Ultimate Bottlenecking Guide/Discussion Thread!

[TechyInAZ]

This thread is now officially not being updated any longer. Simply put, the amount of work to figure out precise bottlenecking numbers is so high that it is impossible for me to do all the work unless I was paid to do it.

This thread will now live primarily as a discussion thread on the topic of bottlenecking. (Unless someone else decides to takeover.)

The bottlenecking charts are still here in case you still want to see them.

Spoiler

Hello community! This guide is dedicated solely to the explanation and details of what electronic bottlenecking is, and which CPUs bottleneck the all new GTX 1000 series GPUs and all new RX 400 series GPUs.

Calling ALL GTX 1080 Ti owners!!

For those of you who have a 1080 Ti, it would mean a lot to me if you guys could give me your estimates on how much you would consider your systems are being bottlenecked by the 1080 TI, if at all. Basically, I consider 90% GPU usage or lower to be a legitimate CPU bottleneck. 90% is pink. 75% is blue, 60% is red. These are all AVERAGE GPU usages.

Unfortunately, I can't just call up Nvidia and tell them to send me a 1080 Ti for me to use. So I need users like you guys to help out.

What is Bottlenecking?

Bottlenecking is where one component is hindering another components performance/efficency.

Truth be told, there is ALWAYS a bottleneck in a computer. Like a CPU being bottlenecked by a GPU -- yeah that’s legit -- but that isn't always a bad thing. When one component is not at 100% utilization, that means it’s being bottlenecked by something whether it’s temps, fans, software utilization etc.


Why Do GPUs Get Bottlenecked by CPUs (When Gaming)?

In a gaming oriented computer, the CPU is the 2nd most important component in your system. The CPU’s job is to send pre-rendered frames to the GPU. The contents of pre-rendered frames are basically anything not related to what the GPU will render. A good example of this is the positioning/location of AI and the positions of your teammates and enemies.

While pre-rendered frames aren’t as hard to render as fully rendered frames, it still takes quite a bit of power from the CPU to render them out --of course this depends on the game engine--. This is why you still need a powerful central processing unit for any kind of modern or advanced game you want to play.

Bottlenecking is Also Affected by Frame Rate:

Supahos, another member here at TH, describes this subject very accurately:

Every CPU is capable of only a certain number of frames in every game. The resolution and settings have very little effect on CPU sided FPS limitations. This is why if you drop graphical settings in simple games your FPS doesn't go up. The CPU was the hold up and the lowered settings don't help your CPU.

As an example, if you are playing League of legends at 720P with a GTX Titan XP, your CPU is holding you back from more frames. (I don't care if you're running a 7700K overclocked at 5.2GHz, it's still the weakest link.) That same system playing Battlefield 1 at 4K ultra settings would make the Titan "bottleneck" the 7700K.

Every GPU has a maximum number of frames it can render at any given setting/resolution. Higher the settings or resolution the less FPS it can possibly render.

Okay so where does the bottleneck come in?

In any given game and setting whichever is lower for maximum possible frames (CPU or GPU) is the fps you'll get roughly.

A GTX 1070 at 1080P in League of Legends will most likely get the same FPS as a GTX Titan XP, since the CPU was the hold up to begin with.

Conversely, a 7600K at 4K max settings paired with a GTX 1070 will have the same FPS as a 6950X paired with a 1070. Because the GPU is the bottleneck in that instance.

Difficulties In Measuring Bottlenecks:

The reason why bottlenecking is so confusing is because it's on a game to game basis and a frame rate basis. Games A, B and C bottleneck, but X,Y and Z don't but if you have a FPS of 200fps or more on those games, the results could be the complete opposite. This is why narrowing down which CPUs bottleneck which GPUs can get extremely difficult.
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Here are the charts of CPUs that will, and will not, bottleneck the GTX 1080, 1070, 1060 and RX 480/470. (This is just a general estimate, again, your mileage may vary according to the games you play, what graphical settings you play at, and what resolution you use.)

I’ve broken down the type of bottlenecking in 4 colors:

Black = No bottlenecking issues.
Magenta = CPU bottlenecking GPU only in a worst case scenario.
Blue = CPU bottlenecking GPU only in more advanced/CPU intensive games (like Crysis 3).
Red = CPU bottlenecking GPU in all gaming applications.

