Barony

# Barony with Intel Core i5-12600KF + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D

This combination of the Intel Core i5-12600KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D delivers exceptional performance in Barony, ranking first out of 2,935 tested combos. The measured frame rates across all resolutions and settings presets are extremely high, with the lowest average being 109 FPS at 4K Ultra settings, indicating that this pairing is capable of handling the roguelike title with substantial headroom at every configuration tested.

FAQ

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

A: All three tested resolutions produce playable frame rates. At 1080p, the average FPS ranges from 331 (Ultra) to 724 (Low). At 1440p, averages range from 209 (Ultra) to 457 (Low). At 4K, averages range from 109 (Ultra) to 239 (Low). The data shows that even at 4K Ultra, the average stays above 100 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 5090 D compare to its nearest GPU rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 5090 D has an average benchmark score of 77,712, placing it 1.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT, and 1.6% behind the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT. It trails the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 12 GB by 2.1% and the Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB by 2.4%.

Q: What is the CPU's single-threaded performance relative to its multi-threaded performance?

A: The Core i5-12600KF scores 3,302 in Cinebench R23 single-core and 23,391 in multi-core. In 3DMark, the single-thread score is 1,016 versus 7,956 for 16 threads and 7,952 for max threads, showing strong scaling from two to many threads.

Q: How much VRAM does the GPU have and what is its memory bandwidth?

A: The RTX 5090 D features 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, providing 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth. The memory clock is 1750 MHz with 28 Gbps effective speed.

Q: What is the rank of this specific combo among all tested combinations for Barony?

A: This combo ranks first out of 2,935 tested combinations, placing it at the top of the database for this game. The data is measured, not estimated.

Q: Does the CPU's architectural design matter for this game's performance?

A: The Core i5-12600KF uses Alder Lake architecture with 10 cores and 16 threads, featuring a base clock of 3.70 GHz and boost clock of 4.90 GHz. The CPU's 20 MB shared L3 cache and dual-channel memory support for both DDR4 and DDR5 likely contribute to its ability to feed the GPU efficiently at high frame rates.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with the GB202 chip, fabricated on a 5 nm process at TSMC. The GPU contains 92,200 million transistors on a 750 mm² die, with a transistor density of 122.9 million per mm². Its base clock is 2017 MHz with a boost clock of 2407 MHz, and the memory operates at 1750 MHz with 28 Gbps effective speed. This configuration produces 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and a pixel rate of 423.6 GPixel/s, with a texture rate of 1,636.8 GTexel/s.

The GPU's 32 GB of GDDR7 memory across a 512-bit bus delivers 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth, which is more than sufficient for Barony at any resolution in this test set. The shading units number 21,760, with 680 TMUs and 176 ROPs, alongside 170 RT cores and 680 tensor cores. These specifications place the RTX 5090 D in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs in the database, with an average benchmark score of 77,712.

In the measured results, the GPU shows clear scaling with resolution. At 1080p Low settings, the average FPS reaches 724, which is 3.02 times the 4K Ultra average of 109 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p is substantial: 724 versus 331 FPS, a 393 FPS difference. At 4K, the same settings comparison shows 239 versus 109 FPS, a 130 FPS difference. This pattern suggests that the GPU is the primary scaling factor as resolution increases, while the CPU becomes more relevant at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 400 FPS.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data provides four settings presets at each of three resolutions: Low, Medium, High, and Ultra. Across all resolutions, the Medium preset offers a balanced experience with measured min/max FPS values available, while Low and Ultra presets do not have min/max data recorded.

At 1920x1080, Low achieves 724 FPS average, Medium 538 FPS with a range of 458 to 619, High 462 FPS, and Ultra 331 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 458 FPS still exceeds the High preset's average of 462 FPS, indicating that Medium provides smoother frame pacing with less variance. At 2560x1440, Medium averages 340 FPS with a range of 289 to 391, while High averages 292 FPS and Ultra 209 FPS. The Medium minimum of 289 FPS is nearly equal to the High average, again favoring Medium for consistency.

At 3840x2160, Medium averages 178 FPS with a range of 151 to 204, High averages 152 FPS, and Ultra 109 FPS. The Medium minimum of 151 FPS essentially matches the High average of 152 FPS, suggesting that Medium delivers the same worst-case performance as High's typical performance. For players seeking the best experience per the measured rows, Medium settings provide the optimal balance between average frame rate and consistency, with the min/max data showing tighter frame delivery compared to the other presets.

How This Combo Ranks

This combo ranks first out of 2,935 tested combinations for Barony, which places it at the absolute top of the database for this game. The measured data confirms that no other tested CPU-GPU pairing outperforms this configuration in this title. This top ranking is consistent with the individual component percentiles: the CPU is in the 79th percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU is in the 92nd percentile of all GPUs.

The CPU's nearest rivals include the Intel Core i9-10900K with an average score of 27,872 (0.3% higher), the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D with 27,896 (0.3% higher), and the AMD Ryzen 7 6800U with 27,887 (0.3% higher). The AMD Ryzen 5 8500GE scores 27,712, which is 0.3% lower. These small deltas indicate that the Core i5-12600KF is competitive with a range of other processors in synthetic benchmarks, yet the combo still achieves the top spot in Barony.

