Is it going to be worth going 3090 to 4090?

[Supmua]

I did some simple calculations, and if the new GPU yields 36% performance uplift in frametime then it will get me to 90 fps in Harrier Caucasus freeflight mission without me touching any current settings other than GPU swap.  The expected performance uplift from the 4090 is supposedly even twice of that so 90 fps is going to be doable at least in some simple missions. 

My current CPU frametime on this mission is ~9ms and GPU FT ~15ms, and you can see that even with the 9900K CPU which is going to be 4 generations behind soon this CPU is not a bottleneck at all in this mission.  In general, my GPU FT is almost always higher than the CPU counterpart even in complex maps such as Mariana and this is why I've been holding off on upgrading CPU for my DCS rig even though I also have an 11th gen i7 in another PC.  This might change soon with the RTX 4090 as the CPU will likely become the bottleneck instead.

[WipeUout]

6 hours ago, Supmua said:

My current CPU frametime on this mission is ~9ms

Your CPU frametime is also affected by graphic settings to a certain extent.  Upgrading the GPU will give you breathing room to increase image quality but it will also increase CPU frametime if you bump up those settings.  In order to fully appreciate the very high resolution of your HMD at native resolution and refresh rate, a CPU upgrade will be required.

When I switched my 9900k for a 12700kf, it was a revelation on how much I was missing because of CPU bottleneck.  All of the sudden, I could enjoy complex multiplayer missions and theaters such as Syria with a decent level of details and quality...  and without re-projection!   

[Supmua]

Been watching unboxing videos and these cards are truly monstrous in size.  My 3090 is already huge next to the 2080Ti and these 4090 cards easily puts it to shame.  The Asus ROG Strix one in particular is larger than other cards.  Too bad no official performance or benchmark reports allowed until Oct 11th.

Also, a very cool video on the RTX 4090FE from Gamers Nexus with an NVIDIA's thermal engineer showing the design process, cooling tech used, etc.

 

Edited October 6, 2022 by Supmua

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

I am told that the cards are available to the reviewers, however, they are NOT allowed to connect the card up to test it...less than a week before the card goes public, we shall see how fate it would be.

[Bazz_Mulder]

Nvidia NDA is lifting on 11 October

[Supmua]

The size, lol.  This the the Asus ROG Strix which is bigger than average cards.

For me size isn't that important as long as cooling is sufficient.  The only issue I have with these cards though is that they still feature DP 1.4a rather than 2.0 ports which are already present in the new Intel GPU cards.  This would've been great for next gen VR headsets as they would allow extra bandwidth support, and this means that high-res headsets such has Varjo may not need to rely on NVIDIA's DSC tech to operate.  Of course the headsets themselves have to support the new protocol also.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Supmua

[nessuno0505]

I don't think it's a VGA problem.

I have a 3080ti and DCS is quite smooth (consider I fly mainly single player); for sure a 4090 will be better (I've never heard of a new VGA generation with less performances than the previous one), but that's not the point.

I could name some software (forbidden by 1.15 rule, so I won't name) having wonderful performances in VR using fancy tech such as DLSS or multi-core support, something we do not currently have in DCS.

We need new tech implemented, rather than a new VGA.

New VGAs are always welcome, but they are not the problem here.

[WipeUout]

That Asus monster will not fit in most cases.  You can probably overclock the sucker big time compared to the FE.

[Morat]

On 9/22/2022 at 8:17 PM, DavePastry said:

this just came up on hoggit, unscientific but looking like we can hold onto our 3090's:

 

l

That's very interesting - and thank you for taking the time.

I don't suppose you have VR? I'd imagine that VR could well show an improvement as it's much more GPU intensive than playing on a monitor. I'm saying it'll be worth the money, but if it's someone else's money it'd fun to find out

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

Since most tech sites do not test VR, I would take any test on MSFS as a reference.

[Supmua]

I believe flightsimmers (not necessarily DCS) will gobble up these new GPUs and a lot of them use VR so we’ll definitely see some VR benchmarks soon.  I’m also planning to do some DCS benchmarks on my own as I’m really hoping to see 90 fps in some scenarios (after years of dreaming).  Would’ve been nice if we have CPUs with equally large performance leap, maybe the 13900KS or 7950X3D will come close.

Edited October 8, 2022 by Supmua

[Scofflaw]

I have a 3090, and run 4k @ 120hz, and I probably wouldn't upgrade if DCS was the only game I played.  That being said, if the leaked benchmarks are accurate, I'll probably pick one up.

I spend at least 8-12 hours every day on my computer for both work and fun combined, so I don't mind spending money on my system.  

[Dragon1-1]

4 hours ago, Supmua said:

Would’ve been nice if we have CPUs with equally large performance leap, maybe the 13900KS or 7950X3D will come close.

