Understanding Hardware "Bottlenecks" and How to Avoid Them (NCIX Tech Tips #81)

Today Linus covers the topic of "bottlenecking" in the context of computer hardware, and gives some strategies to help avoid it and get the most out of your computer.

[@xedalpha1]

Baby Linus using a whiteboard with Vista in the background talking about the high end GTX 480....gods I feel old.

[@Basiliomadera1]

You know this video is old when you realize the windows vista home screen

[@mathlouthibeyrem8719]

+Basilio Madera it's ancient

[@Dimmizer]

+Basilio Madera I loled when he said the 480 was the best card on the market. kinda brought me back for a second thinking damn..

[@mjc0961]

+Basilio Madera Didn't even need to see that, the poor video and audio quality compared to newer videos was an immediate red flag.

[@JfhuTheJedi]

+Basilio Madera it hurts just looking at it lol

[@dagds4216]

+Basilio Madera I just realized it's 6 years old when brings out that ancient graphics card and called it a 'Big Dog'

[@tankliluchuck]

this channel is one of my fav. channels to watch on spare time

[@charlie7mason]

Anyone else getting recommended really old videos? I'm so glad to see how far Linus has come. Kind of feel like we grew together.

[@BlondeNordic]

I like this channel i get tons of info and yet it is not boring and it does keep me awake ( unlike some other channels that i have watched) so A+ Linus. Thank you :)

[@StarAgentRXA4682]

Will my Athlon XP, 1GB DDR2 RAM, 4 year old 300W PSU bottleneck my GTX TITAN X Pascal?

[@fruitcaketech934]

+Craig ferguson you dont get the joke

[@kevinmoehring8259]

you could think of adding another gb of ram, it would definitely help. but other than that I think you should be fine for a couple more years.

[@Azq50]

Nah it's perfect for gaming

[@kevinmoehring8259]

cities skylines here we come!

[@eduardoleiva4959]

the Athlon is an XP and the Titan is also a XP, so, what could be wrong?

[@MrJerramie]

VERY good presentation! Super informative. I had never thought of using software tests to find bottlereck

[@ShotGunRaids]

Would this bottleneck please answer intel core i5 4570 and gtx 660 and 550 PSU

[@mercenarymudcrab]

no, the cpu could feed even a stronger gpu.

[@sunnyvakkalanka2739]

lol this is the first time I saw a verified KZbinr comment smth and not get any likes lmao

[@kklogins]

OMG, dat cheezy porn music of the old NCIX intros! xD

[@TheActright]

I agree with everything you said but the First statement that using a large PSU on a browsing computer creates a "BottleNeck" is false, is it a waste yes, but doesn't effect the flow of data either way. Why I'm pointing this out is because when people come to me and are looking for a Budget Gaming Computer with the plans to upgrade slowly overtime I tell them make sure you buy a good PSU around 750w to 850w because if you go with that cheap ass 300w or 400w PSU that come in most starter gaming rigs under $1000. When you do decide to upgrade, like maybe a new GPU, you'll most likely are going to have to upgrade the PSU. Now you have a Low PSU collecting dust and the money you spent on that low end PSU wasted. If you plan to build a computer that you never plan to upgrade at all, by all means go with the 300w or 400w.

[@fletcherst-germain6608]

This old tech tips is fantastic lol

[@dickiechaney1998]

great video... thanks for this from the UK

[@NoviceindisguiseOfficial]

lel, GTX 480 as the fastest. Wow. Time flies.

[@aaathifa6228]

ikr xD

[@Z0MGH4X]

I thought this was a recent video until Linus showed the GPUs

[@NitroBaak]

Damn, noone has ever made bottlenecking so clear for me. Thanks!

[@BlendEngine]

The double finger snap and hand wave was my favourite part.

[@BruceLee-rh8uq]

Is this a Bottleneck? CPU: I9 9000k RAM: 100GB GPU: GTX 1000 HD: 20TB And will dis run call of doodie mw1?

[@user-pu3kk4zl4e]

GTX 1000 In 2014, cool.

