Computer/Video Card Upgrade, Now or Later?

In case you haven't been keeping up with video card prices, the recent crypto crash has reduced prices to the lowest in years. Probably what some would say actual MSRP should be like, especially at the higher end.

I'm currently running a 1080ti that's about 4-5 years old, along with the rest of the system. Another thing to consider is that later this year both Nvidia and AMD are due to announce their new series of cards, and Intel and AMD new processors.

I've been eyeing a whole new build from scratch. I don't really have anything to play right now that would really benefit from an upgrade. But, with all the games being pushed to 2023, I see can the demand for the newest hardware be a bloodbath. Or maybe the big glut in supply for the current gen of cards will satisfy markets pent up demand.

I'm finding it hard to decide how, where, and when to spend the money. I'm looking for opinions and takes from the community.

I bought in a month or two ago. I think it depends on tolerance for risk and willingness to be on the bleeding edge. The upcoming CPUs/Video Cards are looking to be absurdly powerful, but there's also a lot of x factors such as their very high power draw, new type of ram etc.

So if you want something stable, tried and tested at a strong price now is a great time to buy. If you don't mind waiting a bit longer and potentially dealing with some headaches, the next wave of hardware is looking to be incredibly powerful, but will probably require a strong investment in terms of price and time to get it all setup.

History could also repeat and the new stuff may also be impossible to find, who knows.

I think the current RX 3000 series cards for NVidia are good and the Radeon 6000s are in the mix but I would wait until the 4000s are out. before buying. While a lot of cards (less than 18 months old) are coming back into the market, the people who paid out the nose for their cards that are worth buying (less than 18 months old) will be loath to get rid of them cheaply.

In my opinion...just that, my opinion...most cards are still overpriced by $75-$100. The tricks is will they ever really lower in price? Its a gamble because for all we supplies could constrain and prices will rise.

It's up to you to buy it right now or wait until this Christmas.

Based on your post, I'd say wait. If your 1080ti is still able to play most games today at good settings, and you don't see a need to upgrade at the moment, then wait until the opportunity arrives. Maybe wait until Black Friday weekend and Cyber Monday to make your move. Both events are closer to 2023 and the upgrade might make more sense then. Also, it depends on what kind of gaming you want to do. If you want to do 4K gaming, then you'll need to spend that money on one of those top cards like the 3080. But if 1080p - 1440p at high frame rates is all you're concerned about, then you don't need to spend huge sums of money to get a card that can play games at those resolutions at max settings and with ray-tracing which your current card can't do. A Nvidia 2070 - 3060 or a AMD 6600xt - 6700xt is good enough. You can also wait for the new series of cards coming soon and see how affordable they are. Though, they will likely be quite high from vendors.

Two questions: What is your budget, and how much of a want is a new system for you?

I'm having the same debate right now myself. My CPU is one generation older than yours (it's an Intel i5 3570k, it just had its 10th birthday) and my old 970 still can run most of what I want to play, even if it is at somewhat reduced settings. I'm more running into other non-game things that make my PC choke, and that's what is making me consider the upgrade. Upgrading right now is especially appealing because there's a lot of sales on 5th gen Ryzen CPUs and DDR4 RAM that would make doing the upgrade especially cheap compared to even a few months ago. Even something like a 3060 would be a colossal upgrade for me too.

But at the same time, DDR5 prices have plummeted from a few months ago, and AMD's new CPUs are only a few months away and theoretically there's also new GPUs coming, though whether anyone will be able to get them in a reasonable timeframe is another question altogether. It's tough to decide.

I'll probably end up upgrading on the cheap using this generation's parts partly because my current PC seems like it may be on its way out (I bought some of it in late 2012 but also did upgrades to various bits in 2015). I'm also not one of those people who cares about having the bleeding edge newest PC parts so that doesn't matter to me, but having a functioning computer does which may force my hand.

Thanks for the replies so far.

I've been saving up for a big build, I could do $2000. I'm not planning on spending on a monitor, I already got something that does 1440p 144hz.

As for want, I'd say medium. It's not that I'm desperate for performance, but it's been awhile since I've upgraded anything on my PC. Although long term, I'd like a system that could do VR, but I think I'm waiting for the next generation of headsets before I jump in.

For me it's the timing of the current cards price drop and new stuff on the near horizon. I'm trying to get a grasp on the situation.

So, I currently have a vanilla 3080 that has served me extremely well and never struggles to pump 4k at 60fps with all the bells and whistles turned on. With the crypto crash and the next generation literally just a tiny ways away, even if you aren't going for the newest and greatest, there should be a bit of a dip in the 3080 price from the new generation coming in. I was lucky to get mine at MSRP $800 and I think by the end of the year, they will likely go for around $500, depending on availability. So I would say wait for now but be ready to scoop up a deal if one presents itself. No one really needs more than a 3080 for just about any game right now.

@notsosneakyguy: As a here-and-now type a dude; most of the VR games I'm seeing on Steam list old quad-core CPUs and either a GTX 980 or GTX 1060 for recommended GPUs. So unless you paired your 1080 Ti with a Celeron, your desktop is already in the door for VR, at least on paper. To be sure, I'd YouTube search some benchmarks on the VR games you want with "1080 Ti" to see what the frame counts are.

And as for how the 1080 Ti stacks up against the RTX 3000 series cards, if UserBenchmark is a reputable tool for quick GPU comparisons, you'd have to get at least an RTX 3070 Ti in order to get, what I personally feel is, a meaningful performance upgrade; granted that 3070 Ti can certainly fit within a $2,000 budget along with a hex-core CPU, motherboard, 32 GBs of DDR4 RAM, 850 watt power supply, and maybe an SSD or two as rough estimations based on what I'm seeing on Amazon at the moment.

I guess I'm basically suggesting to not upgrade unless your current system isn't giving you the frames that you want in the games that you have, and to just bite the bullet of not being on the newer generations of hardware despite being a few generations behind. ...unless you reeeeeeeeeally want newer parts with the understanding that being 100% pragmatic about this is unrealistic.

I built a new PC at the beginning of the year because I wanted to be ready for STALKER 2, lol.

As someone who spent the better part of 2021 struggling to get opportunities to buy RTX3000 cards, I REALLY hate all the advice I see that is the same old tired "Don't buy new tech because newer tech is due out in X months!". I feel like these people are assuming the crypto crash means crypto will never come back but it easily can. All it takes is enough idiots in the world to believe in it again, and there's no idiot shortage.

It's easy to buy cards right now below MSRP. If you want a new PC, now is a great time to build one. A quick look at newegg and I already found a better deal on a EVGA RTX 3080 than what I got, AND DDR5 ram seems easy to get now too.

I know a few people who have jumped to get cards for around MSRP. And most other parts seem to be normal prices or cheaper. Might as well grab what you can for a reasonable price just in case.

I've seen a lot of people debating this, also various gaming articles also say the same thing,

"you can grab one now, or wait for holiday discounts later"

It depends on whether you want an upgrade right now, or you can hold out for that super juicy deal. 🍸😎