What does my son need?

[DadOfGamer]

My son really wants to game and stream but says he needs a better computer. I have no idea if he's FOS or if what he has is sufficient. Mind you this would be 3rd computer in 3 yrs. First, he has a laptop we purchased 2 yrs ago.
ASUS TUF FX505DT Gaming Laptop- 15.6", 120Hz Full HD, AMD Ryzen 5 R5-3550H Processor, GeForce GTX 1650 Graphics, 8GB DDR4, 256GB PCIe SSD, RGB Keyboard, Windows 10 64-bit - FX505DT-AH51

His desktop purchased last year.
NZXT H510, Deepcool GamMax GTE v2, GB GeForce RTX 2070 Super Windforce OC 3X 8G, AMD Tyzen 7 3700X 8 core 3.6GHz, 650W Bronze PSU, Team T-Force Vulcan Z 3200 MHz 16GB (2 x 8 GB), m.2 SSD(1.0TB)

He state's he is getting frame drops from 140 to 39 FPS. Sometimes only getting 30 FPS and game freeze, lag and screen tears. His main issue he states is FPS.

These are his descriptions as it's all Greek to me. I will say that his current monitor is SAMSUNG LC27F398FWNXZA SAMSUNG C27F398 which has a refresh of 60 hertz.

Not sure if this is too much or not enough info but any and all assistance is GREATLY appreciated.....Go!

 

[Alm]

I would have thought the desktop would be capable of gaming and streaming. I'm not one of the experts on here, but maybe someone here could help you fix the frame drops.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

There's quite a lot to unpack here, and I'm not going to say I'm an expert either especially when it comes to streaming as I have zero experience of it. My experience in troubleshooting comes only from using my own rig for many years and reading tech forums, I'm no IT pro. With those caveats, I do know a few tricks still.

I would have though the rig you list above would be pretty capable of streaming, its a high end system still capable of playing most games at ultra settings especially at 1080p 60hz. It would also help to know what games he is playing.

I can tell you at least the reason he's getting tearing is that he's using an uncapped refresh rate on a 60hz monitor. He should either put Vsync or adaptive vsync on in the Nvidia settings. This will cause some input lag that a pro level player might notice but that's the compromise on 60hz if you dont want tearing.

There are really a lot of variables here. We don't know if he's monitoring his temperatures, the machine could be overheating and throttling itself to prevent damage. You can download something like GPUZ, and Realtemp or HWINFO and check the maximum temps after a half hour of gaming. CPU should be maxing under 75c, and the GPU officially is fine under 95 but under 85 is much better.

He could be running 3 games at the same time, he could have 5000 tabs open in Chrome eating up all his RAM causing stutters, he could have messed with auto-overclocking and the system might be unstable because of it, he might just need to dust it out or turn the fans up. The CPU cooler might be installed badly, his Windows installation could be corrupted etc.

You get the idea. I'm afraid I'm not around here all the time as I'm in a different time zone to most, but hopefully someone can help you out a bit more and I'll try to check in tomorrow at some point. These kind of sitautuions take a bit of time to work out that I dont always have I'm afraid. So hopefully others can check in too.

First things I would do
1.Make sure all BIOS settings are stock
2. Reinstall graphics drivers
3. Run Windows defender or other good antivirus software. Also run Malwarebytes.
4. Monitor temps while gaming and record the highest levels reached.
5. Make sure Internet browsers are not using up all RAM (Type 'Taskmanager' in search bar and check memory usage with game open from desktop.

 

[Brian Boru]

3rd computer in 3 yrs

Our 2 PCs here are 3 & 6 years old. Unless you're made of money, a PC should last 3-5 years before "needing" to be replaced. I think you probably know this yourself deep down already:

he's FOS

Seriously, his laptop has better specs than our PCs, the desktop is very good for almost all needs. If he can't play one of the latest hot games at ultra settings … oh well. Btw PCs are meant for upgrading when necessary, not full replacement.

Caveat: I don't play the latest & greatest games. I'm not made of money, so I never buy games new—I wait a year or so until there's a serious discount in one of the Steam or other sales. That said, I can play everything newish I want on my less-old PC, eg Far Cry 5 & New Dawn, Civilization 6.

Kaamos_Llama has gone thru many of the issues which could be causing problems. Don't replace the car just because of a flat tire.