Counter-Strike 2

Counter-Strike 2 is a competitive FPS where frame rate consistency and responsiveness matter more than absolute visual fidelity. The measured data for the Intel Core i5-13400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6600 shows a combination that is clearly capable of delivering high refresh rates at standard resolutions, but which begins to show its limits as the workload shifts to the GPU at higher pixel counts. This pairing sits at rank 1309 out of 1632 tested combos, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the database, yet the actual gameplay performance tells a more nuanced story than that ranking alone suggests.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and reveals a classic shift in system bottleneck. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo produces an average of 296.5 FPS. Moving to 2560x1440 Low drops that to 195.4 FPS, a loss of about 34%. At 3840x2160 Low, the average falls to 110 FPS, which is a 63% reduction from the 1080p figure. This pattern indicates that at 1080p, the CPU is doing much of the heavy lifting, and the GPU is not fully saturated. As resolution climbs, the RX 6600’s rendering workload increases, and the frame rate drops accordingly.

The scaling behavior is consistent across settings. With High settings, the system goes from 183.6 FPS at 1080p to 119.8 FPS at 1440p, then down to 65.6 FPS at 4K. The gap between Low and High at 1080p is notable: 296.5 FPS versus 183.6 FPS, a difference of 112.9 FPS. This suggests that even at 1080p, the GPU is not completely idle and settings do matter. However, the fact that Low at 4K (110 FPS) is still faster than High at 1440p (119.8 FPS) shows that resolution has a larger impact on this GPU than quality presets do. The limiting component at 4K is unambiguously the GPU, as the frame rates across all settings at that resolution are the lowest in the dataset.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 is built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture using a 7 nm process from TSMC. It carries 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 224.0 GB/s. The memory clock is listed at 1750 MHz, which translates to 14 Gbps effective. These specifications are modest by modern standards, and the benchmark data reflects that positioning. The GPU’s average benchmark score is 25235, placing it in the 69th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon 890M with a deltaPct of 0, the AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP at -0.2%, and the AMD Radeon RX 6700M at 0.2%. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti sits 0.5% above it in average score. This is a tightly packed group, meaning the RX 6600 is performance-equivalent to several other options in synthetic tests.

In Counter-Strike 2, the GPU’s role is most visible at 4K. At Ultra settings, the combo averages just 56.1 FPS at 3840x2160, which is below the 60 FPS threshold many players would consider playable. The card’s boost clock is 2491 MHz, with a game clock of 2044 MHz, and a base clock of 1626 MHz. These clocks are respectable for the architecture, but the 8 GB frame buffer and 128-bit bus are the likely constraints at high resolution. The thermal design power is 132 W, which is low, and the suggested PSU is 300 W. For a competitive shooter like CS2, this GPU is more than adequate for 1080p and 1440p, but players targeting 4K will need to accept lower settings to maintain playable frame rates.

FAQ

Q: What frame rate can this combo achieve at 1080p with Low settings?

A: The measured average FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings is 296.5 FPS. This is the highest frame rate recorded for this pairing in the dataset, indicating that the system is CPU-bound at this resolution and settings level.

Q: Is this combo capable of 1440p gaming?

A: Yes, but with caveats. At 2560x1440 with High settings, the average FPS is 119.8. With Low settings, it rises to 195.4 FPS. Ultra settings drop the average to 91.7 FPS. All of these are playable, but the margin above 144 Hz refresh rates is only comfortable at Low or Medium settings.

Q: How does the RX 6600 compare to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The RX 6600’s average benchmark score is 25235. The AMD Radeon 890M scores 25246, which is a deltaPct of 0. The AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP scores 25287, a deltaPct of -0.2. The AMD Radeon RX 6700M scores 25180, a deltaPct of 0.2. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti scores 25120, a deltaPct of 0.5. These are all within a fraction of a percent, making them effectively equivalent in synthetic performance.

Q: What is the best settings preset for 4K on this system?

A: At 3840x2160, only Low settings produce a frame rate above 100 FPS, with an average of 110 FPS. Medium settings drop to 91.4 FPS, High to 65.6 FPS, and Ultra to 56.1 FPS. For a competitive game, Low is the only sensible choice at 4K, and even then, the frame rate is not consistently above high refresh rate monitors.

