Dave The Diver

Dave The Diver is not a typical stress-test title, but the measured frame rates for the AMD Ryzen 7 7700X and Intel Arc B580 combination reveal a clear performance hierarchy across resolutions and settings. The data shows a system that is exceptionally capable at 1080p, comfortably handles 1440p, and remains playable at 4K, with the scaling pattern indicating a shift in bottleneck behavior as resolution increases.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate progression from 1080p to 4K follows a predictable curve, but the percentage drops between steps are telling. At High settings, the system delivers 138.8 FPS at 1920x1080, drops to 105.3 FPS at 2560x1440 (a 24% reduction), and then falls to 68.7 FPS at 3840x2160 (a further 35% reduction from 1440p). This accelerating decline is the classic signature of a GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions. The pixel count increase from 1080p to 1440p is 78%, but the frame rate only drops 24%, suggesting the CPU and GPU have headroom at 1080p. Moving from 1440p to 4K increases pixels by 125%, and the frame rate drops 35%, which is closer to what pure pixel-throughput scaling would predict.

The Low settings data reinforces this interpretation. At 1080p Low, the system hits 184.8 FPS, which is a massive 33% jump over High settings at the same resolution. This indicates that at 1080p High, the GPU is already doing substantial work, but the CPU is not the limiting factor. At 4K Low, the system still manages 92.8 FPS, which is 35% higher than 4K High. The fact that Low settings at 4K (92.8 FPS) are nearly as fast as High settings at 1440p (105.3 FPS) shows that the Arc B580's raw throughput is the primary constraint once resolution climbs.

The Ultra preset tells a similar story. At 1080p Ultra, the system achieves 120.5 FPS, which is 13% lower than High at the same resolution. At 1440p Ultra, it drops to 91.9 FPS, and at 4K Ultra, it falls to 65.1 FPS. The gap between High and Ultra widens as resolution increases, which is expected because the Ultra preset likely increases shader complexity and texture filtering that scale with pixel count. The data clearly shows that for maximum refresh-rate monitors at 1440p, High or Medium settings are the sweet spot, while 4K gaming requires dropping to Low or Medium to stay above 80 FPS.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo in Dave The Diver?

A: Based on the measured data, 2560x1440 at High settings provides an excellent balance, delivering 105.3 FPS. This is well above the 60 FPS threshold and leaves headroom for demanding scenes. At 1080p, the system is overkill for this game, with all presets exceeding 120 FPS.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Dave The Diver?

A: Yes, but with caveats. At 4K High, the average is 68.7 FPS, which is playable on a standard 60 Hz display. For smoother performance, dropping to Medium yields 79.9 FPS, and Low settings reach 92.8 FPS. The Ultra preset at 4K dips to 65.1 FPS, which is still technically playable but leaves little margin.

Q: How much performance is lost going from 1080p to 1440p at High settings?

A: The frame rate drops from 138.8 FPS at 1080p to 105.3 FPS at 1440p, a loss of 33.5 FPS or roughly 24%. This is a modest penalty for a significant resolution upgrade and indicates the GPU is handling the increased load efficiently.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor at 1080p?

A: The data suggests the GPU is the primary constraint even at 1080p. The jump from High to Low settings at 1080p increases performance by 46 FPS (from 138.8 to 184.8), which shows that reducing GPU load has a large impact. The Ryzen 7 7700X has ample headroom, as evidenced by its high multi-threaded benchmark scores.

Q: How does the Ultra preset compare to High at the same resolution?

A: At 1440p, Ultra delivers 91.9 FPS versus 105.3 FPS for High, a 13.4 FPS difference. At 1080p, the gap is 18.3 FPS (120.5 vs 138.8). The Ultra preset costs roughly 13-15% performance compared to High, which may not be worth it for the visual gain in this art style.

Q: What is the frame rate at 4K Low compared to 1080p Ultra?

A: 4K Low achieves 92.8 FPS, while 1080p Ultra achieves 120.5 FPS. This means 4K Low is about 23% slower than 1080p Ultra, but it offers four times the pixel density, making it a reasonable trade-off for users with 4K displays.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of AMD Ryzen 7 7700X and Intel Arc B580 ranks 1275 out of 1626 tested combos in Dave The Diver. This places it in the 22nd percentile, meaning roughly 78% of tested combinations perform better in this game. This ranking might seem low given the measured frame rates, but it reflects the fact that Dave The Diver is a lightweight title where even mid-range hardware achieves high frame rates. The ranking also considers the entire combo, and the Arc B580's 66th percentile standing among all GPUs drags the overall position down.

