Doom

# FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Core i5-11400F perform relative to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The i5-11400F has an average benchmark score of 17177, placing it in the 71st percentile of all CPUs. It sits within a tight cluster of competitors: it is 0.3% ahead of the AMD EPYC 7H12 (17120), 0.4% behind the Intel Core i5-12450H (17239), 0.6% behind the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 8300G (17278), and 0.6% ahead of the Intel Core Ultra 7 164U (17074). This indicates performance is essentially neck-and-neck with these very different processor types.

Q: What is the RX 6600's standing among all GPUs, and which rivals are closest?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 6600 sits in the 63rd percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 19036. Its nearest rivals are extremely close: the NVIDIA Quadro K6000 matches it exactly (19030, 0% delta), the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Mobile is 0.1% faster (19049), the NVIDIA Tesla K20m is 0.3% faster (19089), and the NVIDIA RTX 2000 Ada Generation is 0.4% slower (18954).

Q: What is the best playable setting at 4K resolution for this combo?

A: At 3840x2160, the Medium preset delivers an average of 54 FPS with a minimum of 46 FPS and maximum of 62 FPS. This is the only 4K setting where the minimum frame rate stays above 45 FPS. Low averages 62 FPS, but High drops to 45 FPS and Ultra falls to 37 FPS, making Medium the most consistent choice for 4K gameplay.

Q: How does the CPU's multi-threaded performance compare to its single-threaded performance?

A: The i5-11400F shows strong scaling from 2 to 12 threads. In 3DMark tests, it scores 1691 with 2 threads, 3171 with 4 threads, 4691 with 8 threads, and 5619 with 16 threads (which effectively uses the 12 threads available). The max-thread score of 5652 is nearly identical, suggesting the CPU is fully utilized at 12 threads. Cinebench R23 shows a multicore score of 14340 versus a single-core score of 2024, a ratio of about 7:1.

Q: What memory bandwidth does the CPU provide, and does it align with the GPU's capabilities?

A: The i5-11400F supports dual-channel DDR4 with a memory bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s. The RX 6600 has a 128-bit memory bus with GDDR6 memory providing 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The CPU's bandwidth is significantly lower than the GPU's, which suggests that at high resolutions, the GPU's memory system is not the bottleneck for this pairing.

# Settings Recommendations

The measured data for this Intel Core i5-11400F and AMD Radeon RX 6600 combination across three resolutions and four settings presets reveals clear patterns. At 1920x1080, all settings produce playable frame rates: Low averages 176 FPS, Medium averages 153 FPS, High averages 129 FPS, and Ultra averages 106 FPS. The jump from Low to Ultra costs 70 FPS, but even Ultra maintains a solid 106 FPS average. For competitive play at 1080p, Low offers the highest headroom, but for visual fidelity, Ultra remains viable.

At 2560x1440, the picture changes slightly. Low averages 114 FPS, Medium 99 FPS, High 84 FPS, and Ultra 68 FPS. All settings remain playable, but Ultra dips below the 70 FPS threshold, which may matter for fast-paced FPS action. Medium provides the best balance: 99 FPS average with a minimum of 84 FPS and maximum of 114 FPS, ensuring smooth gameplay without sacrificing too many visual details.

At 3840x2160, the choices become more constrained. Low averages 62 FPS, Medium 54 FPS, High 45 FPS, and Ultra 37 FPS. The Medium preset is the only option with a recorded minimum frame rate (46 FPS) that stays comfortably above 45 FPS. High and Ultra fall below the 60 FPS threshold entirely, and Ultra's 37 FPS average would likely feel stuttery in a game like Doom, which demands quick reflexes.

The data suggests that for the best overall experience, Medium at 1440p is the sweet spot: it delivers near-100 FPS averages with a minimum of 84 FPS, offering both smoothness and visual quality. At 4K, Medium is the highest setting that maintains a consistent 50+ FPS average. For 1080p, Ultra is fully playable at 106 FPS, so players with 1080p displays can push maximum settings without concern.

# Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals how this combo behaves under increasing resolution load. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 176 at 1080p to 114 at 1440p (a 35% reduction) and further to 62 at 4K (a 65% reduction from 1080p). At Medium settings, the drop is from 153 to 99 (35% reduction) and then to 54 (65% reduction from 1080p). At High settings, the drop is from 129 to 84 (35% reduction) and then to 45 (65% reduction from 1080p). At Ultra, the drop is from 106 to 68 (36% reduction) and then to 37 (65% reduction from 1080p).

The consistency of these percentage drops across all settings is striking. Each step from 1080p to 1440p reduces performance by roughly 35%, and each step from 1440p to 4K reduces it by roughly 46%. This linear scaling pattern indicates that the GPU is the primary limiting component throughout the resolution range. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see smaller percentage drops at lower resolutions where the CPU has more headroom relative to the GPU workload.

However, the absolute FPS numbers tell a more nuanced story. At 1080p Low, 176 FPS is extremely high, suggesting the CPU can feed the GPU adequately at that level. At 4K Ultra, 37 FPS is quite low, indicating the GPU is heavily taxed. The fact that the percentage drops are uniform across settings suggests that neither the CPU nor the GPU is dramatically out of balance in this pairing—they scale together as expected for a mid-range system.

The 4K Low result of 62 FPS is notable: it shows that even at the highest resolution, the combo can achieve 60+ FPS if settings are turned down. This suggests that the GPU has enough raw compute power for 4K in lighter scenes, but the Ultra preset's 37 FPS average indicates that the GPU's 8 GB of VRAM and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for the most demanding 4K configurations.

# Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured results are as follows: Low averages 176 FPS, Medium averages 153 FPS with a minimum of 130 and maximum of 176, High averages 129 FPS, and Ultra averages 106 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is exactly 70 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 130 FPS is higher than the Ultra average, showing that even the worst-case frame times at Medium beat the typical frame times at Ultra.