Unless they can push 6GHz on a non-LN2 cooling setup, that's very unlikely. DCS is currently bound to a single core, meaning CPU single core performance is going to be the deciding factor. This stat isn't going to improve much (you go crazy with OC and have a custom watercooled setup on the current generation about as well) because we're already pushing physical limits as it is. Multicore needs to happen before we can make proper use of modern CPUs.

[Supmua]

33 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Unless they can push 6GHz on a non-LN2 cooling setup, that's very unlikely. DCS is currently bound to a single core, meaning CPU single core performance is going to be the deciding factor. This stat isn't going to improve much (you go crazy with OC and have a custom watercooled setup on the current generation about as well) because we're already pushing physical limits as it is. Multicore needs to happen before we can make proper use of modern CPUs.

You might be right.  2-3ms improvement in single core performance per year in CPU frametime isn’t cutting it when you need at least 10-15 to jump from 45 to 90 fps tier in VR with the current DCS engine, and this is just average not counting 5th or 1 percentile numbers which also contribute to smoothness. 

[WipeUout]

Here's a quick table to show relationship between FPS amd Frame time.

Frametime (ms)	FPS		FPS	Frametime (ms)
5	200.0		30	33.3
9	111.1		45	22.2
10	100.0		60	16.7
11	90.9		72	13.9
12	83.3		75	13.3
13	76.9		90	11.1
14	71.4		100	10.0
15	66.7		120	8.3
20	50.0		144	6.9
25	40.0		180	5.6

 

First two columns show what would be the maximum FPS you can expect from a specific frame time.  The next two columns show what is the maximum frametime limit you need to sustain a certain FPS.

If your target FPS is 90 or better, then you need to keep your frame time below 11.1.  

[Slammin]

I'm not convinced things will be so linear.  My 3090 seems to be the biggest bottleneck right now, not my 5950x, so if a 4090 can present my CPU as the bottleneck with the settings I want to use, I think I'm good with that.  This is with an 8Kx, but I'd imagine my viewpoint would be different using a less demanding HMD.

Either way, we have all been chasing this for a long time now, but from my perspective, I am hopeful because DCS ran smooth as glass @ 5120x1440 in 2D, even on a 10+ year old CPU.

I am so ready for a 4090, but will await the specific reviews.

[Digitalvole]

Anyone got any guesses on how much a 4090 is going to cost in the UK? 

Our government seems determined to make everything as expensive as possible by wrecking our currency for some reason, twats. 

Im assuming that whatever prices we hear, we are likely to pay more, is this accurate?
 

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

My guess would be more expensive, over £2K, cause RTX-40 is very expensive to produce in the first place.

Edited October 10, 2022 by VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants

[dburne]

15 minutes ago, VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants said:

My guess would be more expensive, over £2K, cause RTX-40 is very expensive to produce in the first place.

 

 

Also possibility of having to get a new power supply to go with it as well. I am still convinced I am going to just skip the 40xx series.

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

As I wish to have a brand new rig, I am a bit interested to see how much gain the RTX 4090 can achieve given the price. Obviously, this series is way over-budget.

[silverdevil]

24 minutes ago, VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants said:

As I wish to have a brand new rig, I am a bit interested to see how much gain the RTX 4090 can achieve given the price. Obviously, this series is way over-budget.

i got my dell last year in april. it was literally the only way to get a 3090 because oem's get first choice. and yeah it was overpriced. economics of supply and demand sucks. a tree falls down in the forest and gas prices go up.

[Digitalvole]

£2k!? Owch.  If so that’s hard for me to justify. I think £1700 is about as much as I’d be prepared to spend without feeling like a bit of a twerp.

Why would one need a new psu? Power required or is it a connector issue?

8 minutes ago, silverdevil said:

i got my dell last year in april. it was literally the only way to get a 3090 because oem's get first choice. and yeah it was overpriced. economics of supply and demand sucks. a tree falls down in the forest and gas prices go up.

I did the same thing

Edited October 10, 2022 by Digitalvole

[Supmua]

The USD pricings seem much more reasonable than elsewhere.  Of course there’s also a possibility of US resellers readjusting (i.e. jacking up) the prices above MSRP, they definitely did that with the last gen cards. 

[silverdevil]

3 hours ago, Digitalvole said:

Why would one need a new psu? Power required or is it a connector issue?

my thought is that there are computers that had lesser than necessary for the new cards. those that have 1000 watts is probably good to go. i heard 4090 can get up to 470 watts use. Supplementary power connectors 3090 1x 12-pin vs 4090 1x 16-pin

Edited October 10, 2022 by silverdevil

[Supmua]

https://videocardz.com/newz/zotac-rtx-4090s-pcie-gen5-power-cable-adapter-service-life-is-up-to-30-connection-cycles
 

^This was the concern. Now we don’t know if this also applies to other AIBs or this is just a precautionary recommendation from Zotac.  In any case, I already have a new ATX 3.0 PSU coming from Newegg so I don’t have to deal with this potential issue. 

Edited October 10, 2022 by Supmua