Another "Help me buy a computer" post

[Silfir]

A 600 € (dollars, pounds, and so on) gaming PC these days can absolutely compete with a console in terms of performance. Bad console ports due to developers/publishers skimping on Q&A are a thing, but aside from that consoles nowadays run mostly the same type of hardware as PCs do. Most games are fully multi-platform; the only reason to own a console as a gamer would be specific console exclusives you can't live without, or a severely limited budget that prices you out of a dedicated GPU entirely on a regular PC, but still allows you to get a basic PS4 or XBox One. (Even so, AMD Ryzen integrated graphics are genuinely pretty decent.)

Nobody needs 32 GB of RAM unless they're super into video editing or very specific use cases. For gaming it does virtually nothing; 16 GB is plenty. RAM is also one of the components that features an inadequate degree of competition, with the result that RAM is more expensive for the same specs than it used to be. Very much unlike SSDs, which are cheaper to get than ever. Any prebuilt or laptop that lacks an inbuilt proper SSD of some kind should be dismissed out of hand in my book; unless your budget is *so* low that your laptop inevitably runs on like 32 GB of flash drive space and 4 GB of RAM. (Of course, it can be very much worth it to look into the possibility of adding an SSD after the fact; though since that entails opening the case and fiddling with the parts and reinstalling the OS from scratch, that option isn't too far off from the option of building the entire thing from scratch.)

If you use a 1080p (full HD) monitor with a frequency of 60 Hz, like most people, a plain Radeon RX 570 is enough, and an RX 580 8 GB or a GTX 1060 6 GB are plenty. Expensive high end graphics cards are for bigger resolutions and higher framerates, and for that purpose generally worth it. There has been a stagnation of sorts in the GPU market in that the graphical demands of games aren't really going up.

What hasn't stagnated at all is the CPU market. I would aim for at least six cores sans hyperthreading, OR four cores with hyperthreading. That means an i5-8600 or higher, or a Ryzen chip of 1400/2400 level or higher (1400/2400 is four cores/eight threads, 1600/2600 is six cores/twelve threads). Between the 7k and 8k generations Intel jacked up the core count of their CPUs, which is worth being aware of; the i5-7600 has only 4 cores to the i5-8600's 6.



For laptops, I generally have to agree that a laptop i5 (which tend to be dual cores with hyperthreading) seems like the place to be. It's plenty for any of the work tasks that a laptop may be asked to handle. A laptop that can handle heavy-duty computing or high-end gaming tends to cost a fortune and have considerable bulk and weight paired with low battery life, so you have to have a specific way of life for that to be the optimal choice.

I've got an i5-7200U, 8 GB of RAM and a 128 GB SSD in my laptop, and found that to be the sweet spot. It weighs nothing and since the battery doesn't have to power a hard drive, the battery life is like ten hours. It's two-and-a-half years old; nowadays I'd expect an i5-8200U instead or something. I would avoid having an inbuilt hard drive if at all possible - trivial if your laptop isn't your only machine anyway, doable with 256 GB SSD space even if it is.

[halfeye]

A 600 € (dollars, pounds, and so on) gaming PC these days can absolutely compete with a console in terms of performance. Bad console ports due to developers/publishers skimping on Q&A are a thing, but aside from that consoles nowadays run mostly the same type of hardware as PCs do.

The difference is that they run exactly the same hardware in any one console. I'm told on what appears to me to be good authority that that makes an enormous difference. When you develop for PCs, you have to allow for the GPU being anything at all from AMD, nVidia or Intel, with a CPU that might be from Intel or AMD, with ram that might be DDR3 or DDR4 with an unknown speed. With a console you know exactly what the CPU, GPU and RAM are, and you can optimise accordingly, which I've heard is worth about *10 the performance. I'm by no means arguing that the parts in a console aren't equivalent to the parts in a $600 PC, with the same raw performance or less, I am arguing that because a game for the PC can't be optimised to the same extent, the more powerful parts in the PC don't achieve as much.

[LordEntrails]

[EDIT] Odd, the link is working now, it wasn't earlier? Looking at it, the linked system is barely adequate to do much more than Web brosing on--it certainly won't run modern games at any reasonable frame rate. It's certainly nowhere near what JDMSJR specified in his original post. If you picked a more expensive machine, would your comparison of time spent come out so well? I suspect not.

