Doom

The AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT paired with the Intel Core i5-12400 delivers a formidable performance profile in Doom, as evidenced by the measured frame rates across three resolutions and four quality settings. The data shows a system capable of delivering smooth, high-refresh-rate gameplay even at demanding 4K Ultra settings, with a clear shift in bottleneck behavior as resolution scales. This analysis walks through the measured FPS data, the roles of the CPU and GPU, and how this specific combination ranks among the 1,681 tested combos in the database.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear and predictable pattern: as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160, average frame rates drop significantly across all settings. At Low settings, the system delivers 336.1 FPS at 1080p, which falls to 218.8 FPS at 1440p, and further to 116.7 FPS at 4K. This represents a 65.3% reduction in frame rate from 1080p to 4K at Low settings, indicating that the GPU becomes the limiting factor as pixel count rises. The scaling is less severe at Ultra settings, where 204.3 FPS at 1080p drops to 132.5 FPS at 1440p and 73.2 FPS at 4K — a 64.2% reduction. This suggests that even at the highest quality preset, the RX 7900 XT's workload scales predictably with resolution, and the CPU is not the primary constraint in this range.

The frame rate deltas between Low and Ultra settings at each resolution further illuminate the GPU's dominance. At 1080p, the difference between Low (336.1 FPS) and Ultra (204.3 FPS) is 131.8 FPS, a 39.2% drop. At 4K, the same comparison shows Low at 116.7 FPS versus Ultra at 73.2 FPS, a 43.5 FPS or 37.3% reduction. The relatively consistent percentage drop across resolutions implies that the RX 7900 XT is handling the additional graphical load without hitting a hard CPU ceiling, even at 1080p where frame rates exceed 300 FPS. The data indicates that while the i5-12400 is capable of driving high frame rates, the GPU's raw throughput is what ultimately governs performance scaling in this title.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combo in Doom?

A: The highest average FPS is 336.1, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. This drops to 204.3 FPS at the same resolution with Ultra settings, showing the impact of quality presets.

Q: How does the combo perform at 4K Ultra settings?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the system averages 73.2 FPS. This is above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, though it represents a significant drop from the 204.3 FPS seen at 1080p Ultra.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more likely to be the bottleneck at 1080p?

A: The data shows a 131.8 FPS difference between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p, suggesting the GPU is still the primary workload driver. The CPU's 6 cores and 12 threads appear sufficient to keep up with the RX 7900 XT's output at these frame rates.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Medium and High settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Medium settings produce 191.0 FPS while High settings produce 163.0 FPS. This 28 FPS difference indicates a moderate performance cost for the higher quality preset.

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

A: This specific combination ranks 347th out of 1,681 tested combos, placing it in the top 20.6% of all configurations in the database for Doom performance.

Q: What is the average FPS at 4K with Low settings compared to 1080p Ultra?

A: 4K Low settings yield 116.7 FPS, while 1080p Ultra yields 204.3 FPS. This shows that resolution has a more substantial impact on performance than quality settings, with a 87.6 FPS difference between these two configurations.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT is the primary driver of performance in this Doom configuration, as evidenced by the consistent scaling across resolution and settings. The GPU's 20 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 320-bit bus provides 800.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is ample for the texture-heavy environments of Doom at 4K Ultra. The memory clock runs at 2500 MHz (20 Gbps effective), and the GPU's boost clock reaches 2394 MHz, with a game clock of 2025 MHz. These clock speeds, combined with 5,376 shading units and 192 ROPs, deliver a pixel rate of 459.6 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 804.4 GTexel/s, explaining the high frame rates observed even at 4K.

The GPU's 82nd percentile ranking among all GPUs and its average benchmark score of 38,358 place it in strong company. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 Mobile (deltaPct 0.0) and the NVIDIA CMP 70HX (deltaPct 0.3), showing the RX 7900 XT is competitive with top-tier mobile parts. The data indicates that in Doom, the GPU's raw compute power is fully utilized, as frame rates scale predictably with the settings changes. At 1080p Low, the 336.1 FPS figure suggests the GPU is not yet saturated, but at 4K Ultra (73.2 FPS), it is clearly working near its limits, given the 300W TDP and the 57,700 million transistors packed into the 529 mm² die.

How This Combo Ranks

This combination of the Intel Core i5-12400 and AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT achieves a rank of 347 out of 1,681 tested combos in Doom, placing it in the 79.4th percentile of all configurations tested. This ranking reflects the balanced nature of the pairing: the CPU's 77th percentile ranking among all CPUs and the GPU's 82nd percentile ranking among all GPUs suggest a harmonious match. The combo outperforms 1,334 other configurations, which is notable given that higher-ranking combos likely feature more expensive or newer components.

The ranking is particularly strong given the CPU's mid-range positioning. The i5-12400's nearest rivals include the Intel Core i7-9700 (deltaPct 0.1) and the Intel Core i5-11600K (deltaPct 0.4), showing it competes well with older high-end parts. The GPU's nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile (deltaPct 0.6) and the NVIDIA GeForce MX570 (deltaPct -0.4), indicating the RX 7900 XT holds its own against a wide range of competitors. The data suggests that this combo offers a performance level that is well above average for the database, with the GPU being the dominant contributor to the overall ranking.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 provides the processing foundation for this combo, with 6 cores and 12 threads operating at a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. This Alder Lake-S architecture chip has an 18 MB shared L3 cache and supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory, though the specific memory configuration is not detailed in the measured FPS data. The CPU's benchmark results show a single-thread score of 910 in 3DMark and 2,249 in Cinebench R23 single-core, while multi-threaded scores reach 5,890 in 3DMark max threads and 15,935 in Cinebench R23 multicore.

In Doom, the CPU's role appears supportive rather than limiting, based on the frame rate data. The fact that 1080p Low settings achieve 336.1 FPS without appearing to bottleneck suggests the 4.40 GHz boost clock is sufficient to feed the GPU. The CPU's 77th percentile ranking among all CPUs and its average benchmark score of 19,850 place it close to the Intel Core i7-9700 (deltaPct 0.1) and Intel Core i7-8700 (deltaPct -0.2), indicating it delivers competitive processing power. The data shows that even at 1080p with Low settings, the frame rates are high enough to suggest the CPU is not the primary constraint; instead, the GPU's workload scaling with resolution is the dominant factor in performance variation.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce an average of 336.1 FPS, which drops to 296.3 FPS at Medium, 251.8 FPS at High, and 204.3 FPS at Ultra. The spread from Low to Ultra is 131.8 FPS, showing a 39.2% performance cost for maximum quality. These figures indicate that at 1080p, the system is capable of driving high-refresh-rate monitors even at Ultra settings, with the 204.3 FPS figure well above typical 144Hz display capabilities.

Moving to 2560x1440, the frame rates remain robust but show a clear step down. Low settings average 218.8 FPS, Medium 191.0 FPS, High 163.0 FPS, and Ultra 132.5 FPS. The delta between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 86.3 FPS, a 39.4% reduction. The 132.5 FPS at Ultra is still comfortably above 60 FPS, making this resolution viable for high-quality gameplay. At 3840x2160, the performance drops further: Low settings average 116.7 FPS, Medium 100.9 FPS, High 89.1 FPS, and Ultra 73.2 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra delta is 43.5 FPS, a 37.3% reduction. The 73.2 FPS at 4K Ultra is playable, though it represents a 64.2% reduction from the 1080p Ultra figure, highlighting the GPU's increasing workload at higher resolutions.