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There never was any desktop 8xx parts, only laptop, desktop went straight from 7xx to 9xx.

The PCI-express version is still 3.0, may have been 2.0 when Linus Tech Tips or whomever tested it back then but the graphics cards has become faster.

On the other hand AMD has abandoned CrossFire branding completely and SLI is pretty dead/unused too. In DX12 you may be able to even force rendering onto two cards but really close to no-one is using two cards for gaming and very close to no-one is using four for that purpose.

SLI didn't worked with a bunch of games and even when it work people complain on micro stutter so personally I kinda feel it may be more worth to get the most expensive model and considering those sit at ~$1300 now you gotta ask yourself how many spend that and how many are willing to spend two-four times more than that? Also those cards can do 60+ fps 4K gaming alone.

For textures the compression has improved which Nvidia argued compensated for the lower memory bandwidth. AFAIK SLI doesn't let you share RAM between the cards, I don't know what the SLI bridge actually do. The new cards use NVLink and as such at-least for the professional cards you can use all the RAM added up together and on the professional cards the connection is very fast but on the consumer cards it's slower but I don't know if they still add the VRAM together and if the typical scenario is just two cards maybe the lower bandwidth doesn't matter all that much.

Not SLI:
https://www.techpowerup.com/re...
8x vs 16x:
AC:O 1080p: 104.7 vs 114.5 fps.
BF1 UHD: 95.8 vs 97.6 fps.
CoD:WWII 1080p: 207.7 vs 217.0 fps.
Civ VI UHD: 115.3 vs 122.7 fps.
And so on.
They lost 2-3% using 8x all in all over the various resolutions, that was just for a single card but hardly worth being upset about.

SLI:
https://www.gamersnexus.net/gu...
Ashes of the Singularity, UHD Crazy:
16+16: 127.2 / 47.7 / 42.8 (avg, 1% low, 0.1% low)
16+8: 125.1 / 46.9 / 41.8 (but in what situation will you ever have 16+8?)
8+8: 106.9 / 40.9 / 37.3
So with NvLINK/SLI it matter more than for a single card.

As for scaling:
NvLink 2080Ti Sniper Elite UHD High DX 12: 209.8 / 145.1 / 132.1
2080Ti FE: 108.2 / 93.2 / 91.4
So a very good result there.
SLI 1080Ti: 170.3 / 104.8 / 97.4
1080Ti: 86.6 / 75.1 / 72.2
So very good results both with new cards with NvLink and the old cards with SLI in that DirectX 12 title.

I don't really know what I wrote when I started this post but for a single card 8x seem to only make 2-3% difference, for two it's more like 20% difference and in a game which has great DX12 and scaling results using two cards whatever SLI or NvLink worked great.

I play with wired keyboard and mouse because I do not like the latency of wireless keyboards and mouse

Specifically what mouse and keyboard do you use and which wireless ones do you not like the latency of? Because you seem to be mis-categorizing the issue, it isn't wired vs wireless at all. That has been debunked a number of times, here is just one example.

No thank you. Hell, even the 1060 is about as fast in 4 Honor!!

Face it AMD is done. They killed what was mediocre of ATI at the turn of the decade and never recovered. Drivers are shitty and it reaks of a cheap quality knock off. Not saying this as a troll, but realistically if you ask any ATI/AMD users where Nvidia drivers are uncrashable and just work at launch.

The i7-2600k in that article ( http://www.gamersnexus.net/gui... ) is quite a bit behind the new Ryzen CPUs for most tests, even though they have it running at 4.7 GHz vs. the Ryzen's 4 GHz with 2933 MHz RAM. The 2600k is only really winning for certain games.

Ryzen overclocking has improved a bit since that article was published, but you'll still be hard-pressed to get a Ryzen CPU much past 4 GHz. What does matter a lot more is running your memory at a higher speed. Since the infinity fabric interconnect is tied to the memory clock, any time a core needs to reach out over that interconnect to talk to another core, you're going to wait on the infinity fabric. Increasing memory speed has a significant effect on Ryzen in synthetic CPU tests and in many games. Additionally, there have been some game updates for Ryzen that have massively improved performance, and some Windows scheduler updates (I think Windows 10 only) that have yielded a moderate improvement.