You crack me up. I state my opinion that their is a break even point for buy vs build.

You reply by stating an absolute, that it is always cheaper to build it yourself.

I reply with an example (which requires a membership to buy from that site, I think it's $35/year).

And then you reply as above. Dude, I was not suggesting a system for him. I was pointing out the fallacy of your absolute. Accept that your absolute statement was wrong. Accept and move on. Or just let it go because it doesn't help the OP at all.

Ok, I talked to the local computer store and they said that either way will work. I can bring them the parts or give them a list and have them order the parts. They charge $99 to assemble, load windows, etc.

I would have them buy the parts. Run yourself a quote and have a good idea of what everything should cost, but let them buy the parts so that they are responsible for them. Last thing you want is something not to work and then to have everyone involved in finger pointing.

[Erloas]

The difference is that they run exactly the same hardware in any one console. I'm told on what appears to me to be good authority that that makes an enormous difference. When you develop for PCs, you have to allow for the GPU being anything at all from AMD, nVidia or Intel, with a CPU that might be from Intel or AMD, with ram that might be DDR3 or DDR4 with an unknown speed. With a console you know exactly what the CPU, GPU and RAM are, and you can optimise accordingly, which I've heard is worth about *10 the performance. I'm by no means arguing that the parts in a console aren't equivalent to the parts in a $600 PC, with the same raw performance or less, I am arguing that because a game for the PC can't be optimised to the same extent, the more powerful parts in the PC don't achieve as much.

Considering that any more most of the consoles are pretty much just PCs with unique combinations of parts compared to what is available to a PC I'm going to say that isn't the case, or at least it doesn't mean what you think it does. A "highly optimized game" isn't going to run 10 times faster, or even 2 times faster, it might be like 10% faster. But really what they do is they take the options out that a PC game has, rather than picking from several different resolutions you get one (and that might not even be a native 1920x1080, you have no good way of knowing on a console/TV), as well as options like AA, post processing, detail, depth of view, etc. etc. all set already. You won't even know the frame rate it is running at on a console, as long as it doesn't detract from the playability no one is even going to say anything (which isn't the case with PCs, since people can and do track that a lot you'll have people claiming anything running under 60fps is unplayable, but objectively they say for most people and most games a minimum of 30fps is good. So situations someone might complain about on a PC no one would even notice on a console because it is more of a mental issue than an actual issue and they don't have any way of telling on a console)

It is also very much the case that *many* developers use engines made by other people and the amount of optimization they can do to the engine is minimal or non-existent. The people writing the engine code could optimize for specific options available in one CPU or GPU that isn't available in another (but there aren't that many of those, they've standardized the vast majority of instructions, the PS4 and Xbox One both use X86 architecture, X86 being the instruction set that the CPU uses). About all most of them can do is pick the best set of options for the console and set those in, rather than letting the player choose said options. Which means you don't have a player that sets the settings too high and have their performance drop. Or if "particle effects" or "highly reflective water" causes performance issues they simply don't put that as an option on the console and no one knows the difference.
It does make developing those engines easier, and they are more stable only having to develop for one possible set of hardware and OS conditions. Also having a minimal OS in a console will help, but it really isn't that big of a difference maker overall. Stability is the biggest advantage for a developer on using a console versus a PC.

[Silfir]

The difference is that they run exactly the same hardware in any one console. I'm told on what appears to me to be good authority that that makes an enormous difference. When you develop for PCs, you have to allow for the GPU being anything at all from AMD, nVidia or Intel, with a CPU that might be from Intel or AMD, with ram that might be DDR3 or DDR4 with an unknown speed. With a console you know exactly what the CPU, GPU and RAM are, and you can optimise accordingly, which I've heard is worth about *10 the performance. I'm by no means arguing that the parts in a console aren't equivalent to the parts in a $600 PC, with the same raw performance or less, I am arguing that because a game for the PC can't be optimised to the same extent, the more powerful parts in the PC don't achieve as much.

Whoever you talked to about this was probably thinking of earlier console generations, when consoles had vastly different configurations compared to PCs. The PS4 or XBox One, however, *are* effectively PCs. Developers can only optimize for them insofar as they can pick the graphics configurations that the console's GPU and CPU can handle while still delivering playable FPS.

