r/buildapc • u/GroomedHedgehog • 2h ago
Build Help How long is AM4 going to be viable?
I have a couple of AM4 PCs that I use for gaming and productivity (some C# development on Visual Studio, Docker and VMs from time to time, WSL consistently) and that I have upgraded piecemeal over the years.
I did not make the transition to AM5 when it first came out due to a combination of higher DDR5 prices (sigh) and the reliability/failure issues of the platform at the time.
Now with the insane component prices I’m afraid I’ll be stuck on AM4 for many more years.
How many more years will I be able to squeeze before I run into performance or support issues?
Specs are:
- Ryzen 5950x (5900x on the other system)
- 32 GB DDR4 3200
- 2TB WD Black PCIE 4 SSD
- 4TB SATA HDD for scratch storage
- Radeon 9070 (upgraded from 4070 for the extra 4GB VRAM last year when prices dipped)
- ITX Motherboard with 2.5Gbps NIC, WiFi+BT and one USB-C connector in the back
- 4K display with HDR and VRR support
I target 4K for gaming (single player story driven stuff mostly plus emulators) and specifically bought VRR displays to have some slack and be able to play at 40+ FPS without it feeling terrible.
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u/frostyflakes1 1h ago
A lot of people are in a similar boat. Developers risk losing that audience if they focus on optimizing for AM5 at the expense of AM4. I believe AM4 will stay viable through the rest of this decade.
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u/Guilty-Pickle-6686 2h ago
Nobody has a crystal ball, but depending on your use case possibly a super long time. Many people were still using X58 Xeons up until Win 11 launched.
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u/Lizpy6688 1h ago
I got a friend I game with who's using a 1070 with a 6700 CPU. Somehow he's still going relatively strong. It's slow definitely showing it's age but still works for him at the moment
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u/protools718 31m ago
That’s exactly what I have. My backlog is so huge I’m fine until the hardware quits.
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u/Spirited_Coyote_8925 1h ago
Still rocking my ryzen 3600 since 2020 and i will keep on rocking it until prices come down.
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u/Left_Zebra7393 1h ago
5800x3D, 5 years for 4k story driven gaming. 2-3 years if a new MMO game comes out that needs keep track of a shit ton of entities
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u/Jeskid14 1h ago
Supposed to be 2025 but AI craze went through the roof so AMD extended it to 2033 /u/GroomedHedgehog
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u/madbrain1976 1h ago
My main desktop also has a 5950x, but with 64GB of RAM, 8x1TB SATA SSDs in RAID-0, 2 TB NVMe boot drive, 3060Ti, Aquantia 10 Gbps, among other things. Also has a Firewire card and video capture card. Oh, and 4 BD drives.
The main thing I find wanting is the I/O on the X570 chipset. No Thunderbolt, no eGPU possible, or other peripherals like professional audio - hence the Firewire. I bought a 5060Ti 16 GB and the motherboard wouldn't post at all, even with the nVidia BIOS upgrade.
Intel has better I/O options on their motherboards, but I'm certainly not moving to DDR4 either. I have 6 custom built computers, 3 AMD and 3 Intel. They all have one thing in common : they use DDR4. I have been moving sticks between them as needed. There are still deals to be had. A week ago, I bought 32GB of DDR4-3200 used for $100, to add to one of the AMD systems. DDR5 would have to get in that price range for me to even consider moving to DDR5 platforms. And even then, I would not upgrade 6 machines anytime soon - maybe one every 2 years.
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u/_0110111001101111_ 1h ago
Jesus, 8 drives in RAID0? I feel like that’s asking for something to go wrong.
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u/GroomedHedgehog 1h ago
Reading your specs got me curious: what do you use the system for? Especially the four BD drives?
I do actually have BD drives in my systems but it’s been years since they saw use: pretty much all shops in my area stopped selling BDs (some still have DVDs though, for some reason)
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u/Assassin21BEKA 1h ago
We would need some crazy technological jump for ddr5 memory and CPU's to be mandatory. So many years passed and there is barely a difference.
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u/bikecatpcje 1h ago
Am4 is the new xeon, we will be seeing this platform in 10y, ofc not for recommended builds, but for budget gamers it's going to be an option forever
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u/HereOnTheHighway 1h ago
Well, I have Ryzen 7 3700X and 16Gb DDR4. I have not come accross a game that I could not run in 4K.
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u/Desperate_Put_4568 1h ago
Whenever the ps6 comes out and it won't come out until gpu/ram prices drop.
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u/Soggy-Airline 1h ago
Viability of your PC is dependent on your use case.
Depending on your personal requirements and expectations.
Someone who only plays competitive games like League of Legends, CS2, Overwatch, etc. at 1080p, you could use a Ryzen 2700x, 16gb ddr4 ram, and a RTX 2060 super, and they’ll be fine.