Disclamer: These charts only apply to the latest games that have come out this year. Assumption is a resolution of 1080P-1440P with a frame rate of 60fps average.
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GTX 1080 Bottlenecking Chart: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17VRKPjyiTBx9Ewc2xkmaMZD2tA3gSOG3rNtH4OEiz3g/edit?usp=sharing

GTX 1070 Bottlenecking Chart: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EQOWVLxk0DOFXKfzCmz9lEZ-qpMb7mIvt8KUYek69A8/edit?usp=sharing

GTX 1060 Bottlenecking Chart: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Q7lIYRK5T0ABLvAkgbM_2jJGvbhlep27mR-eRcCy4FA/edit?usp=sharing

GTX 1050 Ti Bottlenecking Chart: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1OCSzTslVki32BDSlEneeH3zJrTgD5iHe6IsWgbceHcQ/edit?usp=sharing

RX 480 Bottlenecking Chart: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qSkGtqIXpBBFwidUxl2LlWpIh3CQQGTrfc4WySMe14o/edit?usp=sharing

Maxwell Bottlenecking Chart:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14LcYGkqVqaHUK_qwS_6N9s1vp-TH7AyHzn7OrNittag/edit?usp=sharing

 

[Dom_79]

I hope this is the appropriate place for this

I have the 1070FTW and an i5-4670k (full specs in my sig and in the specs section of my profile) and I can say with absolute certainty that the CPU is a bottleneck in advanced games (Fallout 4 vanilla-no mods and GTA V for a start) and should be listed in Blue.

Cheers!

 

[TechyInAZ]

Your in the right spot! Thank you!! I'll update as soon as I can.

 

[OverclockDaddy]

bro thanks for the chart this is very helpful guide for buying a well matched processor for the newly released gtx 10 series cards ...btw is all amd fx bottlenecked? what is happening with amd right now? amd zen better do good this time

 

[TechyInAZ]

bro thanks for the chart this is very helpful guide for buying a well matched processor for the newly released gtx 10 series cards ...btw is all amd fx bottlenecked? what is happening with amd right now? amd zen better do good this time

Now that I'm finding the core i5 6600k is bottlenecking the 1070 and up, the FX 9590 and down will most certainly be a HUGE bottleneck. But remember, the FX lineup is over 4 years old.

As for AMD Zen: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2986517/discussion-amd-zen.html

 

[OverclockDaddy]

the 6600k is also bottlenecking the 1060?

 

[TechyInAZ]

the 6600k is also bottlenecking the 1060?

Nope. The 1060 isn't that powerful.

 

[Batmann77]

Thanks for this! I'm looking to get an EVGA GeForce GTX 1060 SC 6GB for my i7 4770, and according to this, I won't see a bottleneck. My only question is....how did you determine all of this data? Did you personally run tests on all of these CPU/GPU combos, or are you getting data from elsewhere? Basically, I just want to know that what I'm seeing here on these charts is accurate information, seeing as i'll be spending many hundreds of dollars on this GPU!

 

[TechyInAZ]

Thanks for this! I'm looking to get an EVGA GeForce GTX 1060 SC 6GB for my i7 4770, and according to this, I won't see a bottleneck. My only question is....how did you determine all of this data? Did you personally run tests on all of these CPU/GPU combos, or are you getting data from elsewhere? Basically, I just want to know that what I'm seeing here on these charts is accurate information, seeing as i'll be spending many hundreds of dollars on this GPU!

I'm gathering all my information on the internet. Which is one reason why these charts are not done yet. Most of the pinks and blues you see in the charts has already been tweaked from feedback by other users. Eventually this bottlenecking guide should be very accurate. Just give it a few months.

I have a GTX 1060 6GB and a Core i5-4690K at 4.5ghz. I'm not even close to any sort of bottleneck whatsoever. So your i7 4770 will be good.

 

[Batmann77]

I'm gathering all my information on the internet. Which is one reason why these charts are not done yet. Most of the pinks and blues you see in the charts has already been tweaked from feedback by other users. Eventually this bottlenecking guide should be very accurate. Just give it a few months.

I have a GTX 1060 6GB and a Core i5-4690K at 4.5ghz. I'm not even close to any sort of bottleneck whatsoever. So your i7 4770 will be good.

Alright, that puts me at ease. Thanks again

 

[grimfox]

Nice tables. I was thinking about saving some money and only upping my GPU. Seems that is not an option.

 

[mastergooch]

I have an HP z800 workstation(got really cheap) with
-dual xeon x5660 CPUs (12 cores at 2.8 GHz)
-160GB DDR3-1333 ECC Registered RAM
-2 PCIe 2.0 x16 slots
-2560*1600 resolution monitor (looking to upgrade to a 4k soon)
I want to purchase either a 1070 or 1080 but I'm not sure if it will be to bottlenecked by any of the current components in my computer. I figured that the PCIe 2.0 will bottleneck the GPU before anything else, maybe the slow ram may be the second place it could bottleneck. Will I be better off buying an older card because of any potential for a bottleneck or will I still be able to get a decent throughput with a 1080 in my machine?

 

[ibrahimasghar]

Thanks for this guide man, very helpful .

I wanted to ask what could be a worst case scenario?. As right now i'm having a Core i7 4770 and i wanted to get a GTX 1080 soon. i7 4770 is listed in the Magenta category which means it's going to bottleneck GTX 1080 in a worst case scenario.

What would be a worst case scenario?.

