are buffered, intelligently selecting and displaying only the ones that are tear-free, at a rate as fast as the monitor will display. This is one of the reasons I suggested a 144hz panel instead of a 4k, since you'll be able to leverage Adaptive Sync technologies more than you can leverage higher resolution ATM.

If you do decide to spend the extra money for G-Sync, it will work in tandem with Fast Sync to give you a buttery smooth gaming experience, even if you're not always getting 144 FPS or more. Keep in mind that without G-Sync, you'll still experience performance issues in games when you're below the refresh rate of the monitor, but it's unclear how that affects 144hz panels at this time. I don't have one to test so I can't really suggest which way to go on that.

As for the rest of your PC, it looks great (a lot more current than my build and I do fine with lower specced hardware @ 1080p), I don't think you need to do anything more than upgrade monitor/GPU. If you were setting aside a larger budget, that means you can do stuff like consider a multi monitor setup or picking a higher end option like the 1080 if the 1070 was your original plan.

Right now I'm learning towards the 2k 27" 144 Hz IPS. I've never had an IPS and it seems like everyone loves them. I'd love to get the monitor with the Gsync, but the IPS is already outside of what I'd like to spend, although if the devil on my shoulder gets the best of me I'll be getting the Gsync. We'll see. As far as the rest I'm going to stick with the 1070 because it seems like its the best bang for your buck unless you do the crossfire AMD cards at the end of the month, but I'm not interested in crossfire myself. I plan on getting a smaller 19"-24" range monitor as a supplemental monitor for random things while gaming, working, etc., but I don't need anything special for that.

I appreciate all of your help and insight. It is clear you know your stuff.

If anyone else has input to add I'll certainly consider it, but I think I've really narrowed it down to three.

[Auxora]

Others have said the same, but just reiterating that a 1070 isn't really enough to do 4k. I guess in the end it depends what framerate is acceptable to you, and how ok you are with cranking down settings to get it to be passable. I wouldn't be, but some are ok with 30 fps. But really even the 1080 isn't enough for 4k on ultra and 60fps. That probably won't come until the 1080ti (or w/e they call it) late 2016 or early 2017 for ~$800.

Another more realistic option would be to get a 1070 now and a 4k monitor if you want, but plan on running it for games at less than 4k for now. Then you can always sell the 1070 in 6 months and get a 1080ti (or Vega if it can do 4k at similar rates to the 1080ti) when they come out, which should be the first true 4k cards.

[Artorius]

What is HDR?

The one I am looking at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00WUACE...43E1VNVK&psc=1

is not good?

I'm lazy to type today so:


Basically they increased the color-space from sRGB to DCI-P3 and the color-depth from 8bit to 10bit. We went from having 256 levels of colors to having 1024 levels so they used some of those levels to cover "peaks" of light instead of making a denser gradient. So now you can get brighter highlights and the picture overall will be way more vivid.


And the 590D is like the most basic 4K monitor you can get, it's TN and made to be cheap. It is an 8bit panel + FRC though which is nice.

Right now I'm learning towards the 2k 27" 144 Hz IPS. I've never had an IPS and it seems like everyone loves them. I'd love to get the monitor with the Gsync, but the IPS is already outside of what I'd like to spend, although if the devil on my shoulder gets the best of me I'll be getting the Gsync. We'll see.

If you've been using your TN monitors from dead-center angle then the TN -> IPS difference is non-existent.
IPS advantage over TN is better off-axis performance. Everything else is virtually the same for both.

[Lockon Stratos]

4k monitors are more expensive, have lower refresh rates and you can't even use to the fullest extent due to GPU limitations.

You're better off getting a 1440p monitor with 144Hz refresh rate.

[Eroginous]

Right now I'm learning towards the 2k 27" 144 Hz IPS. I've never had an IPS and it seems like everyone loves them. I'd love to get the monitor with the Gsync, but the IPS is already outside of what I'd like to spend, although if the devil on my shoulder gets the best of me I'll be getting the Gsync. We'll see. As far as the rest I'm going to stick with the 1070 because it seems like its the best bang for your buck unless you do the crossfire AMD cards at the end of the month, but I'm not interested in crossfire myself. I plan on getting a smaller 19"-24" range monitor as a supplemental monitor for random things while gaming, working, etc., but I don't need anything special for that.

I appreciate all of your help and insight. It is clear you know your stuff.

If anyone else has input to add I'll certainly consider it, but I think I've really narrowed it down to three.

IPS has much better viewing angles, but can suffer from light bleed. If you have a higher quality phone, you've probably noticed vibrant colors on higher brightness settings tend to bleed through the edges of the Bezel when viewing in the dark. This can happen with IPS panels too, though it has more to do with manufacturing quality control than anything. A well made IPS should have minimal bleed (or at least appear uniform enough to be less noticeable).

A TN panel will not have any light Bleed, but will suffer from color and lighting shifts when you're not viewing them on-center. If you shift a lot in your chair as you work/play, or if you view the panel from different areas of the room, IPS would be a better choice than TN.

And yeah, you can stick to 2k, but you should probably get a 1440p monitor. I forgot, in all my talking points, to mention that 27" is about as big as a 2k panel can be before you start to see the pixels. I can see them on mine but it doesn't really bother me unless I put my face way too close. 1080p is still a nice resolution, even in the world of 4k and soon-to-be-8k monitors. But the difference between a 1440p monitor and a 2k monitor is going to be pretty noticeable, imo.

[TheDeeGee]

1070 = 1080/1200/1440
1080 = 4k

[Aeriedk]

Things really fell into my lap today. After reading all the advice given I decided to go with a 27" 144 Hz TN monitor w/o gsync. However when I was looking around today I noticed that the there was a 27" 144 Hz TN monitor w/ G-Sync on sale for less than $500. I use the retailer quite often and they have a service that allows me to return for free no questions asked if I decide against the upgrade/can't obtain the GPU I need.

Thanks to everyone that answered this thread and tried to help me with my decision. I feel extremely confident about my purchase and I honestly feel quite knowledgeable on the subject as well now. Always an excellent community here. Thanks again.

[Deleted]

Well, the 1070 isn't going to be gaming at 4k/Ultra.

4 players ultra settings 4k diablo 3 - youtube /watch?v=m0qM0jiP-kE
1 player ultra settings 4k diablo 3 - youtube/watch?v=Mn70VsA8PKk

cpu i7-3770

the gameplay is quite satisfying... i may say..