Doom

The Intel Core i5-11400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT delivers a strong 1080p and 1440p experience in Doom, but the data reveals a clear shift in the bottleneck as resolution climbs. At 1080p, the combo produces exceptionally high frame rates, with the gap between settings narrowing at 4K, indicating the GPU takes over as the primary limiter at higher resolutions.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a predictable but steep drop as resolution increases, though the rate of decline varies significantly by settings preset. At Low settings, the average frame rate falls from 262.5 FPS at 1920x1080 to 173.1 FPS at 2560x1440, a reduction of 89.4 FPS. Moving to 3840x2160 Low, the average drops further to 93.4 FPS, meaning the 4K result is roughly 64% lower than the 1080p figure. This steep decline indicates that at Low settings, the GPU is heavily loaded at higher resolutions, while the CPU has ample headroom.

For High settings, the scaling is similar in percentage terms. The average goes from 194.3 FPS at 1080p to 125.5 FPS at 1440p, and then to 68.8 FPS at 4K. The 4K High result is about 65% below the 1080p High score. The Ultra preset shows the most dramatic absolute drop, from 155.4 FPS at 1080p to 104.4 FPS at 1440p, and finally to 57.2 FPS at 4K. The difference between 1080p and 4K Ultra is 98.2 FPS, illustrating that the most demanding settings place the heaviest burden on the GPU.

The scaling pattern suggests that at 1080p, the CPU is likely the limiting factor in some presets, as the frame rates exceed 200 FPS in Low and Medium settings. Once resolution increases to 1440p and 4K, the GPU becomes the dominant constraint. The data shows that the RX 7700 XT maintains playable frame rates at 4K across all settings, but the margin above 60 FPS shrinks considerably at Ultra, where the average is 57.2 FPS.

Settings Recommendations

Given the measured rows, the Medium preset offers the best balance between visual quality and performance for most users. At 1920x1080, Medium produces 229.5 FPS, which is only 33 FPS lower than Low but substantially higher than High’s 194.3 FPS. The jump from Medium to High costs 35.2 FPS at 1080p, which is a noticeable trade-off for what is typically a modest visual gain in a fast-paced FPS.

At 2560x1440, Medium delivers 146.4 FPS, comfortably above the 144 Hz refresh rate that many monitors in this class support. High at 1440p drops to 125.5 FPS, still playable but requiring a higher-refresh display to fully utilize. For 4K, Medium provides 79.2 FPS, which is above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while High at 68.8 FPS is also acceptable but leaves less headroom for demanding scenes.

Ultra settings are only recommended for users with 1080p displays, where the 155.4 FPS average remains high. At 1440p, Ultra drops to 104.4 FPS, and at 4K it falls below 60 FPS at 57.2 FPS. The data indicates that Ultra at 4K is not a viable option for consistent smoothness, while Medium or High are the practical choices for 4K displays. For competitive play at 1080p, Low or Medium are the best picks, as the difference between Low and Medium is only 33 FPS but Medium likely offers better visual clarity.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i5-11400F and AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT ranks 729 out of 1681 tested combos in Doom. This places it in the upper-middle portion of the database, meaning it outperforms roughly 57% of all tested configurations. The rank reflects a pairing that is well-matched for this game, though not at the top tier.

The CPU’s benchmark position helps contextualize this rank. The i5-11400F has an average benchmark score of 17181, placing it at the 75th percentile among all CPUs. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U, scores 17189, a delta of 0%, meaning they are effectively tied in overall compute performance. The Intel Core i7-1260P and Intel Core Ultra 7 164U both score 17212 and 17215 respectively, showing the i5-11400F is within 0.2% of those parts. This level of CPU performance is sufficient to feed the GPU at most resolutions, as evidenced by the high frame rates at 1080p.

