Doom

FAQ

Q: How does the Intel Core i5-12600KF compare to its closest rivals in synthetic CPU benchmarks?

A: The average benchmark score of 27827 places it nearly even with the Intel Core i9-10900K, which scores 27829 with a 0% delta. It is also essentially tied with the Intel Core i5-12600K at 27851 (-0.1%) and the Intel Core Ultra 5 125H at 27872 (-0.2%). The only rival ahead by a margin is the Intel Core i7-13700H at 27716, which is actually 0.4% slower.

Q: What is the GPU's relative standing among all tested graphics cards?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti sits in the 69th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 25120. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 6700M, scores 25180, a negligible -0.2% difference. The AMD Radeon RX 6600 scores 25235 (-0.5%), and the AMD Radeon 890M scores 25246 (-0.5%).

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

A: At 3840x2160, the Medium preset delivers an average of 57.5 FPS, which is playable. High drops to 50.2 FPS, Low reaches 65 FPS, and Ultra falls to 40.3 FPS. The data suggests Medium is the highest quality preset that remains above 55 FPS.

Q: How much performance does the combo lose when moving from 1080p to 4K?

A: At High settings, the average FPS drops from 139.7 at 1920x1080 to 88.9 at 2560x1440, and finally to 50.2 at 3840x2160. This represents a steep scaling curve, with the 4K figure being roughly one-third of the 1080p result.

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU in this title?

A: The benchmark data shows the CPU has a high 16-thread 3DMark score of 7956 and a strong single-thread score of 1016. Given that FPS scales heavily with resolution changes, the GPU appears to be the limiting factor at higher resolutions, while the CPU's headroom is sufficient to avoid bottlenecking at 1080p.

Q: Where does this combo rank among all tested CPU-GPU pairs for Doom?

A: The combo ranks 1220 out of 1681 tested combinations, placing it in the 73rd percentile of all tested combos. This is a mid-to-upper tier ranking, though not exceptional, indicating that other pairings achieve higher frame rates.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is built on the Ampere architecture with 4864 shading units and 152 texture mapping units. Its memory configuration is 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s. The GPU clocks in at a base of 1410 MHz and a boost of 1665 MHz, with memory running at 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective). These specifications place the card in the 69th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 25120.

In Doom, the GPU's role is clearly demonstrated by the frame rate scaling across settings at each resolution. At 1080p, the gap between Low (192.5 FPS) and Ultra (113.5 FPS) is 79 FPS, showing how much the GPU's shading and texture throughput matter. At 1440p, the same gap narrows to 50.2 FPS (126 vs 75.8), and at 4K it shrinks to 24.7 FPS (65 vs 40.3). This pattern suggests that at lower resolutions, the GPU's compute resources are the primary driver of performance differences; at higher resolutions, the memory bandwidth and ROP throughput (80 ROPs) become more critical, compressing the delta between presets.

The card's FP32 throughput of 16.20 TFLOPS and texture rate of 253.1 GTexel/s are substantial for a 200 W part. The pixel rate of 133.2 GPixel/s helps explain why 4K Ultra is challenging, as pixel fill requirements quadruple from 1080p. The 8 GB VRAM is sufficient for Doom's 2016-era engine at these settings, as evidenced by the measured FPS not collapsing at 4K, but it does not provide headroom for future titles. The GPU's nearest rivals — the AMD Radeon RX 6700M and RX 6600 — are within 0.5% in average score, indicating this is a competitive mid-range segment.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear and consistent resolution scaling pattern. At High settings, the average FPS drops from 139.7 at 1080p to 88.9 at 1440p (a 36% reduction) and then to 50.2 at 4K (a 44% reduction from 1440p). This is a non-linear decline, with each resolution step imposing a larger relative penalty. At Low settings, the figures are 192.5, 126, and 65 FPS respectively, showing a similar proportional drop.

The scaling behavior indicates that the GPU is the limiting component at higher resolutions. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect FPS to plateau or decline less steeply as resolution increases, because the CPU workload would saturate first. Instead, the steady decline with resolution — especially the 4K figures falling below 60 FPS at most presets — points to the GPU's memory bandwidth (448.0 GB/s) and pixel throughput (133.2 GPixel/s) being the constraining factors.

At 1080p, the CPU's headroom is evident: the i5-12600KF's 10 cores and 16 threads, with a boost clock of 4.90 GHz, are sufficient to feed the GPU at 192.5 FPS on Low settings. The 3DMark single-thread score of 1016 and 2-thread score of 1995 suggest strong per-core performance that avoids bottlenecking at lower resolutions. However, at 4K, the GPU's fill rate limits the combo to 65 FPS on Low, meaning the GPU is clearly the dominant constraint. The data implies that for 1440p gaming, this combo is well-balanced, but at 4K, the GPU becomes the clear weak link.