The CPU itself ranks in the 89th percentile among all processors, which is excellent, but the GPU sits at the 66th percentile. This mismatch explains the combo's modest rank. In a game like Dave The Diver, which does not appear to be heavily threaded based on the modest frame rates at 4K, the GPU's relative weakness becomes more pronounced. The data indicates that the Arc B580 is the limiting factor in this pairing, as the Ryzen 7 7700X has far more compute headroom than the game requires at any resolution.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers outstanding performance across all settings. Low settings produce 184.8 FPS, Medium produces 154.6 FPS, High produces 138.8 FPS, and Ultra produces 120.5 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 64.3 FPS, showing that settings have a significant impact at this resolution. All values are well above 120 FPS, making this resolution ideal for high-refresh-rate monitors.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but with a noticeable step down. Low settings achieve 141.5 FPS, Medium achieves 120.0 FPS, High achieves 105.3 FPS, and Ultra achieves 91.9 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across settings, ranging from 23% (Low) to 26% (Ultra). At this resolution, High and Medium settings provide the best balance for smooth gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the system remains playable but the GPU is clearly working hard. Low settings deliver 92.8 FPS, Medium delivers 79.9 FPS, High delivers 68.7 FPS, and Ultra delivers 65.1 FPS. The differences between settings shrink at 4K, with only a 27.7 FPS spread from Low to Ultra. This compression indicates that the GPU is becoming the bottleneck, and the impact of settings diminishes as pixel count dominates.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B580 is built on the Xe2-HPG architecture (Battlemage generation) using a 5 nm process at TSMC. It features 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing 456.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU operates at a fixed 2670 MHz for both base and boost clocks, with memory running at 2375 MHz (19 Gbps effective). This memory configuration is well-suited for 1440p gaming, offering ample bandwidth for high-resolution textures.

The GPU's benchmark results show a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3068, a Geekbench Vulkan score of 109672, and a Passmark G3D score of 15748. These scores place the B580 at the 66th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 23021. Its nearest rival is the AMD Radeon 760M, which scores 22999 (0.1% difference), followed by the NVIDIA P106-100 at 22950 (0.3% difference). The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 scores 23181, which is 0.7% higher, making these GPUs statistically equivalent in synthetic tests.

In Dave The Diver, the B580's performance is consistent with its benchmark standing. The 4K High result of 68.7 FPS and 1440p Ultra result of 91.9 FPS demonstrate that the GPU has sufficient compute power for this title, but the scaling between settings shows that its 13.67 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. The 12 GB VRAM is more than adequate for this game, as the frame rates do not suggest any memory capacity issues even at 4K Ultra.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700X is a Zen 4 (Raphael) processor built on TSMC's 5 nm process, featuring 8 cores and 16 threads. It has a base clock of 4.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, with a 105 W TDP. The cache hierarchy includes 64 KB L1 per core, 1 MB L2 per core, and 32 MB shared L3. Memory support is dual-channel DDR5 with 83.2 GB/s bandwidth, and the CPU provides 24 PCIe Gen 5 lanes.

Benchmark results for the 7700X are strong across the board. Cinebench R23 multicore scores 30325 and singlecore scores 4281. Geekbench multicore scores 15538 and singlecore scores 2985. Passmark multithread scores 35686 and single thread scores 4190. The average benchmark score is 34313, placing the CPU at the 89th percentile among all processors.

Its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks are the Intel Core i5-13500 (34175, 0.4% lower), Intel Core i7-12800HX (34136, 0.5% lower), Intel Core Ultra 7 165H (34584, 0.8% higher), and AMD EPYC 4244P (34599, 0.8% higher). These results show the 7700X is competitive with current mid-range and high-end processors, with differences under 1% in either direction.

In Dave The Diver, the CPU's role is secondary. The game's frame rates at 1080p Low (184.8 FPS) suggest the CPU can feed the GPU well beyond what the B580 can render. The single-thread performance, as indicated by the 3DMark single-thread score of 1090 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4281, is more than sufficient for this game's logic. The multi-thread performance (3DMark max threads score of 8852) is unlikely to be fully utilized, as Dave The Diver does not appear to be a heavily threaded title. The Ryzen 7 7700X is clearly not the bottleneck in this system for this game.