If a game is developed with multiple platforms in mind, it will run significantly better on a PC with stronger hardware, according to how much stronger the hardware is. The only games that will run better on consoles "than they should" when compared to their PC version, are games that received a botched port. Even then, "10 times the performance" is a frankly ridiculous figure. And since the PS4 and XBox One run fundamentally the same hardware as PCs do, you have to actively try to botch a port now. It was a nightmare to port to and from the PS3, by comparison.

The "best" reason to get a console is console exclusives. If you want to play the Sony-published Spider-Man game from last year, or MLB The Show, you have to get a PS4. There's just no way around it. Barring that kind of specific need, the PC is just far more versatile. (Most "enthusiast" gamers, who want to be in the conversation about every hot game on the market and spend thousands on their PC build, typically have the spare cash to buy a PS4 just for the exclusives.)

If your budget is only as much as a PS4 would cost - like $300 - then it's the better gaming machine because it's quite hard to build a PC at that price with a dedicated graphics card at all. But a $300 PS4 is not "magically" as good or better than a $600 gaming PC.

[halfeye]

Whoever you talked to about this was probably thinking of earlier console generations, when consoles had vastly different configurations compared to PCs. The PS4 or XBox One, however, *are* effectively PCs. Developers can only optimize for them insofar as they can pick the graphics configurations that the console's GPU and CPU can handle while still delivering playable FPS.

If a game is developed with multiple platforms in mind, it will run significantly better on a PC with stronger hardware, according to how much stronger the hardware is. The only games that will run better on consoles "than they should" when compared to their PC version, are games that received a botched port. Even then, "10 times the performance" is a frankly ridiculous figure. And since the PS4 and XBox One run fundamentally the same hardware as PCs do, you have to actively try to botch a port now. It was a nightmare to port to and from the PS3, by comparison.

The "best" reason to get a console is console exclusives. If you want to play the Sony-published Spider-Man game from last year, or MLB The Show, you have to get a PS4. There's just no way around it. Barring that kind of specific need, the PC is just far more versatile. (Most "enthusiast" gamers, who want to be in the conversation about every hot game on the market and spend thousands on their PC build, typically have the spare cash to buy a PS4 just for the exclusives.)

If your budget is only as much as a PS4 would cost - like $300 - then it's the better gaming machine because it's quite hard to build a PC at that price with a dedicated graphics card at all. But a $300 PS4 is not "magically" as good or better than a $600 gaming PC.

Considering that any more most of the consoles are pretty much just PCs with unique combinations of parts compared to what is available to a PC I'm going to say that isn't the case, or at least it doesn't mean what you think it does. A "highly optimized game" isn't going to run 10 times faster, or even 2 times faster, it might be like 10% faster. But really what they do is they take the options out that a PC game has, rather than picking from several different resolutions you get one (and that might not even be a native 1920x1080, you have no good way of knowing on a console/TV), as well as options like AA, post processing, detail, depth of view, etc. etc. all set already. You won't even know the frame rate it is running at on a console, as long as it doesn't detract from the playability no one is even going to say anything (which isn't the case with PCs, since people can and do track that a lot you'll have people claiming anything running under 60fps is unplayable, but objectively they say for most people and most games a minimum of 30fps is good. So situations someone might complain about on a PC no one would even notice on a console because it is more of a mental issue than an actual issue and they don't have any way of telling on a console)

It is also very much the case that *many* developers use engines made by other people and the amount of optimization they can do to the engine is minimal or non-existent. The people writing the engine code could optimize for specific options available in one CPU or GPU that isn't available in another (but there aren't that many of those, they've standardized the vast majority of instructions, the PS4 and Xbox One both use X86 architecture, X86 being the instruction set that the CPU uses). About all most of them can do is pick the best set of options for the console and set those in, rather than letting the player choose said options. Which means you don't have a player that sets the settings too high and have their performance drop. Or if "particle effects" or "highly reflective water" causes performance issues they simply don't put that as an option on the console and no one knows the difference.
It does make developing those engines easier, and they are more stable only having to develop for one possible set of hardware and OS conditions. Also having a minimal OS in a console will help, but it really isn't that big of a difference maker overall. Stability is the biggest advantage for a developer on using a console versus a PC.