[@toastergaming6945]

you got your dream finally lmao. try an i9-7980xe and a gtx 1080ti

[@IplayXbox4funzies]

I was wondering why he was using the 480 when the 980 is out and then I realized the vid was from 2010

[@leonardoandersson6520]

simple and helpful, thank you :)

[@Suneru]

Daaamn Linus lookin' fresh

[@asAbsolute]

Will my FX-4300 bottleneck a GTX 970 I'm planning on getting?

[@MW3TIM]

Wel assuming a FX-6300 and GTX 970 is a bottleneck. Yes, the FX-4300 and 970 will be too.

[@asAbsolute]

Purple Hawk How badly will it bottleneck though? I'm using a 1600x900 screen.

[@MW3TIM]

+Mat7hew_ Probably to the point the 970 is not even worth it anymore.

[@asAbsolute]

Purple Hawk What do you recommend I do then?

[@MW3TIM]

+Mat7hew_ Upgrade your system, what are your specs?

[@laithjebril7217]

Who's watching this in 2017 🐸

[@Audiman0aha]

Laith Jebreel 2018 bro ;)

[@willn8664]

2020 lol

[@squelchedotter]

:)

[@MrJerramie]

I learned this lesson by doing my homework. Its an easy concept to follow. Always read up on you hardware before you decide to build. Bottle necking can be so easy to miss

[@gefluzafix]

you are correct on the bottlneck for gpu and cpu except for several newer cards... such as anyone that runs cuda acceleration or ope cl architecture... where it runs entirely upon the gpu or givesa limited ammount of frames for each call before running to gpu (1-4 frames average) -thereby completely ignoring the speed of the cpu.

[@thosko98]

would a grx 960 go together with a core i5 4460?

[@___Robin___]

+Fluffy Greyfoot they can go together yes, and your system won't have a bottleneck either. Both CPU and Video card have a high performance and this would be a really good gaming setup. In future your core i5 4460 could become your bottleneck, but it all depends on how programs are developped, if they are GPU intensive or CPU intensive. Only for CPU intensive games you will see the 4460 becoming a bottleneck to the system. The best match for the GTX 960 is the core i5-4690K 3.5 GHz operating 13% better in games than the core i5 4460. The core i5 4460 is almost a perfect match for the 960 and a very good choice (unless you think of video rendering and other intensive stuff requiring a core i7, which you probably won't need). The only thing it really misses is overclock potential. Other then that a very good match they would serve well together. Even if you plan to upgrade your 960 in future because of higher graphical demands I'm pretty sure the 4460 would still be able to keep up.

[@thosko98]

Robin Clarijs thanks! Anything is better than the C2D and radeon 3850 I have at the moment lol

[@djjesus.hediedforyourspins3154]

+Robin Clarijs No.... just no.... a 4690k for a 960? The i5 4460 can take advantage of my gtx 970 with no problems...

[@thosko98]

DJ Jesus.He Died for your spins I've decided to get an r9 390 instead of the 960 though. Would the i5 4460 still not be a bottleneck? From what I've heard the 390 performs similar to the 970, but it has more vram which helps in 1440p or even 4k.

[@djjesus.hediedforyourspins3154]

Fluffy Greyfoot the i5 4460 won't bottleneck anything. I saw some dude with a titan x and an i5 4460 running it with no problems.

[@swifty1969]

so I guess a titan z black edition will not go well with an Athlon 64...LOL!!!

[@admirljubovic6759]

nice video! A lot of usefull information!

[@slicker55]

GREAT video's - will be sharing with a friend who can use these to put his retirement to better use!

[@MajesticDeathray]

I have an Intel Core i5 4690K 3.5Ghz, and I'd like to get an EVGA GTX-960 SSC 2GB. Will it bottleneck, or should i get something else? Thanks beforehand. :D

[@ArulinETheKirin]

The Stealth Shadow Yes you can bottleneck an i5 , just got to have something so intense it would need to run on a CAD card. i7 + Fire Pro = Game building.

[@branflakes0399]

Dude zabby I'm making the same computer right now as you are haha I wanted to know if the 960 was too much for the cpu also.

[@MajesticDeathray]

branflakes0399 It is. I resolved getting a GTX-970 STRIX from ASUS. It's not that much more expensive (349.99 on Amazon), and for Nvidia, it's the price to performance sweetspot for high-end, new cards.

