Microsoft Flight Simulator

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and Intel Arc B570 combination delivers a strictly limited experience in Microsoft Flight Simulator, with the data showing that playable performance at 60 FPS is confined to lower resolutions and presets. At 4K, the system fails to hit the 60 FPS threshold at any tested setting, while 1440p and 1080p offer a narrow window of playability. The following analysis breaks down the measured frame rates, contextualizes the hardware against its nearest rivals, and provides a clear verdict on what this PC can and cannot achieve.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data covers three resolutions (1920x1080, 2560x1440, 3840x2160) across four presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra). The average frame rates show a consistent pattern: the lower the resolution and preset, the higher the FPS, but the margins between presets are significant.

At 1920x1080, the best performance comes from the Low preset, which delivers an average of 86 FPS. The Medium preset drops to an average of 67 FPS, with a minimum of 57 FPS and a maximum of 77 FPS. The High preset falls further to 50 FPS average, and the Ultra preset bottoms out at 48 FPS average. The gap between Low and Medium is 19 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 17 FPS, suggesting a steep scaling curve as visual quality increases.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset is the only configuration that clears the 60 FPS threshold, averaging 69 FPS. The Medium preset averages 54 FPS, with a minimum of 46 FPS and a maximum of 62 FPS — meaning even at this setting, the system dips below the playable threshold during demanding scenes. High averages 41 FPS, and Ultra averages 39 FPS. The drop from Low to Medium is 15 FPS, and from Medium to High is 13 FPS, showing that each preset step costs roughly 13-15 FPS at this resolution.

At 3840x2160, no preset reaches 60 FPS. The Low preset is the fastest, averaging 51 FPS. Medium drops to 40 FPS, with a minimum of 34 FPS and a maximum of 46 FPS. High averages 30 FPS, and Ultra averages 28 FPS. The scaling here is steeper: from Low to Medium is an 11 FPS drop, but from Medium to High is a 10 FPS drop, and High to Ultra is only 2 FPS — suggesting that the Ultra preset adds little visual benefit relative to its performance cost at this resolution.

The min/max data, where available, shows that the Medium preset at 1920x1080 has a 20 FPS range (57 to 77), while at 2560x1440 the range is 16 FPS (46 to 62), and at 3840x2160 the range is 12 FPS (34 to 46). This narrowing range at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU becomes more consistently bottlenecked, reducing frame-time variance.

FAQ

Q: Can this PC run Microsoft Flight Simulator at 4K Ultra settings?

A: No. The data shows an average of 28 FPS at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, which is far below the 60 FPS playable threshold. Even at 4K Low, the average is only 51 FPS, so no 4K preset is playable.

Q: What is the best playable setting at 1440p?

A: Low is the only playable preset at 2560x1440, averaging 69 FPS. The Medium preset averages 54 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS threshold, and the minimum of 46 FPS confirms it cannot hold playable frame rates consistently.

Q: Is 1080p Medium a stable experience?

A: The average of 67 FPS at 1920x1080 Medium clears the threshold, but the minimum of 57 FPS means the system occasionally drops below 60 FPS. The data shows a 20 FPS range between min and max, indicating some frame-time instability during heavy scenes.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 has an average benchmark score of 20468, which is 0.1% above the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V (20454), 0.2% above the AMD Ryzen 5 8500G (20425), and 0.5% above the AMD EPYC 9454P (20422). These deltas are negligible, meaning the 5600 performs nearly identically to those CPUs in synthetic benchmarks.

Q: How does the GPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Intel Arc B570 has an average benchmark score of 20556, which is 0.1% above the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile (20534), 0.1% below the Intel Arc A750 (20582), and 0.5% above the NVIDIA Quadro M4000M (20480). The differences are minor, suggesting similar raw performance levels.

Q: What is the most demanding preset that stays above 60 FPS at 1080p?

A: Medium, with an average of 67 FPS. The Low preset averages 86 FPS, but Medium is the highest quality setting that maintains an average above the 60 FPS threshold at 1920x1080.

Similar Performance Alternatives

Based on the nearestRivals data, the CPU and GPU each have close performance equivalents that would likely produce similar gameplay results.

For the AMD Ryzen 5 5600, the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V scores within 0.1% (20454 vs 20468), making it a near-identical match in CPU-bound scenarios. The AMD Ryzen 5 8500G (20425, 0.2% lower) and the AMD EPYC 9454P (20422, 0.2% lower) are also within a rounding error. The AMD EPYC 7713 (20363, 0.5% lower) is slightly behind but still in the same performance class. In practice, any of these CPUs would deliver nearly the same frame rates in Microsoft Flight Simulator, given that the game's CPU load is unlikely to differentiate between such small benchmark deltas.

For the Intel Arc B570, the Intel Arc A750 (20582, 0.1% higher) is the closest match, meaning it would be essentially indistinguishable in gameplay. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Mobile (20534, 0.1% lower) is also a near-identical performer, though it is a laptop part with different power characteristics. The NVIDIA Quadro M4000M (20480, 0.4% lower) and AMD Radeon R9 M390X (20662, 0.5% higher) round out the list, but these are older or workstation-oriented parts that may have different driver and feature support. For the purposes of this game, a system with an Arc A750 or RTX 3070 Mobile paired with a similarly performing CPU would show the same FPS profile as the tested combo.