That is what I used to think, but then I was told. It made sense when I thought about it. The CPU is identical all through a production run, the GPU is identical all through that same production run. If the developer is hitting the metal, they can write to the exact specifications of the CPU, and to the exact specifications of the GPU. There's a lot of power in knowing exactly where the boundaries are, exactly how many cores you have to work with, exactly how much GPU memory there is available. The console's hardware isn't much compared to the average gaming PC but with the PC the game has to run whether there are two cores or 16, whether there is a CPU based GPU or there's a discrete one, and if there's a discrete one then no matter how powerful it is and how much memory the card has on board the game still has to run (there are minimum specs, but they aren't high, and it still needs to run to the point of saying "specs inadequate").

[factotum]

You reply by stating an absolute, that it is always cheaper to build it yourself.

Um, I never said that? I'm not going to check back through the thread to see who did, but it certainly wasn't me.

[JDMSJR]

I was able to talk to the IT guy where I work and he said he will help me put together a list of parts to give to the computer store. Thanks for all the comments and suggestions guys, just re-affirming my belief that this is one of the best forums on the internet!(and I hear it even has a comic also )

[snowblizz]

I was able to talk to the IT guy where I work and he said he will help me put together a list of parts to give to the computer store. Thanks for all the comments and suggestions guys, just re-affirming my belief that this is one of the best forums on the internet!(and I hear it even has a comic also )

A comic? Well that's news to me! I'll have to check it out as soon as am done arguing about the minutae of various stuff.

[JDMSJR]

Wait just a minute!! It's possible to be DONE arguing about the minutae of various stuff??? Inconceivable.

[tyckspoon]

Wait just a minute!! It's possible to be DONE arguing about the minutae of various stuff??? Inconceivable.

Nope. This is now a Star Wars thread.

I'm looking for a new Astromech droid. Should I just buy one off the sales floor? Or can I kit-build? Maybe get a reconditioned one used? I know I don't want to deal with any Jawas, I don't trust their quality control..

[JDMSJR]

You just need to order all the parts off of Jawa Part-picker and then build your Astromech droid. That's where all the fun is and you will get a much better droid for less credits.

[Brother Oni]

I don't know - fallen off the back of a sandcrawler is cheap, but they don't do good data wiping of your refurbished parts and the next thing you know, your reconstructed droid has swept you up into a galactic rebellion.

[Erloas]

So how about that timing. It looks like I'll be looking for a new system now. My old computer just died on me. Had been 8 years, a very good run. Needed to be replaced but couldn't justify the cost before, but now it's not a choice.

[Silfir]

How much are you willing to spend - right now and on upgrades over time? What do you want to use it for? Which country are you in? How opposed are you to self-assembly?

There should be a way to re-use your Windows license at the very least. Eight years is quite a lot, so a clean slate wouldn't be a terrible idea, even though it's probably only a part of your old machine that's dead. (PSU, probably? How did it die?)

[Erloas]

I think the MB went out, though it could have been the CPU too. Not even getting post beeps with just CPU/MB but everything seems to power on. Even pulled the CPU heatsink and the processor doesn't even start to get warm. There had been a few times recently where it seemed slow to come on, but ran just fine after that (like a few seconds from power button to starting to see the BIOS info), but last night it just never came on.

I'm hoping to recover the Windows key, but it's a free upgrade from Win7 so I only ever had a digital copy of the key. The main issue is that the HDDs are in a RAID so I'm not sure how hard it is going to be to get the RAID set up on a new computer so I can recover the key.

I'm looking at either the Ryzen 5 2600 or the I5-9400f.
Right now I'm leaning towards the 9400, the only issue is that many of the MBs currently available are gen8 without a BIOS update and no way to know what BIOS version anything ships with and of course I don't have an 8th gen CPU to boot with long enough to update the BIOS if I got that route.

[Silfir]

If you still have the Windows 7 key printed out somewhere, it should work.

Any particular reason you're looking at the i5-9400F? It seems to be marginally faster than an R5 2600 in terms of single core speed and lacks hyperthreading.

[Erloas]

If you still have the Windows 7 key printed out somewhere, it should work.

Any particular reason you're looking at the i5-9400F? It seems to be marginally faster than an R5 2600 in terms of single core speed and lacks hyperthreading.

I've been married, divorced, and moved 3 times since then. The original box is *probably* sitting in a box in storage 1000 miles away, so not much of an option.

