Gamer Buys New Nvidia Graphics Card, Extremely Disappointed – Doesn’t realize he’s overlooked an important part in the upgrade

A gamer saved money to upgrade to a new Nvidia graphics card. But after months he is dissatisfied and regrets the upgrade. It’s not the graphics card that’s the problem, it’s the rest of the installed hardware.

A user had replaced his old Radeon RX 570 with a GeForce RTX 3060 Ti. On paper, a noticeable upgrade. But he is not really satisfied, he now explained in one reddit thread:

• The performance is hardly better than before and sometimes the games even stutter.
• On top of that, the new card would be annoying with coil whine.

He himself explains that he honestly regrets the upgrade and that the new map only caused him a lot of stress. But then he didn’t want to give the card back.

What’s the problem now? On reddit, a number of users explain that the built-in processor is far too weak. His Ryzen 5 2600 is simply too old for the new Nvidia graphics card and would limit his system. But the gamer just doesn’t want to notice that. As someone writes: “He’s absolutely CPU limited, but he doesn’t get it.”

But what is a “bottleneck” anyway and when do you realize that hardware can be limited?

When upgrading, forgotten old hardware can be limiting

What does “bottleneck” even mean? Bottleneck means that often a certain component slows down the rest of your system. You buy a new graphics card, for example, but your processor is also 10 years old or you still have a slow hard disk (HDD) installed. Such a “bottleneck” then ensures that individual components cannot be fully utilized.

How do you recognize such a limitation? You can often see this when you check your hardware under load. Normally, the load should be fairly evenly distributed over the entire hardware. If a part, such as the processor, is limited, this is often quickly recognizable:

• Your memory is only low.
• Your graphics card is bobbing at around 10%.
• But the processor is close to its maximum and has little room for improvement.

These are often helpful signs that your processor isn’t keeping up with the rest of your hardware

When does such a limitation happen? This often happens when gamers upgrade their old system. Often the graphics card is then thought of, which for many players symbolizes concentrated performance in gaming. If money is then available for an upgrade, hundreds of euros are often invested in a new graphics card – and it is quickly forgotten that a gaming PC consists of many components.

Beginners in particular then quickly pump money into a graphics card and are surprised that the effects are not as great as hoped.

However, it is often forgotten that all parts of your gaming PC play an important role. With old systems, it is often sufficient to replace your slow HDD with an SSD.

Gamer buys Nvidia’s fastest graphics card for an unbeatable 800 euros – now he should regret the “purchase” bitterly