[@narutofreakwersdfzxc]

Zabby lol you guys are funny no it wont you can keep an i5 for 5 years without upgrading it, you can sli 2 gtx 980's with no bottleneck

[@Buckeyeband1]

Daevon Jackson and Zabby, I built my rig with a 4690k that I overclocked to 4.0 Ghz, and a GTX 980 sc with the acx 2.0 from Evga. When I'm in games, my GPU always can get to 100% load if it needs to, which is what matters, and my CPU can also hit 100% load. So, basically you'll be fine with any graphics card right now with that quad core

[@speeeeros7095]

Anyone who is thinking of pairing a gtx 770 with an i3,don't do it xD

[@joshua33112]

nearly did it with core 2 quad, talking about a noob upgrading his pc :P

[@speeeeros7095]

***** Well,tbh, core i3 and pentium are a good pair with mid-ranged cards.The limit is 7870 from radeon and gtx 660ti from nvidia. Once you go to high end cards you will definitely see bottlenecking. I didn't read that anywhere, I experienced it myself ;)

[@minamontasser]

I have gtx 770 paired with i3 4130 and 8g ram. no bottleneck at all The new haswell generation cpu are very powerfull ...

[@speeeeros7095]

minamontasser Lel. Have you been living under the stones? Haswell lineup is just ~5% more powerful than ivy-bridge. As for the bottlenecks,i kinda don't believe you because i had it. My cpu was the i3-3240 with 8 gigs or 1600mhz ram(recently upgraded to i5-3570k).

[@minamontasser]

SpyRos13 sir with all due respect ,, i didn't use the ivy bridge i use to have an old i5 second generation laptop ,, that why when comparing my old i5 second gen 2410 processor with the new i3 4130 haswell it feels like night and day ... second regarding the bottle necks i could assure you i could play any games at ultra setting with a 60/90 fps no lag at all .... have a great day sir ..

[@blakegriplingph]

I agree on the part where you mentioned that having lots of VRAM is pointless for entry-level GPUs. I've seen DDR3 video cards with 4GB RAM, and it's moot as there's simply not enough bandwidth to go around, not to mention you wouldn't be able to max games out, rendering the card's framebuffer excessive for its worth.

[@rentenzen_FGO]

In physics, it's somewhat ironic that in the traffic/merging analogy cars slow down whereas in study of fluids liquid (such as pipe flow) displacing from a bigger area (circle) to a small area liquid speed up. But, of course, the liquid travel with the same velocity in the same area at a point in time. Cars don't normally go at the same velocity.

[@superjugy]

Something that you have to keep in mind is that there is always going to be something that bottlenecks unless you are giving less work to the system than it can handle. There is always going to be a "weak" link, it can be your SSD, your processor, your Mobo, your GPU or your RAM. But that is just a law. The point is to get that "weak" link so high that the tasks you throw at it won't stall or even if they stall, it is good enough for you. For example, a car factory has several parts, you have to build the parts, then asemble them, then paint them, then test them, etc. Even if you can paint 1000 cars a day, if you can only make parts for 100 cars, you would be wasting the painting power. So before even building the factory, the company has to know how many cars per day they want to produce and THEN make sure each of the parts is able to handle that. so If they choose 100 cars, they will "bottleneck" at 100 cars but that was their goal anyway so there is no problem.

[@Felipe03000]

Mobos can decrease (drasticaly) performance? I only knew that it could raise temps... :-P

[@superjugy]

+Felipe03000 it is not common but it can happen.

[@Felipe03000]

superjugy hm... In my build my mobo makes my CPU heat too mutch. Without an decent cooler it reached 80C easily (FX 4100)

[@mundan2435]

First video i saw from linus :)

[@gelzgrant13]

And now linus tech tips :3

[@TheMASTERFURIOUS]

thanks for the info.

[@soontaesin2069]

oh~ thank you ~^^ from S.Korea 감사합니다 point is balance .

[@supervegito2277]

0:26 i was recently informed (and rather surprised but i dont have a license myself) that no that truck doesnt have to find place... the other lane HAS to give it space.