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

A: The comboRankInGame is 1309 out of 1632 total combinations. This places it in the lower 20% of tested systems, but this ranking is across all hardware pairings, including those with much more powerful GPUs and CPUs.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance at 1080p?

A: The data suggests the CPU is the limiting factor at 1080p Low, given the 296.5 FPS average. The GPU still has headroom, as evidenced by the significant drop in FPS when moving to 1440p at the same settings (195.4 FPS). At 1080p High, the GPU becomes more involved, but the system is still likely CPU-bound at very high frame rates.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a clear picture of the system’s capabilities across three resolutions and four quality presets. At 1920x1080, the averages are as follows: Low produces 296.5 FPS, Medium produces 244.3 FPS, High produces 183.6 FPS, and Ultra produces 142.8 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 153.7 FPS, which is substantial and indicates that quality settings have a major impact on performance at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low at 195.4 FPS, Medium at 164.7 FPS, High at 119.8 FPS, and Ultra at 91.7 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 103.7 FPS. This resolution is still highly playable, but the gap between Low and Ultra narrows in percentage terms compared to 1080p.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low at 110 FPS, Medium at 91.4 FPS, High at 65.6 FPS, and Ultra at 56.1 FPS. The drop from Low to Ultra is 53.9 FPS. Notably, the difference between High and Ultra at 4K is only 9.5 FPS, suggesting that Ultra settings are not worth the performance cost at this resolution. The data shows a consistent pattern: the higher the resolution, the more the settings matter in absolute FPS terms, but the less headroom there is for quality improvements.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo’s rank of 1309 out of 1632 tested combinations places it in the 80th percentile from the bottom, meaning about 20% of tested systems perform worse. This is a low ranking overall, but it is important to contextualize this against the game’s requirements. Counter-Strike 2 is not a graphically demanding title by modern standards, and the ranking likely reflects the inclusion of many high-end systems in the database. The Intel Core i5-13400F has an average benchmark score of 25236, placing it in the 82nd percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the Intel Core i7-13620H with a deltaPct of 0.1, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D at -0.5%, the AMD EPYC 9474F at 0.5%, and the AMD Ryzen AI 5 PRO 340 at 0.5%. The CPU is a strong performer in isolation.

The GPU, as noted, is in the 69th percentile. The combination of a strong CPU and a mid-range GPU means that the ranking is likely dragged down by the GPU’s performance at higher resolutions. In games that are CPU-bound, this combo would rank much higher. In CS2, the ranking reflects the system’s overall capability across all tested scenarios. The data shows that this is a balanced pairing for 1080p and 1440p, but it is not a top-tier system for 4K gaming. The rank of 1309 suggests that there are many other combos that offer higher frame rates, but for the price point of the components, this system holds its own in the most common esports usage cases.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F is a 10-core, 16-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, manufactured on a 10 nm process. It has a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.60 GHz. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and a shared 20 MB L3 cache. The CPU supports both DDR4 and DDR5 memory, with a dual-channel memory bus. It has a TDP of 65 W and uses the Intel Socket 1700. The processor’s single-thread benchmark scores are strong: 3DMark single-thread score is 960, and Cinebench R23 single-core is 3004. Multi-threaded scores are also solid, with Cinebench R23 multi-core at 21279 and Geekbench multi-core at 10971.

In Counter-Strike 2, the CPU’s role is most apparent at 1080p Low, where the frame rate hits 296.5 FPS. This is a very high frame rate that many CPUs would struggle to maintain. The 13400F’s boost clock of 4.60 GHz and its 20 MB of L3 cache are well-suited to the game’s physics and entity updates. The fact that the frame rate drops to 195.4 FPS at 1440p Low indicates that the CPU is still keeping up, but the GPU is now the limiting factor. The CPU’s percentile ranking of 82% shows that it is a better-than-average processor, and its nearest rivals all score within 0.5% of its average benchmark score, making it a competitive choice. For CS2, the 13400F provides enough single-thread performance to avoid being a bottleneck at typical esports settings, provided the resolution and quality settings do not overwhelm the GPU.