Microsoft Flight Simulator

The Intel Core i5-12400F and Intel Arc B580 pairing can run Microsoft Flight Simulator, but only at reduced settings. Measured data shows the combo clears the 60 FPS threshold at 1080p on Medium (74.1 FPS) and at 1440p on Low (76.9 FPS), while 4K falls short on every preset, topping out at 56.4 FPS even on the lowest graphics option. This is a demanding simulation, and this hardware sits at rank 2845 of 3714 tested combinations in the game — below the midpoint — so expectations should be calibrated accordingly.

Best Settings per Resolution

At 1920x1080, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is Medium, delivering an average of 74.1 FPS. High drops the average to 57.6 FPS, which falls below the playable threshold, so Medium is the ceiling for a 60 FPS target at 1080p.

At 2560x1440, only Low qualifies. It averages 76.9 FPS, a comfortable margin above the threshold. Medium manages 59.4 FPS at this resolution — agonizingly close to 60 but technically under it — so the data-driven recommendation is Low for 1440p gameplay.

At 3840x2160, no preset reaches 60 FPS. Low averages 56.4 FPS, Medium 43 FPS, High 31.5 FPS, and Ultra 31.7 FPS. Native 4K is not a viable target for this pairing in Microsoft Flight Simulator; players wanting to game on a 4K display would need to render at a lower resolution instead.

CPU and GPU Roles

The benchmark results indicate this game is GPU-limited for this pairing at higher resolutions and increasingly CPU-relevant at lower ones. Consider the scaling: from 1080p Medium to 1440p Medium, the average falls from 74.1 FPS to 59.4 FPS — a drop of roughly a fifth — and from 1440p Low to 4K Low, from 76.9 FPS to 56.4 FPS. When frame rates drop substantially as resolution rises while settings stay constant, the GPU is the component absorbing the extra load. The Arc B580, sitting in the 68th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 23021, simply does not have the headroom for this simulation at high resolutions.

At 1080p, the picture shifts. The gap between Low (96.4 FPS) and Medium (74.1 FPS) is large, but the gap between Medium (74.1) and High (57.6) is nearly as large in absolute terms — 16.5 FPS — while High to Ultra (52.5 FPS) costs only about 5 FPS. When each successive preset stops delivering proportional frame gains, the CPU is likely capping the ceiling. The Core i5-12400F, with 6 cores, 12 threads, and a 4.40 GHz boost clock, sits in the 73rd percentile of all CPUs, which is respectable but not exceptional for a simulation this heavy on single-threaded and main-thread work.

The 4K numbers reinforce the GPU-bound diagnosis: High and Ultra average 31.5 and 31.7 FPS respectively — nearly identical. At that point the CPU is no longer the differentiator at all; the Arc B580's 12 GB of GDDR6 and 456.0 GB/s of bandwidth are saturated, and preset changes barely move the needle.

Similar Performance Alternatives

On the CPU side, the nearestRivals data shows four processors with virtually identical aggregate performance to the Core i5-12400F. The AMD Ryzen 5 7535HS averages 19047 against the i5-12400F's 19039 — a 0% difference. The Intel Core 3 201E averages 19056, just 0.1% higher. The Intel Core i5-1335U averages 18982, 0.3% lower, and the AMD EPYC 7773X averages 18979, also 0.3% lower. Any of these chips would deliver broadly similar frame delivery in this title, though the EPYC 7773X's server orientation makes it an impractical swap in practice despite the statistical parity.

On the GPU side, the alternatives cluster just as tightly. The AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP averages 23061, 0.2% above the Arc B580's 23021. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 averages 22895, 0.6% below. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 averages 23172, 0.7% above, and the NVIDIA P106-100 averages 23249, 1% above. Swapping the B580 for any of these cards would produce effectively the same Microsoft Flight Simulator experience: playable at 1080p Medium and 1440p Low, and short of 60 FPS at 4K. Notably, this rival group spans several GPU generations, which underscores how evenly aggregate scores can match despite architectural differences — the B580's Xe2-HPG architecture on TSMC's 5 nm node with DirectX 12 Ultimate support may behave differently in driver-sensitive titles, but the composite data places them as peers.

FAQ

Q: Can the i5-12400F + Arc B580 run Microsoft Flight Simulator at 1080p?

A: Yes. Medium settings average 74.1 FPS at 1920x1080, above the 60 FPS playable threshold. Low reaches 96.4 FPS for those who prefer higher frame rates.

Q: What about 1440p?

A: Playable, but only on Low, which averages 76.9 FPS at 2560x1440. Medium averages 59.4 FPS — just under the threshold.

Q: Is 4K possible with this combo?

A: No preset reaches 60 FPS at 3840x2160. Even Low averages just 56.4 FPS, and High and Ultra both sit near 31 FPS.

Q: Which component is the bottleneck?

A: The GPU at 1440p and 4K — frame rates drop sharply as resolution rises — and the CPU increasingly at 1080p, where High and Ultra presets stop delivering proportional gains (57.6 and 52.5 FPS respectively).

Q: How does this pairing rank among tested combinations in this game?

A: It ranks 2845 out of 3714 tested combos, placing it below the middle of the field for Microsoft Flight Simulator.

Q: What CPU would perform similarly to the i5-12400F here?

A: Per the rival data, the AMD Ryzen 5 7535HS (0% delta), Intel Core 3 201E (-0.1%), Intel Core i5-1335U (0.3%), and AMD EPYC 7773X (0.3%) all match it within a fraction of a percent on aggregate benchmark scores.

Measured FPS Breakdown

All figures below are measured average frame rates; minimum and maximum values were not recorded in this dataset.

1920x1080

• Low: 96.4 FPS avg
• Medium: 74.1 FPS avg
• High: 57.6 FPS avg
• Ultra: 52.5 FPS avg

2560x1440

• Low: 76.9 FPS avg
• Medium: 59.4 FPS avg
• High: 45.2 FPS avg
• Ultra: 41.3 FPS avg

3840x2160

• Low: 56.4 FPS avg
• Medium: 43 FPS avg
• High: 31.5 FPS avg
• Ultra: 31.7 FPS avg

The pattern is consistent: every preset loses a large share of its frame rate moving from 1080p to 1440p and again from 1440p to 4K. Low settings lose about a fifth of the frame rate per step up in resolution, while High and Ultra collapse by roughly a third between 1080p and 1440p, then by a similar proportion again at 4K. The near-identical High and Ultra results at 4K (31.5 vs 31.7 FPS) are the clearest signal that the GPU is fully saturated at that resolution.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the Microsoft Flight Simulator benchmark database, this pairing ranks 2845 out of 3714 tested combinations. That places it below the median — roughly the bottom quarter of the field — for a game released in August 2020 that remains one of the heaviest simulations in the dataset.

That ranking aligns with the individual component percentiles. The Core i5-12400F sits in the 73rd percentile of all CPUs and the Arc B580 in the 68th percentile of all GPUs — both solidly mid-range parts that are individually competent but not flagships. Microsoft Flight Simulator punishes exactly this tier, because its workload stresses both strong single-threaded CPU performance and substantial GPU throughput simultaneously. The verdict: this combo is a legitimate 1080p Medium machine for this title at 74.1 FPS, a borderline 1440p option at 76.9 FPS on Low, and not a 4K candidate at any preset.