 

[grimfox]

The worst case is that the GPU isn't ever fully utilized (wasted money). I suppose there could be some visual defects if the CPU can't get the appropriate data to the GPU in time for the frame it's required. But you could probably fiddle with the settings to decrease and eliminate those defects. But this would overall yield poorer visuals compared to the same GPU that wasn't bottlenecked.

 

[TechyInAZ]

Thanks for this guide man, very helpful .

I wanted to ask what could be a worst case scenario?. As right now i'm having a Core i7 4770 and i wanted to get a GTX 1080 soon. i7 4770 is listed in the Magenta category which means it's going to bottleneck GTX 1080 in a worst case scenario.

What would be a worst case scenario?.

Worst case scenarios, as described in my guide, are games that are either insanely CPU bound or are not optimized very well (ie. WatchDogs).

 

[TechyInAZ]

I have an HP z800 workstation(got really cheap) with
-dual xeon x5660 CPUs (12 cores at 2.8 GHz)
-160GB DDR3-1333 ECC Registered RAM
-2 PCIe 2.0 x16 slots
-2560*1600 resolution monitor (looking to upgrade to a 4k soon)
I want to purchase either a 1070 or 1080 but I'm not sure if it will be to bottlenecked by any of the current components in my computer. I figured that the PCIe 2.0 will bottleneck the GPU before anything else, maybe the slow ram may be the second place it could bottleneck. Will I be better off buying an older card because of any potential for a bottleneck or will I still be able to get a decent throughput with a 1080 in my machine?

The max I'd get is a 1060. CPUs from 2010 are going to cause SERIOUS bottlenecking, including GTX 1060s. If those CPUs were in my chart, they would be listed as red.

 

[3Dns]

What about I5-2500 ?

 

[TechyInAZ]

What about I5-2500 ?

Most likely magenta. Though I'm not sure. It could be blue.

 

[d_A_e]

How would a A10-7860K OC to 4.3 Ghz perform with a 1060? Would it still bottleneck the card?

 

[TechyInAZ]

How would a A10-7860K OC to 4.3 Ghz perform with a 1060? Would it still bottleneck the card?

Yes. The A10 is performs roughly the same as an FX 6350 (if combining all games). So there will be a bottleneck.

 

[Luminary]

Here's a request for another column, if the data is able to be gathered.

On a recent thread a gentlemen was asking about pairing Xeon processors with the 1060/ 1070 etc. While for gaming there really isn't much doubt that they aren't ideal, it would still be helpful to see a list of the most recent Xeon processors included in these docs in order to see where they fall performance-wise.

I know this is a long-shot, as honestly you just don't see many performance reviews using Xeon processors (for good reason), but I thought I'd at least share the idea in case that information bubbles up over time.

 

[TechyInAZ]

Here's a request for another column, if the data is able to be gathered.

On a recent thread a gentlemen was asking about pairing Xeon processors with the 1060/ 1070 etc. While for gaming there really isn't much doubt that they aren't ideal, it would still be helpful to see a list of the most recent Xeon processors included in these docs in order to see where they fall performance-wise.

I know this is a long-shot, as honestly you just don't see many performance reviews using Xeon processors (for good reason), but I thought I'd at least share the idea in case that information bubbles up over time.

Thank you for your input! But unfortunately I doubt I'll be able to do that any time soon. I've only barely been able to get any bottlenecking info as is with the popular CPUs let alone Xeons.

However, if I see enough info on the web. I will make another chart.

Just as a reminder to everyone, the charts above are NOT 100% accurate. Bottlenecking info as of now is very hard to find and it's going to be a little while before I get enough info to make them as accurate as possible.

 

[FlowyMint]

bro thanks for the chart this is very helpful guide for buying a well matched processor for the newly released gtx 10 series cards ...btw is all amd fx bottlenecked? what is happening with amd right now? amd zen better do good this time

Now that I'm finding the core i5 6600k is bottlenecking the 1070 and up, the FX 9590 and down will most certainly be a HUGE bottleneck. But remember, the FX lineup is over 4 years old.

As for AMD Zen: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2986517/discussion-amd-zen.html

So the i5 6600k will bottleneck the 1070?

 

[TechyInAZ]

Now that I'm finding the core i5 6600k is bottlenecking the 1070 and up, the FX 9590 and down will most certainly be a HUGE bottleneck. But remember, the FX lineup is over 4 years old.

As for AMD Zen: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2986517/discussion-amd-zen.html

So the i5 6600k will bottleneck the 1070?

A little bit, yes.

 

[FlowyMint]

Now that I'm finding the core i5 6600k is bottlenecking the 1070 and up, the FX 9590 and down will most certainly be a HUGE bottleneck. But remember, the FX lineup is over 4 years old.

As for AMD Zen: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2986517/discussion-amd-zen.html

So the i5 6600k will bottleneck the 1070?

A little bit, yes.

Thank you for the answer! Would that apply for gaming or mainly just video editing, etc...?