Doom

# Doom: Intel Core Ultra 7 265 + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 — Benchmark Analysis

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 produces a remarkably strong performance profile in Doom, with measured frame rates that consistently exceed 200 FPS at 1440p and remain playable even at 4K Ultra settings. This 20-core Arrow Lake processor, paired with the Ada Lovelace-based RTX 4080, delivers results that place the combo in the 215th position out of 3,712 tested combinations — a top-tier showing that reflects both components' capabilities in this fast-paced FPS title. The data reveals a system that prioritizes high refresh rate gaming across all resolution tiers, though the performance scaling between settings indicates where each component's influence becomes dominant.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear and predictable degradation as resolution increases from 1080p to 4K, but the magnitude of that drop reveals important information about the system's bottleneck structure. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo achieves 401 FPS, while the same settings at 1440p produce 260 FPS — a reduction of 141 FPS (approximately 35%). Moving from 1440p Low to 4K Low yields 141 FPS, another drop of 119 FPS (approximately 46%). The scaling pattern suggests that at lower resolutions, the CPU's ability to feed frames becomes increasingly relevant, while the GPU's rendering workload takes over as pixel count rises.

The gap between settings widens at higher resolutions in absolute terms but narrows proportionally. At 1080p, the spread from Low (401 FPS) to Ultra (241 FPS) is 160 FPS, representing a 40% performance penalty for maximum quality. At 4K, the same settings spread from Low (141 FPS) to Ultra (85 FPS) — a 56 FPS difference, or approximately 40% penalty. This consistency in percentage terms suggests that the RTX 4080's 16 GB of GDDR6X memory and 716.8 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient to handle the increased memory pressure at 4K without introducing a disproportionate penalty, keeping the scaling linear across resolution tiers.

The 4K Ultra result of 85 FPS is particularly telling. While this is the lowest measured value across the entire dataset, it remains comfortably above the 60 FPS threshold typically associated with smooth gameplay. The fact that 4K Medium (123 FPS) sits closer to 4K Low (141 FPS) than to 4K High (104 FPS) indicates that the GPU's compute resources — 9,728 shading units and 76 RT cores — handle the incremental quality steps efficiently until the Ultra preset's additional effects begin to exert measurable pressure on the render pipeline.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest measured frame rate for this combo in Doom?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 401, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. The Medium preset at the same resolution reaches 350 FPS, while High and Ultra produce 295 FPS and 241 FPS respectively.

Q: Can this system maintain 4K gameplay in Doom?

A: Yes. The lowest measured 4K average is 85 FPS at Ultra settings, which remains above standard 60 FPS playability thresholds. The 4K High preset reaches 104 FPS, and 4K Medium achieves 123 FPS, indicating consistent 4K capability across all quality levels.

Q: How does the CPU's performance compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 has an average benchmark score of 64,640, placing it 0.3% behind the AMD EPYC 4464P (64,823) and 0.3% ahead of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F (64,438). It also outperforms the AMD EPYC 7343 by 0.7% and trails the AMD EPYC 9124 by 0.7%.

Q: What is the GPU's percentile ranking among all tested graphics cards?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 sits at the 86th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 54,247. Its closest rival, the RTX 4080 SUPER, scores 54,209 — a negligible 0.1% difference.

Q: Which resolution provides the largest gap between Low and Ultra settings?

A: At 1920x1080, the difference between Low (401 FPS) and Ultra (241 FPS) is 160 FPS, the largest absolute gap in the dataset. At 2560x1440 the gap is 104 FPS (260 vs 156), and at 3840x2160 it narrows to 56 FPS (141 vs 85).

Q: Does the combo's ranking reflect a balanced pairing?

A: The 215th rank out of 3,712 combos places this pairing in the top 5.8% of all tested configurations. Given that the CPU ranks at the 93rd percentile of all processors and the GPU at the 86th percentile of all GPUs, the in-game ranking suggests effective synergy between the two components.

GPU Role

The RTX 4080's specifications directly explain the measured performance ceiling in Doom. With a boost clock of 2505 MHz and 48.74 TFLOPS of FP32 compute, the GPU has substantial raw throughput for a title that emphasizes high frame rates. The 16 GB of GDDR6X memory running at 22.4 Gbps effective provides 716.8 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves sufficient even at 4K Ultra where the 85 FPS result indicates the GPU is the primary constraint.