[@frigginjoe]

I built an FX-6350 & HD 7950 PC for someone a few weeks back. He's happy. The latest FX chips (6300 and 8300) are good processors and keep up just fine for whatever GPU.

[@joachimelskerdumle]

great video

[@MegF142857]

Yes, it is very overwhelming!

[@thephaze3]

Great video, I found after Putting an R9 280X on my reasonably new (2012) Socket 1155 H61 Board lol.. my poor old 2500 couldn't take it. The new Z97 chipset + 4670k fairs much better.. I was always aware of bottle necking but never realised how easily it can occur haha.

[@RelentlessBros]

Good job

[@trot0493]

Aside from price, as he mentions, what are the main specifications to look at in determining what cpu's and gpu's are best suited for each other?

[@Superkaylog2]

AMD Athlon X4 760K CPU NVIDIA GeForce GTX 760 2GB Radeon R7 260X 2GB ,,, are thous gpu's going to perform same, i mean witch should i use cheaper one Radeon , or GeForce?

[@leswhinn]

Hi Linus, I just bought a G30i 3XS Gaming PC from Scan computers in the UK which has these parts installed: Graphics card: 2GB EVGA GTX 750Ti SC, PCIe 3.0, 5400MHz GDDR5, GPU 1176MHz, Boost 1255MHz, Cores 640, DPort/DVI/HDMI CPU: Intel Core i7 4770, 1150, Haswell, Quad Core, 3.4GHz, 3.9GHz Turbo, 1200MHz GPU, 34x Ratio, 84W System Memory: 16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz Motherboard: Asus H81M-PLUS, 2xSATA 6Gbps, 2xSATA 3Gbps, 2xUSB3, 4xUSB2, HDMI, DVI, D-Sub, mATX SSD: Sandisk SSD, ULTRA II, 2.5" SATA 6GB/S, 480GB HDD: 1TB Seagate Barracuda, 7200rpm, 64MB Cache DVD Drive: Samsung SH-224DB (SATA) Case: Corsair 200R ( I've Installed some Corsair 120mm SP and 120mm AF fans to the tower too) Power supply: 600W Corsair CXM series, Hybrid Modular, 80 PLUS Bronze CPU Cooler: Coolermaster Hyper TX3 EVO CPU Cooler ((Did have an Intel reference cooler 1150 in But i change it a couple of days ago Due to high temps)) Sound Card: Creative Labs Audigy FX 5.1 Gaming Soundcard OS: Microsoft Windows 7 Pro 64bit, Supports 16GB RAM and above Any bottle necking possibilities please? and what would be the Best GPU setting too please for gaming? Thank you in advance for All/Any info

[@RaptorZX3]

i have an fairly old setup here (as my 3rd best PC), Core 2 Duo E8400 + GTX 295, though i'm looking to get a better board since this one is limiting me to 2.87gb of DDR2 because of the BIOS. But i still get fairly good performance for older games, even Just Cause 2 run fairly good on it. I tried a GTX 480 on that setup and it did next to no difference in performance in a few benchmarks (FF14 and Valley Benchmark), so i'll keep this GTX 480 for another future setup.

[@Pork_eating_crusader]

You know this video is ancient when Linus mentioned one of the boards used is a DFI Lanparty. DFI has been kaput for ages!

[@alkevinzmedia]

Wow just learned something, but please help me. Did you mention at 7:01 that if you have a high end card, you should turn your settings to high rather than low or medium? Does that also apply to the GPU's menu in the control panel and game or game settings only?

[@MrGencyExit64]

The biggest bottleneck in modern computing is memory latency. Compute power increases much quicker than memory performance, and rather than fixing the actual problem, more cores have been introduced to keep at least one CPU core busy doing work while a memory fetch is stalling the others.

[@mashuboyable]

i actually did change it to a haswell shortly after posting that, it allowed me to get a much better motherboard for the same price.

[@timo2342]

i use my computer for 2d/3d animation - photoshop, after effects, 3ds max, mudbox video conversion - all that stuff, my computer was pre-built by HP and is about 3 years old (bought it with student loan money). not had any problems with it until very recently when it started to slow down quite a bit, so my first piece of upgrade was an ssd to run the os and programs! all this confusion about compatible components makes me worry to the point were i'm just tempted to get newer versions of what's already in the case, any advice on motherboards and graphics cards?? i currently have an i7 2600 processor and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460! i'm tempted to get the GTX 660 since since i know everything will be just fine if i do!

