Worth the upgrade?

Kaden_4

Currently running a B360M with an i5-9600K. I've been looking for a CPU upgrade for a while. Would the i7-11700K and Z590 be good upgrades for $250? The system is currently used mainly for gaming. Any direction is appreciated.

Yingdong

Depend on what you do with your pc. If you are playing some competitive cpu heavy games like csgo, apex, or doing some cpu heavy jobs like rendering, autocad; then yes. If you are just playing some AAA titles that rely more on GPU then no, the 6c6t 9600k is still able to handle most of modern triple a titles. Even if you decide to upgrade, I would suggest to go either 3700x+b550(cheaper while gives upgrade headroom to 5900x/5800x3d) or 12700k+z690(expensive but powerful, capable of upgrade to 13th gen cpu). The lga1200(z590) is pretty much a dead socket, while 11th gen offers not much upgrade compare to the previous 10th gen.

Rye_Bread

Hey, Kaden! To piggyback off of Yingdong, I definitely think that the upgrade to the 12700k is more than worth it, especially with the combo deal we have going at the moment.

I'm currently rocking a 9700k and a 3080, and I've noticed that the CPU is bottlenecking my GPU in some instances playing at 3440x1440. It's not giving me any major issues at the moment but it's definitely worth noting. Still, I might end up picking up the combo for myself.

As Yingdong mentioned, the differences between the 10th and 11th generation CPUs aren't all that noticeable, and they don't give you that much of an improvement in gaming performance over the 9th. If I were in your position, I would go for the 12700k combo. It's a pretty darn good improvement over the 11th, plus it has the new hybrid architecture with performance and efficiency cores. It'll give you a much bigger bang for your buck when it comes to gaming performance and you'll even be able to throw a 13th gen CPU in there if you ever wanted another upgrade down the line.

Hope that helps! Good luck :)

Quietman

The other option would be the 5800X 3d and a new MB, which outperforms the 12700k in gaming and is on sale for less right now.