I myself have a i7-2600k in my main system. I intend to build a Ryzen (or Threadripper) system later this year.

Intel is up to their shady tactics again with AMD's new Ryzen release. Maybe not out right paying off computer makers, just now they are sponsoring reviewers. The reviewers jump through all kinds of hoops to make sure that Intel is on top of the benchmark graphics and read like a Intel marketing brochure. None of the reviewers disclose that they are sponsored by Intel.
Examples of oddities from reviewers that are sponsored by Intel.

1) Tom's Hardware: Complains about the power consumption being higher than spec, leaves out that the result was from a overclocked test and an MSI board that has an additional CPU power.
2) GamersNexus (one worst of them)
a) Had to compared the 1800x to 6 different Intel processors that were overclocked with the 6900k overclocked by 700Mhz.
b) Only one AMD processor was OC by -100Mhz(yep) . There OC vs stock were almost exactly same.
c) Makes the 6900k pop on the top of the benchmarks.
d)1800X only loses 6 vs 8 to the Intel 6900k at stock speeds. With only 2 benchmarks with the 1800x losing by more than 7fps.
e)Pretty much all benchmarks by the same author never included OC tests, but suddenly he had to compare it to 6 different OC benchmarks. http://www.gamersnexus.net/gam... http://www.gamersnexus.net/gam...
f) Out right lied saying AMD told him not to benchmark Ryzen at 1920x1080. AMD just asked him to benchmark at multiple resolutions , not just 1080P.

Intel is up to their shady tactics again with AMD's new Ryzen release. Maybe not out right paying off computer makers, just now they are sponsoring reviewers. The reviewers jump through all kinds of hoops to make sure that Intel is on top of the benchmark graphics and read like a Intel marketing brochure. None of the reviewers disclose that they are sponsored by Intel.
Examples of oddities from reviewers that are sponsored by Intel.

1) Tom's Hardware: Complains about the power consumption being higher than spec, leaves out that the result was from a overclocked test and an MSI board that has an additional CPU power.
2) GamersNexus (one worst of them)
a) Had to compared the 1800x to 6 different Intel processors that were overclocked with the 6900k overclocked by 700Mhz.
b) Only one AMD processor was OC by -100Mhz(yep) . There OC vs stock were almost exactly same.
c) Makes the 6900k pop on the top of the benchmarks.
d)1800X only loses 6 vs 8 to the Intel 6900k at stock speeds. With only 2 benchmarks with the 1800x losing by more than 7fps.
e)Pretty much all benchmarks by the same author never included OC tests, but suddenly he had to compare it to 6 different OC benchmarks. http://www.gamersnexus.net/gam... http://www.gamersnexus.net/gam...
f) Out right lied saying AMD told him not to benchmark Ryzen at 1920x1080. AMD just asked him to benchmark at multiple resolutions , not just 1080P.

$500 R7 1800X vs $340 i7 7700k.

http://www.gamersnexus.net/hwr...

The 1800X is a shitty choice for gaming. Perhaps drivers, coptimized software, and more mature motherboards/BIOSes will help over time. AMD's shit does tend to improve with age, but there's a huge delta there.

The 1050 and 1060 don't support SLI, so the only option is multi-gpu support through DirectX 12. For DirectX 11, there is no support. http://www.gamersnexus.net/gui...

Here in Sweden:
FX-8370: 1890 SEK
FX-8370E: 1620 SEK
FX-8350: 1690 SEK
FX-8350 with Wraith cooler: 1811 SEK.
i5 6400 Box: 1868 SEK.
i5 6500 Box: 2006 SEK.

I'd definitely take the i5 6400 over the FX-8350.

I've seen FX-8300-series processors closer to the i3 pricing though.
FX-8320: 1390 SEK
FX-8320E: 1328 SEK
FX-8300: 1299 SEK
FX-6350 with Wraith: 1308 SEK
FX-6350: 1249 SEK
FX-6300: 990 SEK

So with those you're in i3 territory:
i3 6320: 1594 SEK
i3 6300: 1390 SEK
i3 6100: 1149 SEK
G4400: 565 SEK

I think the i5 6500 and the i3 6100 is the processors to consider (and the older G3258 maybe?), those are the Intel processors which have the best value. Similarly I think the FX-8320 may have the best value of that line?