[@frigginjoe]

Intel chips are of the fineass variety for years now, so that i5 would probably keep up fine. I personally would be looking into one of their newer CPU's, but with 7950's dropping to the $200 mark you're going to see a decent performance bump even if you keep the CPU and motherboard. That 3gb of VRAM is also nice. You're just more likely to frequent frame rate hiccups here and there, depending on the game.

[@muhammadnaufalalauddin8522]

Nice polo Linus! :p

[@edmarkgutierrez972]

Hi NCIX, May I ask an advice before I buy my gaming PC? The specs below is what I plan to buy. AMD Kaveri A8-7500 x4 3.6GHz w/ Radeon R7 Graphics (Integrated) MSI A68HM-E33 Motherboard. What's the best GPU should I partner with this specs to avoid bottleneck? Can I run GTA V with this build? Thanks! Hoping for response... More power!

[@Shammer1]

Linus tech tips young

[@radioman970]

thumbed up as soon as he explained those were trucks veering over.. :D my brain is slow but I got that fast.

[@letalmike]

I had huge bottleneck with an PHENOM II X4 955 and GTX 680... Even with 4 ghz on that old AMD cpu,my bottleneck was very present at that time in almost all games and benchmarks. After i bought an I5 4670K,all my framerates were almost doubled in games and benches scores also!

[@danwithjesus]

I do have my RAM on the sweet spot...on 1866mhz with the timings at 9-9-9-24 CR2...they are more for the Intel but they work on amd just as great...on the NB and HT clock is 2400 and 2600...I don't OC my system because of bad cpu cooler and PSU but i like it just as it is...

[@kozhitnrun]

question i recently put a pc together that i use for trolling the net and gaming (eve online ,bf4,metro,cod) am i bottlenecking it or is it a solid build Pc component’s Tower=Corsair Carbide series 300R Power Supply=Cooler Master 850W stealth Motherboard=ASUS M5A97 R2.0 (970/sb950) chipset Processer=AMD X6 fz-6300 black edition 8mb cache Processer cooling =COOLERMASTER Hyper 212 evo DRAM=G.SKILLS Ripjaws x 16gb DDR3 2133mhz cl10 duel channel kit Fan controller=NZXT Sentry LX (5 temp and 5 fan controller) Video Card= Sapphire Radeon R9 270X DUEL-x Hard drive -ssd Samsung 850 Pro series 256g Hard drive #2 WD Black 3TB (7200rpm 64mb cache) 3Deepcool 120mm blue led fans 1 deepcool 120mm blackout 1 corsair af140mm blue led 1 corsair 140mm blackout Idle temp 23.4 c

[@galinpetkov]

More about bottleneck: www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-avoid-bottlenecking-galin-petkov?trk=prof-post

[@CanadianCraft]

thanks

[@ThibautVDP]

question: RAM has a max frequency and latencies. but is it just a limit of how often the RAM can be called to, or is it a set value that the pc will have to be synced to? (example: 3.2GHz processor with 1.6GHz RAM)

[@JoshBlanket]

Hard drive: WD Blue 1 TB Desktop Hard Drive: 3.5 Inch, 7200 RPM, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64 MB Cache - WD10EZEX Power supply: Corsair Builder Series CX 600 Watt ATX/EPS 80 PLUS (CX600) And im using windows 7.

[@RomieJayEqueGIpsyche]

I need help, been planning this Build for quite some time now, did some research here and there, watched a lot of linus tech tips lol, but im not sure. Please suggest if what are the parts that needs to be removed or to be replaced in order to have an optimized Build - im on a tight budget though XD many thanks ;-) CPU: INTEL CORE I5 4460 3.2GHz LGA1150 MOBO: MSI Z87-G41 Coolong Fan: DEEPCOOL Ice Wind PRO RAM: KINGSTON 4GB HYPER-X FURY 1866MHz (or 8gigs maybe) GPU: PALIT GTX750Ti STORMX DUAL 2G DDR5 128BIT (the only GPU i could afford now) HDD: WESTERN 1TB SATA3 BLUE/GREEN PSU: XIGMATEK X CALIBRE SERIES 80 PLUS 600W (is it over what i need?)