Settings Recommendations

For the best experience per the measured rows, the Medium preset emerges as the optimal choice across all resolutions. At 1080p, Medium delivers 170 FPS, which is 22.5 FPS below High (139.7) but still far above the 60 FPS threshold. At 1440p, Medium hits 109.6 FPS, comfortably above the 88.9 FPS of High. At 4K, Medium provides 57.5 FPS, which is the only preset that stays near playable frame rates while maintaining visual quality — High drops to 50.2 and Ultra falls to 40.3.

Low settings are only advisable if maximum frame rate is the sole priority. At 1080p, Low achieves 192.5 FPS, which is useful for high-refresh-rate displays. At 1440p, Low reaches 126 FPS, still strong. However, at 4K, Low's 65 FPS is only 7.5 FPS better than Medium, making the visual quality sacrifice less worthwhile.

Ultra is not recommended at any resolution for competitive play. At 1080p, it still reaches 113.5 FPS, which is playable, but at 1440p it drops to 75.8 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 40.3 FPS — below the playable threshold. The data suggests that Medium provides the best balance of visual fidelity and frame rate, as it consistently stays above 55 FPS even at 4K. For users with 1440p monitors, Medium at 109.6 FPS is ideal, while 1080p users can comfortably use High at 139.7 FPS if they prefer better visuals.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its strongest results. Low settings achieve an average of 192.5 FPS, Medium hits 170 FPS, High reaches 139.7 FPS, and Ultra manages 113.5 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 79 FPS, indicating that the GPU's compute power scales well with settings at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, the averages are 126 FPS (Low), 109.6 FPS (Medium), 88.9 FPS (High), and 75.8 FPS (Ultra). The delta between Low and Ultra narrows to 50.2 FPS, showing that pixel fill demands begin to constrain the GPU. All presets remain above 75 FPS, making 1440p a strong resolution for this combo.

At 3840x2160, the numbers drop significantly: 65 FPS (Low), 57.5 FPS (Medium), 50.2 FPS (High), and 40.3 FPS (Ultra). Only Low and Medium exceed the 55 FPS mark, and Ultra falls below 45 FPS. The scaling from 1080p to 4K at High settings is a 64% reduction in FPS (from 139.7 to 50.2), while at Low settings it is a 66% reduction (from 192.5 to 65). This proportional decline reinforces that the GPU's memory bandwidth and ROP throughput are the limiting factors at 4K.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12600KF features 10 cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 4.90 GHz. Its cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 per core, 1.25 MB of L2 per core, and 20 MB of shared L3. This configuration yields a strong multithreaded performance profile: the Cinebench R23 multicore score is 23444, and the 3DMark 16-thread score is 7956. Single-thread performance is equally robust, with a Geekbench single-core score of 2529 and a 3DMark single-thread score of 1016.

In Doom, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and game logic. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo reaches 192.5 FPS, which is a high frame rate that many CPUs would struggle to sustain. The i5-12600KF's high boost clock and strong single-thread performance (Cinebench R15 single-core score of 333) are sufficient to avoid bottlenecking at these frame rates. The 16 threads also provide headroom for background tasks and future titles that may use more cores.

The CPU's nearest rival, the Intel Core i9-10900K, has an identical average score (27829 vs 27827), suggesting that the i5-12600KF's hybrid architecture (Alder Lake) offers comparable performance to a higher-tier previous-generation part. This is notable because the i5 has a 125 W TDP and uses a 10 nm process, while the i9 is a larger chip. The CPU's 84th percentile ranking among all CPUs indicates that it is a high-performing part, but the combo's rank of 1220 out of 1681 shows that the GPU holds back the overall system in Doom.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of the Intel Core i5-12600KF and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti ranks 1220 out of 1681 tested combinations in Doom, placing it in the bottom 27% of tested combos. This is a surprising result given the individual component strengths: the CPU is in the 84th percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU is in the 69th percentile of all GPUs. The ranking suggests that other combos with better-matched GPUs or higher-end graphics cards achieve significantly higher frame rates in this title.

The CPU's average benchmark score of 27827 is nearly identical to the Intel Core i9-10900K (27829), which is a strong result. However, the GPU's average score of 25120 is only slightly above the AMD Radeon RX 6700M (25180) and RX 6600 (25235), indicating that the RTX 3060 Ti is a mid-tier GPU. In Doom, which is a fast-paced FPS that benefits from high frame rates, the GPU's 8 GB VRAM and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are adequate but not exceptional.

The rank of 1220 out of 1681 implies that a significant number of tested combos outperform this pairing. This could be due to the GPU being the limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the data shows 4K frame rates below 60 FPS at most settings. The combo is well-suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming, where it delivers excellent frame rates, but it falls behind in 4K scenarios. For users considering this combo, the data suggests that the CPU has headroom for a GPU upgrade in the future, while the GPU is the current constraint in demanding titles like Doom at higher resolutions.