That is pretty much why. Pretty much nothing I do that is very demanding even uses 6 cores (most games seem to be optimized around 4 cores) so the extra performance of each core makes up for the extra virtual cores that I'll never actually put to much use. They're about $5 difference in price and the same power consumption. MBs seem pretty close in price too (Fry's seems to have great deals on the 300 series 1151 MBs compared to everyone else) but the Intel ones look a bit better (like 4 RAM slots is a lot more common as are full sized boards).
I tend to lean more towards Intel too.

For the GPU I'm still debating between the GTX 1060, RX 570, and RX 580. The prices on those cards are all over the place though, so haven't really narrowed it down farther than that.

[factotum]

I'm not convinced 2 extra RAM slots really offers much of a benefit--especially if you've been using the same computer for 8 years it doesn't sound like upgrades are high on your list of priorities, and 4 RAM slots aren't any faster than 2 on any modern home CPU I know of. RX 570 is faster than a 1060, I believe--I have one sitting on my printer right now ready to be installed in the new machine I'm building shortly.

As for Windows, you can download the full installer for Windows 10 direct from Microsoft, all you need after that is a valid key.

[Erloas]

Yeah, the key is the issue. The ISO is easy to find.

RAM is an easier upgrade, I went from 4 to 8 on the old system, so having that option for like $5 is worth considering. Money is tight right now though, so starting at 8gb and going to 16 later might be worth looking at.

I'm also considering staying with my GTX 275 for a while (originally had a 4850), most games have been CPU bound and the GPU is often not running over 60%. Missing out on DX12 that way though. The question between the new ones isn't so much which is better but which is the better value.

Also after seeing Newegg's flash deals right now, the 1600 and 1700x are legitimate options to consider, and no potential BIOS revision issues with those and some of the cheaper AM4 boards...

[Silfir]

I'm also considering staying with my GTX 275 for a while (originally had a 4850), most games have been CPU bound and the GPU is often not running over 60%. Missing out on DX12 that way though. The question between the new ones isn't so much which is better but which is the better value.

Have you considered a 2400G? Its integrated graphics chip (Vega 8) should be a good bit faster than the GTX 275. Solves your support issues as well.

It'll have fewer cores than an i5-9400F or 1600/2600, but since it's also less pricey than either, the value should be there.

[LordEntrails]

As for Windows, you can download the full installer for Windows 10 direct from Microsoft, all you need after that is a valid key.

If you are that cost conscious, you don't need a key. You can run Win10 indefinitely in trial mode. You just get a task bar message and some of the theme customization are blocked.

[Erloas]

Have you considered a 2400G? Its integrated graphics chip (Vega 8) should be a good bit faster than the GTX 275. Solves your support issues as well.

It'll have fewer cores than an i5-9400F or 1600/2600, but since it's also less pricey than either, the value should be there.

But that is compromising on core count, per-core performance, and graphic performance. And while it would be better than the 275 it really isn't that much better, it's still just mediocre 1080p performance but requiring both a new video card and new CPU in the future to fix that.
Really though I'm just going to get the card, the finances aren't really going to change any time soon so not really going to make much of a difference in putting it off.

Still not sure which way to go. The 2600/2600x both have the option to OC, in which case they'll be better than the 9400, but if I've got to spend much more on a MB, RAM, and cooler to do it then it isn't going to help much. Especially since they 9400 is already the same price, it's just a matter of how much more the 2600 would gain from OCing.


Newegg has better bundles with the 9400 right now, though I don't know if any are really that good. I need to just finish a build for each and see what they look like.

RX 570 is faster than a 1060, I believe--I have one sitting on my printer right now ready to be installed in the new machine I'm building shortly.

I believe the 580 and 1060 are direct competition, with the 570 being slower but less expensive than those.
Although the 570 is about $40 cheaper if I stick with the 4GB model. My monitor is about half way between 1080 and 1440p (its 1920*1200, so yeah, an odd aspect ratio)
It seems like either way, the cost difference is pretty close to the performance difference between the cards.

[tonberrian]

UserBenchmark agrees with the RX 580 being just under the GTX 1060 - https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compar...580/3639vs3923.

I don't know how accurate UserBenchmark is, mind, but that's what I use to compare cards.

[Erloas]

So I called Fry's (and another local place but the guy that could actually help me wasn't around) and they said they can flash a BIOS for $20. Which could be needed with either the Ryzen 2 gen or the i5 9th gen (but less likely with the Ryzen since it's been out longer). $20 isn't much, but it's also the price difference between going up a part on some of these.

