Doom

The Intel Core i5-11400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT delivers a robust 1080p experience in Doom, but the performance curve reveals a system that transitions from CPU-bound at lower resolutions to firmly GPU-bound at 4K. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo pushes 194.3 FPS, dropping to 141.9 FPS at High, and further down to 115.3 FPS at Ultra. These figures indicate that at the lowest settings, the frame rate is heavily influenced by the processor's capability to feed the GPU, while the gap between Low and High (a 52.4 FPS difference) shows the graphics card beginning to take on more responsibility as shader complexity increases. Moving to 1440p, the average frame rates remain highly playable: 124.3 FPS at Low, 110.6 FPS at Medium, 92.5 FPS at High, and 75.1 FPS at Ultra. The drop from Low to Ultra at 1440p (49.2 FPS) is slightly less severe than at 1080p, suggesting the GPU is starting to become the primary constraint. At 4K, the picture changes dramatically. The average FPS falls to 68.4 at Low, 57.6 at Medium, 48.4 at High, and just 39.1 at Ultra. This steep decline across settings at 4K confirms that the Radeon RX 6600 XT is the limiting component at this resolution; the CPU has ample headroom, but the GPU's rendering throughput cannot sustain high frame rates with 8 GB of VRAM and a 128-bit memory interface under 4K loads.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data illustrates a classic resolution scaling curve. From 1080p to 1440p at High settings, the average frame rate drops from 141.9 FPS to 92.5 FPS, a reduction of 49.4 FPS or roughly 34.8%. This is a substantial decrease, but the system remains well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay. The scaling from 1440p to 4K at High is even more punishing: the average FPS falls from 92.5 to 48.4, a 44.1 FPS drop that pushes the experience below the 60 FPS mark. This pattern indicates that at 1080p, the Intel Core i5-11400F with its 6 cores and 12 threads is capable of driving the GPU to high output, but as pixel count increases, the GPU's compute resources (2048 shading units, 128 TMUs) become the bottleneck. The delta between Low and Ultra settings also widens with resolution. At 1080p, the spread is 79 FPS (194.3 to 115.3). At 4K, the spread narrows to 29.3 FPS (68.4 to 39.1). This compression of performance across settings at 4K is a strong indicator that the GPU is saturated; lowering settings does not proportionally increase FPS because the fill-rate and memory bandwidth limits are the dominant factors.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT, built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with a 7 nm process, plays the decisive role in this game's higher-resolution performance. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p but becomes a limiting factor at 4K where texture data demands exceed what this bus can efficiently deliver. The GPU's clock speeds are notably high: a base of 1968 MHz, a game clock of 2359 MHz, and a boost clock of 2589 MHz. These aggressive clocks help the card achieve a pixel rate of 165.7 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 331.4 GTexel/s, which explains its strong 1080p performance where these metrics are less stressed. In the benchmark database, this GPU holds a percentile rank of 71 among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 27985. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti, scores 27956, showing a delta of only 0.1%, indicating near-identical average performance. However, the RX 6600 XT trails the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 by 0.9% (28238 vs 27985), placing it in a competitive but not top-tier position. The 4K results—39.1 FPS at Ultra—underscore that while the card is capable for esports and 1440p gaming, it lacks the raw throughput for high-fidelity 4K in Doom.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F, a Rocket Lake part on the Intel Socket 1200 platform, provides the computational backbone for this combo. With 6 cores and 12 threads, a base clock of 2.60 GHz, and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, it is a solid mid-range processor. Its 12 MB of shared L3 cache and dual-channel DDR4 memory support (with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth) ensure that the GPU is not starved of data at lower resolutions. In synthetic benchmarks, the CPU scores 14372 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2029 in single-core, placing it in the 75th percentile of all CPUs. Its average benchmark score is 17181, nearly identical to the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U (17189, 0% delta) and the Intel Core i7-1260P (17212, -0.2% delta). This indicates that the i5-11400F offers competitive multi-threaded performance for its class. In Doom, the CPU's influence is most apparent at 1080p Low, where the 194.3 FPS average suggests the GPU is waiting on the processor to issue draw calls. As resolution increases, the CPU's role diminishes; the 4K results show minimal difference between Low (68.4 FPS) and Medium (57.6 FPS), which would be more pronounced if the CPU were the bottleneck. The data indicates that at 1440p and above, the GPU is the limiting factor, as the CPU has enough headroom to maintain frame pacing without becoming a constraint.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo to maintain 60+ FPS on High settings?

A: At 1440p High, the combo achieves an average of 92.5 FPS, which is well above 60 FPS. At 4K High, the average drops to 48.4 FPS, so 1440p is the recommended upper limit for High settings.

Q: How does the RX 6600 XT compare to its nearest rival in average GPU benchmark scores?

A: The RX 6600 XT has an average benchmark score of 27985, which is 0.1% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti (27956) and 0.9% lower than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 (28238).

Q: Is the i5-11400F a bottleneck for the RX 6600 XT in Doom?

A: At 1080p Low, the CPU is likely the limiting factor, as the frame rate reaches 194.3 FPS. However, at 1440p and 4K, the GPU becomes the bottleneck, as shown by the steep FPS drops with resolution increases.

Q: What is the performance difference between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p?

A: At 1080p, the average FPS goes from 194.3 at Low to 115.3 at Ultra, a difference of 79 FPS, indicating that the GPU is significantly taxed by Ultra settings even at this resolution.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations in Doom?

A: This combo ranks 1168 out of 1681 tested combos, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the database for this game.

Q: Does the GPU's memory bandwidth affect 4K performance?

A: Yes, the 256.0 GB/s bandwidth on a 128-bit bus is a limiting factor at 4K, where the average FPS drops to 39.1 at Ultra, suggesting the memory subsystem cannot keep up with high-resolution textures.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested hardware combos for Doom, this configuration of the Intel Core i5-11400F and AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT ranks 1168 out of 1681 combos. This places it in the 30th percentile or so of all tested systems, indicating that while it delivers a playable experience at 1080p and 1440p, it is not a top-tier performer for this title. The rank reflects the GPU's mid-range standing (71st percentile) and the CPU's solid but not exceptional position (75th percentile). The combination of the 6-core processor and the 8 GB GPU is well-balanced for 1080p gaming, but the 4K results (sub-50 FPS on High) pull the overall ranking down when compared to systems with higher-end GPUs. The measured data shows that at 1080p Ultra, the combo achieves 115.3 FPS, which is competitive, but at 4K Ultra, the 39.1 FPS average is a significant weakness. Relative to other combos in the database, this system is best suited for high-refresh-rate 1080p or solid 1440p gaming, rather than 4K. The rank of 1168 out of 1681 suggests that users seeking 4K performance would need to look at configurations with more powerful GPUs, while those focused on 1080p will find this combo more than capable, as evidenced by the 194.3 FPS at Low settings.