The GPU’s benchmark data shows the RX 7700 XT has an average score of 30097, at the 73rd percentile among all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060, scores 30109, a delta of 0%, indicating near-identical rasterization performance. The AMD Radeon RX 570 scores 30158, which is 0.2% higher, while the NVIDIA Tesla M60 and RTX 5070 Mobile are within 0.4% and 0.6% respectively. This suggests the combo’s rank is primarily driven by the GPU’s strong performance in Doom, as the CPU is not a limiting factor in most scenarios.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low averages 262.5 FPS, Medium 229.5 FPS, High 194.3 FPS, and Ultra 155.4 FPS. The spread of 107.1 FPS between Low and Ultra shows that the GPU has significant headroom at this resolution, with even the most demanding preset exceeding 150 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 173.1 FPS for Low, 146.4 FPS for Medium, 125.5 FPS for High, and 104.4 FPS for Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across settings, with Low losing 89.4 FPS, Medium losing 83.1 FPS, High losing 68.8 FPS, and Ultra losing 51 FPS. This indicates that the GPU is becoming more stressed as pixel count increases.

At 3840x2160, the averages fall to 93.4 FPS for Low, 79.2 FPS for Medium, 68.8 FPS for High, and 57.2 FPS for Ultra. The 4K results show that the RX 7700 XT can handle Doom at this resolution, but only Low and Medium settings maintain averages above 75 FPS. High is still above 60 FPS, while Ultra falls just below the 60 FPS mark.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT is the primary driver of frame rates in Doom, particularly at 1440p and 4K. The GPU features 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing 432.0 GB/s of bandwidth. For a game like Doom, which uses moderate texture sizes, 12 GB is sufficient for 4K Ultra without causing memory-related stutters, as evidenced by the playable 57.2 FPS average at that preset.

The GPU’s clock speeds range from a base of 1435 MHz to a boost of 2544 MHz, with a game clock of 2171 MHz. The boost clock is particularly relevant for Doom, as the game’s engine scales well with GPU frequency. The 35.17 TFLOPS FP32 performance is ample for this title, which is not overly demanding compared to modern releases. The 96 ROPs and 216 TMUs contribute to the strong pixel and texture fill rates, with 244.2 GPixel/s and 549.5 GTexel/s respectively.

The GPU’s 73rd percentile ranking and average benchmark score of 30097 suggest it is a solid mid-range performer. Its nearest rivals are all within 0.6% in average score, indicating that the RX 7700 XT is competitive with the RTX 5060 and other similar parts. In Doom specifically, the GPU’s performance is strong enough to push 4K Medium above 75 FPS, showing that it is not a bottleneck at 1080p or 1440p.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F provides six cores and twelve threads, with a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. For Doom, which launched in 2016 and is optimized for high frame rates, this CPU configuration is more than adequate. The 12 MB of shared L3 cache helps reduce memory latency, and the dual-channel DDR4 memory support with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth is sufficient to feed the GPU without creating a bottleneck.

The CPU’s benchmark results show it is a capable mid-range part. Its Cinebench R23 multicore score of 14372 and single-core score of 2029 indicate strong per-thread performance, which is important for Doom’s engine that relies on a few primary threads. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 5619 and max-thread score of 5652 show good scaling across all cores, while the single-thread score of 868 confirms the boost clock is effective in lightly threaded workloads.

The 75th percentile ranking among all CPUs means the i5-11400F outperforms three-quarters of tested processors. Its nearest rival, the Ryzen 7 5700U, has a nearly identical average score of 17189, showing they are equivalent in overall compute. The 65W TDP indicates efficient power draw, which is beneficial for system thermals in a gaming build.

At 1080p, the CPU’s performance is likely the limiting factor in Low and Medium settings, where frame rates exceed 220 FPS. The boost clock of 4.40 GHz allows the CPU to keep up with the GPU’s output at these high rates. However, at 1440p and 4K, the GPU becomes the bottleneck, and the CPU has ample headroom, as shown by the consistent frame rate drops that correspond directly to resolution increases.