The GPU's nearest rivals show more variance: the AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT scores 76,904 (1.1% lower), while the AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT scores 78,940 (1.6% higher). The NVIDIA Tesla P100 variants score 79,396 and 79,605, which are 2.1% and 2.4% higher respectively. Despite these rivals having higher synthetic scores, the RTX 5090 D's combination with the Core i5-12600KF produces the best measured performance in Barony.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows how performance scales across 1080p, 1440p, and 4K resolutions at each settings preset. At Low settings, the average FPS decreases from 724 at 1080p to 457 at 1440p (a 36.9% reduction) and further to 239 at 4K (a 67.0% reduction from 1080p). At Ultra settings, the averages drop from 331 at 1080p to 209 at 1440p (a 36.9% reduction) and 109 at 4K (a 67.1% reduction from 1080p).

The proportional scaling is nearly identical across all settings presets, with 1440p consistently delivering approximately 63% of the 1080p frame rate, and 4K delivering approximately 33% of the 1080p frame rate. This consistent pattern indicates that the GPU is the limiting component as resolution increases, since the frame rate scales inversely with pixel count in a predictable manner. The 4K resolution has 4 times the pixels of 1080p, but the frame rate only drops to about one-third, suggesting that the GPU has sufficient headroom to maintain higher-than-linear scaling due to reduced CPU bottleneck at lower frame rates.

At 1080p Low settings, the 724 FPS average suggests the CPU may be approaching its limit in feeding frames to the GPU, since the pixel throughput demand is relatively low. Moving to 1440p Low (457 FPS) and 4K Low (239 FPS) shifts the bottleneck more toward the GPU, which still delivers very high frame rates. This interpretation is supported by the CPU's 10-core, 16-thread configuration with a 4.90 GHz boost clock, which provides substantial single-thread performance for game logic that cannot be fully parallelized.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are: Low 724, Medium 538 (min 458, max 619), High 462, and Ultra 331. The Medium preset's min/max range of 458 to 619 FPS represents a 35.2% spread from minimum to maximum, while the average sits at 538 FPS. The High preset's 462 FPS average is 14.1% below Medium, and Ultra's 331 FPS is 38.5% below Medium.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low 457, Medium 340 (min 289, max 391), High 292, and Ultra 209. The Medium range of 289 to 391 FPS shows a 35.3% spread, consistent with the 1080p pattern. High is 14.1% below Medium at 292 FPS, and Ultra is 38.5% below Medium at 209 FPS, matching the proportional differences seen at 1080p.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low 239, Medium 178 (min 151, max 204), High 152, and Ultra 109. The Medium range of 151 to 204 FPS represents a 35.1% spread. High is 14.6% below Medium at 152 FPS, and Ultra is 38.8% below Medium at 109 FPS. The consistency of these percentage differences across all resolutions indicates that the settings presets scale uniformly regardless of resolution, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario where the relative cost of each quality level remains constant.

The data also shows that doubling the resolution from 1080p to 1440p reduces the Low preset from 724 to 457 FPS (a 36.9% drop), and from 1440p to 4K reduces it from 457 to 239 FPS (a 47.7% drop). This non-linear reduction suggests that at lower resolutions, the CPU becomes a more significant factor, while at 4K, the GPU's pixel throughput dominates the performance profile.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12600KF is a 10-core, 16-thread processor from the Core 12th Gen series, based on Alder Lake architecture manufactured on Intel's 10 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 4.90 GHz, with a 125 W TDP. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and 20 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU supports both DDR4 and DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration, and provides PCIe Gen 4 with 20 lanes.

In synthetic benchmarks, the CPU scores 3,302 in Cinebench R23 single-core and 23,391 in multi-core. The 3DMark results show 1,016 for single-thread, 1,995 for 2 threads, 3,806 for 4 threads, 6,128 for 8 threads, and 7,956 for 16 threads. The scaling from 8 to 16 threads is 29.8% (from 6,128 to 7,956), indicating diminishing returns beyond 8 threads for this workload. The Geekbench scores are 2,157 single-core and 12,137 multi-core.

The CPU's percentile ranking of 79th among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 27,799, places it within 0.3% of several rivals including the Core i9-10900K and Ryzen 7 5800X3D. This suggests that the Core i5-12600KF provides competitive performance for games like Barony that may not fully utilize all 16 threads. The high boost clock of 4.90 GHz and strong single-thread score of 3,302 in Cinebench R23 are likely relevant for the game's main thread, especially at 1080p where the measured 724 FPS average at Low settings indicates the CPU must process frames at a rate exceeding 12 per millisecond.

The 20 MB shared L3 cache is substantial for a desktop processor in this class, and the dual-channel memory support for both DDR4 and DDR5 offers flexibility. At 4K resolutions where the GPU is more heavily loaded, the CPU's role diminishes, but at 1080p Low settings, the 724 FPS result demonstrates that the Core i5-12600KF can sustain extremely high frame delivery when paired with the RTX 5090 D. The measured data shows that this CPU-GPU combination achieves the top rank in Barony, indicating that the CPU's performance characteristics align well with the game's requirements across all tested settings and resolutions.