[@TraZix]

Hi Linus, I have a 350W PSU with a Intel Pentium 4. I'm planning on buying a nvidia GEFORCE GT 640M (Not Ti). Would it work fine or do I require more wattage? I also plan buying a E8400 2 Cure CPU later.

[@TheLightMyFire]

Using a Single PCI Express 3.0 Video card in a PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot is it a bottleneck ? MSI Nvidia gtx 650 ti boost on an ASRock 970 pro 3 with pci express 2.0 slot. (cpu amd fx6300)

[@sulthanelite]

Operating System: Windows 8.1 Single Language, 64-bit DirectX version: 11.0 GPU processor: GeForce GT 740M Driver version: 353.30 Memory interface: 64-bit Dedicated video memory: 2048 MB DDR3 Ram: 8GB CPU: i5 4200U While am playing NFS rivals, or Crysis 2 it starts lagging after 5 mins. What would be the bottleneck for this Laptop?

[@CGProducer2011]

I'm using a XFX790i ultra SLI with a QX9770, 8GB Ram and a GTX295. It's doing pretty well so far, except for DX11 since the video card is only DX10. What would be the video card recommended upgrade? Thanks.

[@HUGUH94]

Hi, I have an intel core i7 870 and 12GB of ram DDR3 with a HD5770... Do you think that changing the old 5770 to a R9 270x will bottleneck? Thanks by the way, love your videos....

[@LORDGEEK]

i have an Intel Core 2 Quad 2.5 and a Asus GTX 750 Ti OC edition 2GB. Will this bottleneck my pc?

[@vincetravis70]

nice linus

[@Mutubeish]

Yea youre right, as soon as i post it, i remembered. :D But yea, you can have other bottlenecking between other components. Not only between cpu and gpu. But yea, youre right! I dont know, i can just refer to that video that i linkd. But htey had some "okey" fps in1600hz :s

[@dionboon4919]

Wow LinusTechTips Has changed since then

[@MultimediaIndonesia]

i had pc that my friend build it for me.. amd fx 6300 asrock 970 pro3 ram corsair 8gb (4x2gb) msi r9 270 gaming 2x hdd wdc 500gb corsair vs450w is it bottlecking or not and how about my psu, do i need to upgrade it?

[@VFB1210]

I'm interested to know as well. I've got an FX-4300 OC'd at 4.5Ghz with a 7970 in the mail; I'm starting to hope I didn't waste my money.

[@RyanMah34]

the traffic analogy looks alot like friggin Edmonton roads.

[@frigginjoe]

Happens to be you can get a $100 CPU that does the job well enough to justify a $400 GPU. Under normal conditions (like video settings you'd use with a higher end card) the lost frames from a higher end card and less than best CPU are minimal. The latest AMD FX (Piledriver) or 2 generation old Intel i5 will suffice for pretty much any level of visuals and the CPU requirements are going to start dipping as OpenCL(or equivalent) takes over.

[@TheDarkKnight03]

linus i love your white board it helps us understand whether its bottleneck or raid 0 or whatever. use white board more in your videos !! :) however why you didn't include in the video how to test or someone can tell if he has bottleneck issue in their system.. i had to search my self and got the answer finally my core 2 duo works great with geforce 9800 GT :) (your system is old..ok i know but still play 2014 games on smooth fps)

[@lidge1994]

i recently changed my plan to a 4670k and the same mbo but with 1150 socket, and from 660 ti to 760 :)

[@ShmonkeyShmonks]

great video, older but still valid :-)

[@ArtisChronicles]

Linus went back in time o_o

[@AIMIWA95]

I already knew I had a bottleneck on my system, but I still get one hell of a performance increase, I have an fx 4130 and have just upgraded to an r9 280x from a gtx 650, I can live with a small amount of bottleneck until I can upgrade my cpu, I mean, it still gets 40 - 60 fps on ultra in most games, which I fond more than playable

[@marfg12345]

your cpu is fine for pretty much any gpu out there, of course, OC'ing your cpu might be a good idea just to make sure, but yeah, you're set pretty much you might see some bottlenecks with crazy gpu's like gtx 690 in sli or hd7990 in crossfirex

[@UniversalGamer647]

i have an 8120 cpu and i have an sapphire r9 280 graphics card. is my cpu a bottleneck? can i get more performance if i upgrade my cpu? What CPU would be a better one to get if it currently a bottleneck for my GPU?

