Archeage

# Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates across resolutions reveal a classic scaling pattern for this MMORPG, with the Intel Core i5-12400 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 combination showing clear behavior as pixel count rises. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo delivers 198.8 FPS, dropping to 177.2 FPS at Medium, 121.6 FPS at High, and 80.2 FPS at Ultra. Moving to 2560x1440, the same settings ladder produces 132.8 FPS (Low), 120.1 FPS (Medium), 82.5 FPS (High), and 57.0 FPS (Ultra). The 4K results at 3840x2160 show 78.4 FPS (Low), 65.5 FPS (Medium), 43.4 FPS (High), and 33.2 FPS (Ultra).

The transition from 1080p to 1440p at Low settings reduces performance from 198.8 FPS to 132.8 FPS, a drop of roughly one-third. The same resolution step at High settings lowers the average from 121.6 FPS to 82.5 FPS, again a reduction of approximately one-third. This proportional scaling indicates that the Radeon RX 9070 remains the dominant factor even at lower resolutions — the frame rate falls in near-linear fashion with the pixel count increase from 1080p to 1440p.

The jump from 1440p to 4K tells a slightly different story. At Low settings, the average drops from 132.8 FPS to 78.4 FPS, which is a 41% reduction. At High settings, 82.5 FPS falls to 43.4 FPS, a 47% reduction. These steeper declines suggest that the GPU's memory bandwidth and rasterization throughput are being taxed more heavily as the resolution approaches 4K. The RX 9070's 644.6 GB/s memory bandwidth and 322.6 GPixel/s pixel rate are adequate for 1440p but become limiting factors at 4K, particularly at higher quality presets.

At 1080p, the spread between Low and Ultra is striking: 198.8 FPS versus 80.2 FPS, representing a 118.6 FPS gap. This wide margin indicates that the CPU has headroom to feed the GPU at lower settings, but the Ultra preset's additional shading and lighting effects saturate the GPU's compute resources. The 4K Ultra result of 33.2 FPS confirms that this combination is not designed for maximum quality at maximum resolution — the data shows a 4K experience that is playable only at reduced settings.

# GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 brings substantial resources to Archeage: 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, 3584 shading units, 224 texture mapping units, and 128 raster operation units. The memory operates at 2518 MHz with 20.1 Gbps effective speed, yielding 644.6 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's boost clock reaches 2520 MHz, with a game clock of 2070 MHz and base clock of 1330 MHz. This configuration produces 36.13 TFLOPS of FP32 compute and a texture rate of 564.5 GTexel/s.

The 16 GB VRAM capacity is more than sufficient for Archeage at any of the tested settings, as the game's 2014 release date means its texture budgets are modest by modern standards. The measured data supports this — even at 4K Ultra, the frame rate of 33.2 FPS is limited by compute rather than memory capacity. The RX 9070's RDNA 4.0 architecture provides 56 ray tracing cores, though Archeage's rendering pipeline does not appear to leverage them heavily based on the frame time behavior across presets.

Comparing the RX 9070's benchmark profile, its Passmark G3D score of 25381 places it in the 79th percentile among all GPUs. Its nearest rivals in the database include the NVIDIA A2 with an average score of 34866 (a delta of -0.2%), the NVIDIA Quadro GV100 at 34677 (delta +0.3%), the AMD Radeon HD 7970 at 34541 (delta +0.7%), and the AMD Radeon PRO W6400 at 34511 (delta +0.8%). These deltas are all within 1%, indicating that the RX 9070's average benchmark score of 34780 sits in a tightly clustered performance band. The GPU's DirectX 12 score of 74 and DirectX 11 score of 281 from Passmark reflect its ability to handle the API workloads that Archeage relies upon.

The scaling from Low to Ultra at each resolution shows the GPU's performance envelope. At 1080p, the Ultra preset demands 118.6 FPS less than Low, while at 1440p the gap narrows to 75.8 FPS, and at 4K it compresses to 45.2 FPS. This pattern indicates that at lower resolutions the GPU has spare throughput that the higher settings consume, whereas at 4K the GPU is already near saturation even at Low settings.

# Settings Recommendations

Examining the measured rows, the most balanced experience appears at 2560x1440 with Medium settings, where the combo achieves 120.1 FPS. This preset provides a substantial frame rate cushion above the 60 FPS threshold while maintaining visual quality that is acceptable for an MMORPG of Archeage's age. The 1440p Medium result is 54.7 FPS higher than the 1440p High setting (120.1 versus 82.5) and only 12.7 FPS lower than 1440p Low (132.8), making it the clear sweet spot in terms of quality-to-performance ratio.

For players prioritizing maximum smoothness, 1920x1080 with Low settings delivers 198.8 FPS, which is suitable for competitive play or large-scale PvP encounters where frame pacing matters. The 1080p Medium preset at 177.2 FPS offers a modest visual upgrade while still maintaining high refresh rate performance. The 1080p High setting at 121.6 FPS remains viable for 120 Hz displays, though it represents a significant drop from the Medium result.

At 4K, the data recommends Low settings (78.4 FPS) as the only playable option for smooth gameplay. The Medium preset at 65.5 FPS is borderline, while High at 43.4 FPS and Ultra at 33.2 FPS fall below acceptable thresholds for action-oriented gameplay. The 1440p Ultra result of 57.0 FPS is notable — it is the only Ultra preset across all resolutions that approaches 60 FPS, but the High preset at the same resolution (82.5 FPS) offers a more comfortable margin.