My initial build is making me question my budget though... so I'll have to see.

[Silfir]

But that is compromising on core count, per-core performance, and graphic performance.

The i5-9400F can't do hyper-threading, while we're at it - if you care about core count, doesn't that mean you care about multi-core performance? The lack of hyper-threading puts the 9400F heavily behind the Ryzen CPUs. I really can't see a good argument for it.

Overclocking on Ryzen is relatively cheap, since it can be done on B350/B450 chipsets, and those motherboards are marginally more expensive than A320 ones.

Whatever you do, don't end up with a GTX 1060 with 3 GB VRAM.

[halfeye]

The i5-9400F can't do hyper-threading, while we're at it - if you care about core count, doesn't that mean you care about multi-core performance? The lack of hyper-threading puts the 9400F heavily behind the Ryzen CPUs. I really can't see a good argument for it.

I'm not sure what AMD hyperthreading is. On Intel, hyperthreading is running two simulated cores on one real core, there's no gain to it, because due to the second law of thermodynamics, to get two out of one you have to run at half speed or less.

As I understand it, at the moment AMD are still behind Intel core series (i3, i5, i7 and i9) on instructions per clock (Intel Atom series (and ARM?) are still way behind AMD).

I am strongly in favour of AMD succeeding, but I don't think they're there yet, and I wouldn't recommend that somebody buys something because the rest of us need that company to succeed in a few years time, if their products aren't yet there, and I don't think AMDs are.

[Silfir]

I'm not sure what AMD hyperthreading is. On Intel, hyperthreading is running two simulated cores on one real core, there's no gain to it, because due to the second law of thermodynamics, to get two out of one you have to run at half speed or less.

You might want to look up what hyperthreading (and the AMD equivalent) actually is, then.

I don't fully understand what you're getting at anyway. Are you trying to say that hyperthreading is a conspiracy on the part of CPU manufacturers, and that the multi-core performance gains from it that have been measured in countless hardware tests by independent reviewers were doctored to further the conspiracy?

As I understand it, at the moment AMD are still behind Intel core series (i3, i5, i7 and i9) on instructions per clock (Intel Atom series (and ARM?) are still way behind AMD).

Behind, yes. But by a very small margin.

Here's the R5 2600 compared to the i5-9400F. As you can see, the i5-9400F - no hyper-threading, most current Intel CPU generation - is about 8-9% faster at single core speed, as a result of the remaining instructions-per-clock advantage. That's before you do any overclocking on the 2600. For tasks that use an arbitrary number of CPU threads, the AMD's equivalent to hyper-threading technology makes it 40% faster. To choose the i5-9400F over the Ryzen 5 2600, you have to be dead certain that multi-core performance will never matter.

I am strongly in favour of AMD succeeding, but I don't think they're there yet, and I wouldn't recommend that somebody buys something because the rest of us need that company to succeed in a few years time, if their products aren't yet there, and I don't think AMDs are.

Neither would I. AMD is being widely recommended (not just by me) because they are there now. You're still stuck in the pre-Ryzen era, when AMD legitimately could not compete. Ryzen CPUs were first released in February 2017, which was two years ago. It really should be on your radar by now.

[Erloas]

Hyperthreading is significantly more efficient switching between threads on the hardware level (as opposed to the software/OS level) and you get more full utilization out of the hardware. But it isn't as good as another actual core. So while hyperthreading is about 40% more efficient per core for running multiple threads, whereas another core is 100% more.

That is of course only if you're putting them to use. Most games now are pretty good at using 4 cores, because those have been around a long time, but very few games gain much for more cores. So having extra cores is nice but it isn't going to have much of a difference on most games. There are some things that do benefit from it, a few games too, but not a lot. Chances are if you're actually doing something that will make use of 8-16 cores you already know it.

[factotum]

As far as I understand it, hyper-threading was first introduced on the Pentium 4 because they found that some of the execution units in the chip were spending a lot of their time idle, so having them running another thread would help boost performance. Back then the gains weren't stellar--I think it was maybe 5-10%--but there were definitely gains, and as with all technologies, it's improved since then. Oh, and apologies for the RX 570 thing, I misremembered--it's faster than the GTX 1050Ti for around the same price, which is why I got one.