The Verdict

The data is unambiguous: this PC cannot maintain 60 FPS at 3840x2160 under any preset. The best 4K result is 51 FPS on Low, which is below the playable threshold. At 2560x1440, the system is playable only on Low, with an average of 69 FPS. At 1920x1080, both Low (86 FPS) and Medium (67 FPS) clear the threshold, but High (50 FPS) and Ultra (48 FPS) do not.

The verdictByResolution data confirms this: 3840x2160 has no playable settings, 2560x1440 has Low as the sole playable setting, and 1920x1080 has Low and Medium as playable. The best settings per resolution are Low at 1440p (69 FPS) and Medium at 1080p (67 FPS). For users targeting a locked 60 FPS experience, the system is limited to 1080p Medium or 1440p Low. Anything above those presets will result in frame rates that dip below 60 FPS, with the minimums at 1080p Medium (57 FPS) and 1440p Medium (46 FPS) confirming the instability at higher settings.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 + Intel Arc B570 combination ranks 2988 out of 3714 tested combos for Microsoft Flight Simulator. This places it in the lower third of all tested systems, at roughly the 80th percentile from the bottom (or the 20th percentile from the top). The rank reflects the system's inability to handle high presets at common resolutions — it is a mid-to-low-tier performer for this specific title.

The CPU's percentileVsAllCpus is 74, meaning it outperforms 74% of all tested CPUs, while the GPU's percentileVsAllGpus is 65, outperforming 65% of tested GPUs. The gap between these percentiles and the combo's overall rank suggests that the game is heavily GPU-limited at higher resolutions, dragging the combined ranking down despite the CPU's relatively strong showing. The combo rank of 2988 out of 3714 indicates that most other tested systems, even those with weaker individual components, manage to achieve better in-game performance — likely because Microsoft Flight Simulator scales poorly with this particular GPU configuration at high settings.

Best Settings per Resolution

The most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS, based on the measured data, is as follows:

• 3840x2160: No preset reaches 60 FPS. The fastest is Low at 51 FPS, but it is not playable. The verdictByResolution confirms no playable settings exist at this resolution.
• 2560x1440: Low is the only playable preset, averaging 69 FPS. Medium averages 54 FPS, which is below the threshold. The best (and only) choice is Low.
• 1920x1080: Medium is the highest playable preset, averaging 67 FPS. Low averages 86 FPS, but Medium provides better visual quality while still clearing 60 FPS. High (50 FPS) and Ultra (48 FPS) are not playable.

For users who prioritize frame rate stability over visual fidelity, 1080p Low (86 FPS) offers the largest headroom above the threshold, while 1080p Medium (67 FPS) is the best balance of quality and performance. At 1440p, Low (69 FPS) is the only option, and the 9 FPS headroom above 60 FPS is modest, meaning heavy scenes could push the average down to the threshold.

CPU and GPU Roles

The scaling between resolutions and presets reveals how the CPU and GPU each contribute to performance in Microsoft Flight Simulator. At 1920x1080, the difference between Low (86 FPS) and Ultra (48 FPS) is 38 FPS, while at 2560x1440 the same preset gap is 30 FPS (69 to 39), and at 3840x2160 it is 23 FPS (51 to 28). This narrowing delta at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU becomes the dominant bottleneck as pixel count increases — the CPU has more headroom to drive higher frame rates at low settings, but the GPU cannot keep up as the resolution scales.

Conversely, the CPU's role is more prominent at lower resolutions. At 1920x1080 Low, the system achieves 86 FPS, which is 35 FPS higher than at 2560x1440 Low (69 FPS) and 35 FPS higher than at 3840x2160 Low (51 FPS). This 35 FPS drop from 1080p to 1440p, and again from 1440p to 4K, suggests that the GPU's memory bandwidth (380.0 GB/s) and pixel throughput (200.0 GPixel/s) are the limiting factors. The CPU, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, is likely sufficient to feed the GPU at 1080p, but at higher resolutions the GPU's 10 GB GDDR6 memory and 160-bit bus become the constraining hardware.

The preset scaling also shows a CPU/GPU split. At 1080p, the jump from Low (86 FPS) to Medium (67 FPS) costs 19 FPS, but the jump from High (50 FPS) to Ultra (48 FPS) costs only 2 FPS. This suggests that the Ultra preset adds features that are GPU-heavy but provide diminishing returns, while the Medium preset's additional CPU load (e.g., physics, AI, world generation) is more costly relative to the performance gain. At 4K, the same pattern appears: Low (51 FPS) to Medium (40 FPS) is an 11 FPS drop, but High (30 FPS) to Ultra (28 FPS) is only 2 FPS. This indicates that the GPU is saturated at 4K even on Low, and the CPU's influence on frame rate diminishes as the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck. The data supports a conclusion: the Intel Arc B570 is the limiting component at 1440p and above, while the AMD Ryzen 5 5600 is adequate but not exceptional for this title's CPU demands at 1080p.