The Ultra presets across all resolutions show diminishing returns: 1080p Ultra (80.2 FPS), 1440p Ultra (57.0 FPS), and 4K Ultra (33.2 FPS). Given that High at 1080p (121.6 FPS) and 1440p High (82.5 FPS) both outperform Ultra at the next resolution down, the data suggests that High settings provide the best visual fidelity per frame rate cost. The gap between Medium and High is relatively small at each resolution — 55.6 FPS at 1080p (177.2 versus 121.6), 37.6 FPS at 1440p (120.1 versus 82.5), and 22.1 FPS at 4K (65.5 versus 43.4) — indicating that High's additional effects are expensive.

# FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo in Archeage?

A: Based on the measured data, 2560x1440 with Medium settings provides the best balance at 120.1 FPS, offering smooth gameplay with moderate visual quality. The 1080p Low preset at 198.8 FPS is the best for maximum performance.

Q: Can this system run Archeage at 4K?

A: Yes, but only at lower settings. The measured results show 78.4 FPS at 4K Low and 65.5 FPS at 4K Medium. The 4K High (43.4 FPS) and 4K Ultra (33.2 FPS) presets are below playable thresholds.

Q: How does the RX 9070 compare to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The RX 9070's average benchmark score of 34780 puts it within 0.8% of its nearest rivals. The NVIDIA A2 scores 34866 (0.2% higher), the Quadro GV100 scores 34677 (0.3% lower), the Radeon HD 7970 scores 34541 (0.7% lower), and the Radeon PRO W6400 scores 34511 (0.8% lower).

Q: Is the Core i5-12400 a bottleneck at 1080p?

A: The data shows 198.8 FPS at 1080p Low, which suggests the CPU can feed the GPU effectively at lower settings. The 118.6 FPS gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p indicates the GPU becomes the limiting factor as settings increase.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra settings?

A: At 1080p, High delivers 121.6 FPS versus Ultra's 80.2 FPS, a difference of 41.4 FPS. At 1440p, the gap is 25.5 FPS (82.5 versus 57.0), and at 4K it is 10.2 FPS (43.4 versus 33.2).

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested combinations?

A: This Intel Core i5-12400 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 combination ranks 554 out of 1727 tested combos in Archeage, placing it in the upper third of all configurations.

# How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i5-12400 with AMD Radeon RX 9070 achieves a rank of 554 out of 1727 tested combinations in Archeage, placing it in the 68th percentile of all tested systems. This ranking reflects the combination's solid performance across the measured resolutions, particularly at 1440p where the data shows strong results. The top-third placement is consistent with the individual component percentiles — the CPU sits in the 77th percentile among all processors, while the GPU sits in the 79th percentile among all graphics cards.

The ranking implies that roughly two-thirds of tested combos deliver higher average performance in this game, which is expected given that Archeage is a 2014 MMORPG with modest system requirements. Higher-ranked combinations likely feature newer or more powerful CPUs and GPUs that excel in the game's specific workload. However, the absolute frame rates from the measured data tell a more nuanced story: the combo delivers 121.6 FPS at 1080p High and 82.5 FPS at 1440p High, both of which are comfortably playable.

The gap between this combo's rank and its raw performance suggests that many of the 1727 tested configurations are more specialized for gaming workloads. The Core i5-12400's 6 cores and 12 threads, combined with the RX 9070's 3584 shading units, produce a balanced pairing that handles Archeage well but does not dominate the rankings. The combo's rank of 554 means it outperforms 1173 other tested combinations, placing it in the upper 32% of the field.

# CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 provides 6 cores and 12 threads, operating at a base clock of 2.50 GHz and boosting to 4.40 GHz. This Alder Lake-S architecture processor has 80 KB of L1 cache per core, 1.25 MB of L2 cache per core, and 18 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU's benchmark scores show strong single-thread performance with a Passmark single-thread score of 3456, which is critical for Archeage's gameplay loops that often rely on a primary thread for game logic.

The multi-threaded capabilities are equally solid: Cinebench R23 multicore scores 15935, while the 3DMark max-threads test reaches 5890. The Passmark multithread score of 18747 and physical score of 1105 indicate that the CPU can handle the various background tasks an MMORPG typically runs, including networking, asset streaming, and UI updates. The CPU's 65 W TDP and dual-channel DDR4/DDR5 memory support provide adequate bandwidth for the RX 9070, as evidenced by the high frame rates at 1080p.

The Core i5-12400's percentile ranking of 77 places it above the average processor, and its nearest rivals show tight competition: the Intel Core i7-9700 scores 19831 (0.1% higher), the Core i7-8700 scores 19894 (0.2% lower), the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5995WX scores 19928 (0.4% lower), and the Core i5-11600K scores 19771 (0.4% higher). These sub-1% deltas indicate that the i5-12400 performs within a narrow band of its contemporaries, with an average benchmark score of 19850.

In the context of Archeage's measured frame rates, the CPU's role becomes apparent when examining the scaling pattern. The 198.8 FPS at 1080p Low suggests the CPU is not the limiting factor at lower settings, as the GPU has enough headroom to render frames quickly. However, the steeper performance drops at higher resolutions and settings — from 198.8 FPS at 1080p Low to 33.2 FPS at 4K Ultra — show that the GPU takes over as the bottleneck. The CPU's 18 MB L3 cache helps maintain consistent frame delivery in crowded areas, a common MMORPG scenario, by keeping frequently accessed game data close to the cores. The 4.40 GHz boost clock provides the single-thread responsiveness needed for Archeage's combat and interaction systems, which typically do not scale well across many cores.