Anyway, they are close enough and given a choice I'd pick the i5 6400 over the FX-8350 easily. And I'd pick an i3 6100 over the FX-6300 - FX-6350 too.

The Pentium Dual is like 1/3 of the price (565 SEK vs 1690 SEK), I have no idea where you've "seen" your numbers but they are completely off.

It is close and the Intel processors are most likely better for games which is where they matter for me. And i5 6500 will likely keep up with the over-locked FX-8350 in gaming.
https://youtu.be/xKR04WMP9sw?t...

Both chips are competitively priced against each other just as the graphics cards are. There's no performance advantage in picking the AMD chip over the Intel one in a given price category unless for integrated graphics because they are faster there. As said.

What is a "much nicer" motherboard? If anything the cheap AM3+ motherboards have huge issues running the FX processors even at stock speeds. Plenty of people who have motherboards which is supposed to support the FX-6300 but which can't run it anyway. AMD doesn't have any processors with PCI-express 3.0 support. You can get cheap H110 motherboards too and at-least your build will actually WORK with those.

The FX-8000 series is worse for games than i5,
http://www.gamersnexus.net/gam...
Fallout 4, 1440p, Ultra, 980Ti
i3 4130: 53 FPS average, 33 FPS 0.1% low.
FX-8370E: 51 FPS average, 33 FPS 0.1% low.
FX-8320E: 50 FPS average, 31 FPS 0.1% low.
The i5?
i5 4690K: 71 FPS average, 45 FPS 0.1% low.

An i3 keep up in the 6300-8300 territory and an i5 beats it. An overclocked i5 the AMD chips can't keep up with.

An AMD APU doesn't cost "a lot less" than an i3 with integrated graphics. They are pretty expensive I'd say. Compare the Athlon II X4 860K vs the A10 7850K, you pay a lot for that pretty shitty but functional integrated graphics. The G4400 and the i3 6100 cost similarly and you will of course have "excellent picture quality and hardware accelerated video" with the i3 6100 too.

So now what to do... GPU in x16 slot, and slow down my fast SSD by putting it in a x8? Or have my SSD be nice and fast by putting it in the x16 slot and slow down my FPS by putting the GPU in the s8 slot?

Simply, no.

You are right about the physical PCIe slot connectors.

You could be right about the physical PCIe slot wiring, but in many boards with two x16 slots (assuming that there are only two, with the chipset-wired slots not being physically x16) both are electrically wired to be x16. You do not have to put a card in a specific one of the two slots to have an operational x16 connection.

You are wrong about the functional connections. I'll assume an Intel-compantible motherboard since that is what I'm familiar with. AMD-compatible motherboards could be different - I simply do not know.

Intel CPUs provide 16 PCIe lanes for connection to the x16 slot(s). If you have one card inserted, that slot will be allocated all 16 lanes. If you have two cards inserted in a board providing two slots, each slot will be allocated 8 lanes. In Z170 boards there could be three CPU-connected slots, and with three cards inserted in such a board, the slots would be allocated x8/x4/x4. See here.

Everything else runs off chipset-provided PCIe lanes, which are connected to the CPU by a PCIe x4-like . Thus, for example, in my Ivy Bridge system (Z68), there is a third PCIe x16 physical slot that is PCIe x4 electrically wired and functionally PCIe x1-connected unless I set a BIOS option that disables certain other peripherals (USB3 and eSATA add-ons).

If you connect your GPU and this SSD at the same time, you will be either x8/x8 (if using CPU-connected slots) or x16/x4 (if using one CPU-connected slot and one chipset-connected slot). That x4 would also be shared with every other I/O connection in the system due to the DMI "x4" like bandwidth limitation.

PCIe PLXs switches add lanes to slots, but do not add further connections to the CPU or chipset. At the end of the day you're sharing either the 16 CPU-provided lanes or the 4 chipset provided lanes in Intel's consumer-oriented boards. You have to go to the LGA2011 socket and workstation chipsets to gain more available bandwidth to the CPU.