[@BenKuyt64]

Should be completely fine. They actually run really well together.

[@sigmaoctantis_nz]

Noticed this first hand after I dropped a 660ti into my old core 2 duo system, then upgraded to a i7 4770k. My framerates in games literally doubled.

[@Mall_Crawling_X]

i have asus maximus 7 hero MB, i54690k and GTX 980 ti. am i bottlenecking?

[@stater3]

Good video. Now I'll rethink my video card.

[@Wzawah]

I have a fx6300 6-core overclocked at 4.3Ghz, will it bottleneck a r9 290 4gb? Because I ordered that gpu today. Thanks in advance

[@scott_terwilliger]

I would really consider a larger power supply and going with one of the high-end Sandy Bridge CPUs (i.e. the 3930k, don't go extreme, it's a waste of money).

[@Taffer-bx7uc]

I want to know if my RAM is a possible bottleneck for my computer. Thanks for you help! -CPU: Intel Core i&-4790k Haswell Quad Core 4.0Ghz -MB: Asus Maximus VII Formula -Video: Asus Matrix GTX780Ti-P-3GD5 -RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) SDRAM DDR3 1333

[@eyesblank]

I`m currently using: MSI P55-GD55 ATX Intel Motherboard Palit GeForce GTS 250 NE3TS25EFHD02 Video Card Western Digital Caviar Black 500GB 3.5" SATA 3.0 GB/s Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive G. SKILL 6GB (3x2GB) 240-PIN DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Triple Channel Kit Desktop Memory Corsair CMPSU-750TX 750W Compatible with Core i7 Power Supply Intel Core i5-750 2.66GHz LGA 1156 95W Quad-core processor My question is how much more RAM can I get without any bottleneck. And also, any suggestion for affordable recording/streaming products.

[@chunkysenior]

im upgrading my cpu, i have a gtx 770 direct cu ii 2GB, but, sadly, with an intel i5 4430 3.0 Ghz. any recommendations on what i should purchase? im planning on overclocking with an h80i cooling system. I was thinking an i5 4690k but idk if its worth paying 100+ for an i7 4790k

[@Suntro]

Is it possible for a bottleneck between the gpu and cpu to appear after no prior issues? (might be a bitcoin miner tbh)

[@xtnj2032]

proc:FX-8320 mem:Kingston HyperX Fury 8gb (4x2) 1866 mobo:Asus M5A97 LE R2.0 hhd:Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB vcard: palit GTX 960 jetstream psu:FSP Hexa 700w APFC Power Supply Aerocool Templarius Ferrum White is this build fine ?

[@RE-mu6fr]

i hav been thinking of new gpu for my q9550 clocled to 3.6ghz, what would be the best for it

[@kaerbs]

I have FX-8350 (upgraded from FX-4100) and XFX Radeon 7770 Core edition (upgrading to R9 270X DC2 TOP)

[@SeaNBlack]

Phenom II x4 965 @3,40Ghz do bottleneck with a 7870 or a GTX660ti?

[@danwithjesus]

I have: MB = Asus Crosshair 5 Formula-Z CPU = Fx-8350 with turbo on CPU Cooler = Zalman CNPS-9700-led(old from 2008) RAM = Kingston HyperX Beast 16Gb(2x8) at 2133 GPU = Asus GTX 760 HDD = 1Tb + 500Gb + 250Gb (all WD and sata2) PSU = Enermax Liberty Eco 620w (2x12v with 30 amps each,old from 2009) Monitor = Fujitsu Siemens ScaleoView L24W-4(old from 2009) Mouse = A4Tech Bloody Gun 3 V7(i don't even use it for what it is made for) Keyboard = A4Tech KLS-23MU(old from 2006) Is there a bottleneck