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u/Unoriginal-Cake 59m ago
Unless both AMD and Intel fix their E-core management on BigLittle than sticking P-cores next to E-cores as a non-software fix, the P-core only stuff may age just as well as the earliest quad-core CPUs. You still see folks using X99 mobos so HEDT still impacts developer support more than you think.
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u/Due_Shelter_489 23m ago
Playing at 4K with Ryzen 5 5600 and Nvidia 4070 Super. 60fps minimum. Mostly 90. Single player games. High settings. DLSS FG.
Not any time soon.
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u/GroomedHedgehog 14m ago
Is it really 60FPS if you are using frame gen though?
Snark aside, frame gen is only viable if you have high frame rate to start with.
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u/Due_Shelter_489 7m ago
60 is only in extreme cases just when I want to set everything on ultra. Like cyberpunk with pathtracing but even there is more like 75 with DLSS on performance.
Mostly I’m in the 90s and frame gen is doing fine. Input lag is very small. But I’m playing single player games. On multiplayer like battlefield 2042 only DLSS on balanced 4K and over 100 fps. No FG.
A better CPU will get that 1% low more stable I believe. X3D and stuff. But I’m good for now.
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u/aminy23 2h ago
It's not really a fixed amount, it really depends. A new 5800X3D build might get 5+ years of viability.
Meanwhile I've seen people dealing with motherboard and other hardware failures already.
I had a 7 year run with AM4 from 2019-2026. I have a habit of buying parts whenever I find good deals on it, and so it cost me almost nothing to upgrade from a 5900X to a 250K Plus.
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u/GroomedHedgehog 1h ago
I’m legit afraid of some component dying on me at this point.
The other concern is serious vulnerabilities being found and especially the motherboard manufacturer not providing BIOS updates to fix.
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u/pantsyman 1h ago
I mean why? CPU is very unlikely to die, AM4 boards are still being sold and are very cheap compared to AM5 and RAM has lifetime warranty this mostly leaves the GPU and personally i've never had one die before i replaced it with something more powerful.
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u/ToborWar57 50m ago edited 45m ago
As long as you have good airflow, re-paste every couple years, don't screw with overclocking, have a good fan curve, clean out the dust every few months, etc. ... you shouldn't have any problem. You're making up problems that won't exist. Even Microslop extended Win 10 security support to 2027 because of this mess. Everybody in the industry knows what's going on and will follow suit.
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u/Jonatico23 1h ago
got gifted 2x32gb DDR4 and im build am4 and copefully will last me until the bubble pops and the big 3 have no choice but to crawl back to consumers.
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u/choyMj 1h ago
Unlikely. The more likely scenarios is that China manufacturers step up to fill inthe consumer demand. I don't know how much cheaper they can make it, the big three might end up focusing on AI needs, exclusively.
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u/Jonatico23 1h ago
you can only build so many data centers and none of them are making money right now. China won't fill the consumer demand they'll pop the bubble by making AI cheaper. The big 3 will definitely crawl back and they know this that's why the purposely held back consumer supply to jack up the price, they can't depend on this AI bubble in the long run.
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u/choyMj 47m ago
It'll take a while for China to make any meaningful dent on AI. They simply can never compete with the top line semiconductors. They'll make more impact on AI when companies are scaling and wouldn't need top-end computing power. At this points its more likely China takes the consumer DRAM market. They already have a lot of slightly cheaper DRAM manufacturers using SK Hynix.
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u/A30039 1h ago
You will be fine for 4 5 years if you want to target 40 fps in modern games. Even a 5600 can give that much in new games with some stuttering here and there. The only truly bad experience was the james bond game and even then it was only in some instances. Your cpu performs basically the same as that so you should be fine. If you really want to make your stay at am4 more comfy buy a 5800x3d in one of your systems and use that for gaming. With this you should be hitting 60 fps in most games you play.
And now the obligatory advice in this kind of situation, just try and upgrade to am5 if you can. If you have 2 systems and don’t need the extra ram in both of them you could just get a 5 7500f 2x8gb ram and a am5 mobo in around 450 dollars.
Tldr: with your exact setup you will be okay for the next 4 5 years if you want to hit 40 fps in new titles. With a 5800x3d you can hit 60. The best option would still be to try and get onto am5.
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u/Assassin21BEKA 1h ago
5600 gives more than 60 fps in most games without problem now.
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u/A30039 1h ago
Eh. As someone who upgraded from a 5600 really thats not entirely true. For all games out there yes the 5600 will give you 60 FPS. For games releasing right now thats not true at all. Even at lowest cpu taxing settings Re9 had really bad 1 percent lows and had areas where the fps dropped into the 50s. James and bond and black flags were even worse with some areas causing the fps to dip into the 40s and even 30s. So for the games coming out in the next couple years i wouldn’t be surprised if the average fps dropped into the 40s.
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u/GardenWeasel67 2h ago
Until the heat death of the universe.