GPU vs CPU

l_stowe

Maybe this is too hard a question to get a sensible answer, but I am going to upgrade my PC in one of two ways and I wanted to know (from an iRay DAZ rendering point of view) which would be more effective

1. CPU upgrade from dual core i3 to quad core i5

2 GPU swapping out my GTX 750 Ti for a 970

I think upgrading the CPU will be a little cheaper, but is it worth spending that little extra to get the CUDA cores?

Tobor

There have been some threads here comparing the 970, which uses the older Maxwell architecture, and the more recent 1060, based on the latest Pascal cores. Though the 1060 has fewer cores than the 970, some have claimed comparable Iray throughput. The base 1060 also comes with 6GB, as opposed to the standard 4GB on the 970. Because of the recent rush to mining digital currency, the 1060 and 1070 cards are currently at a premium, but it's not too bad, and still less than the 970. If you haven't already, you might want to read through these threads to pick up some pointers.

As to whether you should upgrade the GPU or CPU, if this is just for Iray rendering, I'd go with the GPU.

Chezjuan

As Tobor said, for Iray, GPU is the upgrade you want.

l_stowe

Point taken, thanks guys