At 2560x1440, Low averages 114 FPS, Medium averages 99 FPS with a minimum of 84 and maximum of 114, High averages 84 FPS, and Ultra averages 68 FPS. The Medium preset's maximum of 114 FPS exactly matches the Low average, indicating that Medium at 1440p can occasionally hit the same performance as Low, but with better visual quality. The Ultra average of 68 FPS is just below the 70 FPS mark, which might be borderline for some players.

At 3840x2160, Low averages 62 FPS, Medium averages 54 FPS with a minimum of 46 and maximum of 62, High averages 45 FPS, and Ultra averages 37 FPS. The Medium preset's maximum of 62 FPS matches the Low average, again suggesting that Medium can occasionally reach the same performance as Low. The High and Ultra averages of 45 and 37 FPS respectively are below the 60 FPS threshold, making them less suitable for a fast-paced shooter.

The data shows a consistent pattern: each settings tier costs roughly 15-20% performance relative to the tier below it. From Low to Medium, the average FPS drops by about 13% at each resolution. From Medium to High, the drop is about 16-17%. From High to Ultra, the drop is about 18-19%. This diminishing returns curve is typical, with Ultra offering the smallest visual improvement for the largest performance cost.

# GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 features 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth. Its base clock is 1626 MHz, with a game clock of 2044 MHz and a boost clock of 2491 MHz. The GPU is built on RDNA 2.0 architecture with 1792 shading units, 112 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, delivering 8.928 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. The thermal design power is 132 W, and the card uses a PCIe 4.0 x8 interface.

In Doom's benchmark results, the GPU's role becomes evident in the resolution scaling. The uniform 35% FPS drop from 1080p to 1440p and the additional 46% drop from 1440p to 4K across all settings indicates that the GPU is the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions. The 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p at all settings, but at 4K Ultra, the 37 FPS average suggests the GPU is struggling with memory bandwidth or capacity limits.

The boost clock of 2491 MHz is notably higher than the game clock of 2044 MHz, which is typical for RDNA 2 GPUs with aggressive boost behavior. This boost headroom helps at lower resolutions where the GPU is less thermally constrained. At 4K, the sustained load likely keeps the clock closer to the game clock, reducing the effective performance margin.

The GPU's benchmark scores reflect its mid-range positioning: it ranks in the 63rd percentile of all GPUs. Its passmark G3D score of 15096 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1492 are solid for its class. The nearest rivals include workstation and mobile parts, showing that this GPU competes with a wide range of offerings. The 0% delta against the Quadro K6000 is particularly interesting, as that is a much older professional card.

# CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Rocket Lake architecture, built on Intel's 14 nm process. It has a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, with a TDP of 65 W. The CPU supports DDR4 memory in dual-channel configuration with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth. It features 80 KB of L1 cache per core, 512 KB of L2 cache per core, and 12 MB of shared L3 cache.

The CPU's synthetic benchmark scores show balanced performance. In Cinebench R23, it scores 14340 multicore and 2024 single-core. In Geekbench, it scores 7737 multicore and 1777 single-core. The Passmark multithread score is 16908, with a single-thread score of 2981. These numbers place it in the 71st percentile of all CPUs, indicating solid mid-range performance for gaming.

In Doom, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU, given the uniform resolution scaling. However, the 1080p Low result of 176 FPS suggests the CPU can push frame rates well above 144 Hz, which is important for high-refresh-rate monitors. At 1080p Ultra, the 106 FPS average is still high, suggesting the CPU is not holding back the GPU at this resolution. If the CPU were a bottleneck, we would expect the 1080p results to plateau regardless of settings.

The CPU's 6 cores and 12 threads are sufficient for Doom's engine, which is known for good multi-threading. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 5619 versus the 2-thread score of 1691 shows that the CPU scales well with thread count, though the 16-thread score is nearly identical to the max-thread score of 5652, indicating that 12 threads are fully utilized. The boost clock of 4.40 GHz provides strong single-threaded performance, which is still important for game logic and physics.

# How This Combo Ranks

This Intel Core i5-11400F + AMD Radeon RX 6600 combination ranks 2883 out of 3712 tested combos in Doom, placing it in the 22nd percentile of all tested systems. This rank reflects the mid-range nature of both components: the CPU is in the 71st percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU is in the 63rd percentile of all GPUs. The combo's rank in-game is lower than either component's individual percentile, suggesting that the pairing is not perfectly optimized for this title.

The data shows that the combo performs adequately at 1080p and 1440p but struggles at 4K with high settings. The rank of 2883 out of 3712 means that roughly 830 combos perform worse, but over 2800 perform better. This places the system in the lower half of tested configurations, which is expected given the RX 6600's mid-range positioning.

Comparing to the nearest rivals, the CPU is nearly identical in synthetic performance to the AMD EPYC 7H12 (0.3% faster) and Intel Core i5-12450H (0.4% slower). The GPU is essentially tied with the NVIDIA Quadro K6000 (0% delta) and RTX 4050 Mobile (0.1% slower). These close margins suggest that swapping either component for a direct rival would not meaningfully change the in-game rank.

The combo's rank in Doom specifically, rather than synthetic benchmarks, reflects how well these two components work together in a real-world gaming scenario. The 1080p Ultra result of 106 FPS shows the combo can handle high refresh rates at full settings, while the 4K Ultra result of 37 FPS indicates it is not suited for 4K gaming at maximum quality. The rank of 2883 suggests that this is a capable 1080p/1440p gaming system, but not a high-end 4K machine. Players seeking higher 4K performance would need a more powerful GPU, while those satisfied with 1080p may find this combo sufficient for most titles.