The memory configuration deserves particular attention. The 256-bit bus width paired with 16 GB capacity ensures that Doom's texture and geometry data remain resident without paging bottlenecks at any tested resolution. The scaling from 4K Low (141 FPS) to 4K Medium (123 FPS) to 4K High (104 FPS) shows a consistent 13-15% performance step per quality tier, suggesting the GPU's memory subsystem is not introducing nonlinear penalties as quality settings increase.

The RTX 4080's 76 RT cores and 304 tensor cores are present in this configuration, though Doom's traditional rasterization workload means these specialized units likely contribute less to the measured results than the 9,728 shading units and 304 texture mapping units. The 112 ROPs, delivering a pixel rate of 280.6 GPixel/s, become increasingly relevant at 4K where fill-rate demands escalate. The fact that 1080p Ultra (241 FPS) only drops to 4K Ultra (85 FPS) — a 65% reduction — while 1080p Low (401 FPS) drops to 4K Low (141 FPS) — a 65% reduction — demonstrates consistent GPU scaling without unexpected architectural penalties.

How This Combo Ranks

The rank of 215 out of 3,712 tested combinations places this pairing in the top 5.8% of all configurations evaluated for Doom. This ranking must be interpreted in context: the CPU's 93rd percentile standing among all processors and the GPU's 86th percentile among all GPUs suggest that the combination slightly exceeds what either component might achieve individually. The CPU's nearest rivals — the EPYC 4464P at -0.3% and EPYC 9124 at -0.7% — represent server-class parts that would likely behave differently in gaming workloads, yet the Ultra 7's 5.30 GHz boost clock and 20-core configuration prove well-suited to Doom's frame generation demands.

The GPU's ranking context is equally important. The RTX 4080's nearest rival, the RTX 4080 SUPER, scores only 0.1% higher on average, yet the measured FPS differences in Doom would be imperceptible in practice. The AMD Radeon Pro W5700X and RX 6750 GRE 12 GB score 1.1% and 2.6% higher respectively on aggregate benchmarks, but those synthetic results do not translate to Doom-specific performance advantages given the measured frame rates.

The 3712-combo dataset provides substantial statistical power for this ranking. Being in the 215th position means the Ultra 7 + RTX 4080 pairing outperforms the vast majority of alternatives, including many combinations featuring higher-tier GPUs paired with weaker processors. This suggests the CPU's 2.40 GHz base clock scaling to 5.30 GHz boost provides sufficient single-thread performance to avoid bottlenecking the GPU even at 1080p where frame rates exceed 400 FPS.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265's 20 cores and 20 threads — with no hyper-threading — represent a modern Arrow Lake design that prioritizes efficiency and high clock speeds. The 2.40 GHz base clock ramps to 5.30 GHz boost, and the 30 MB of shared L3 cache provides ample capacity for Doom's working set. The absence of SMT means each physical core handles one thread, which can reduce contention in lightly-threaded workloads while the 20-core count ensures headroom for background tasks.

The CPU's benchmark data reveals a strong single-threaded presence: the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 5,960 and multi-core score of 42,216 indicate balanced performance that translates well to gaming. The PassMark single-thread score of 4,689 places the chip in a competitive position, while the multi-thread score of 49,682 confirms that the 20 cores scale effectively under load. Doom's engine, which typically utilizes 4-8 threads for game logic and rendering submission, benefits from the high per-core performance rather than raw core count.

The 65W TDP is notable for a 20-core desktop processor, indicating that Arrow Lake's 3nm process node from TSMC delivers efficiency that allows sustained boost clocks without thermal throttling. The 102.4 GB/s dual-channel DDR5 memory bandwidth provides sufficient data throughput for Doom's streaming requirements, and the PCIe Gen 5 interface (20 lanes from the CPU) ensures the RTX 4080's PCIe 4.0 x16 connection operates at full bandwidth without bottleneck. The CPU's 93rd percentile ranking among all processors aligns with the measured FPS results, particularly at 1080p where the 401 FPS Low-settings result approaches the practical limits of frame presentation.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo demonstrates exceptional headroom for high refresh rate displays. The Low preset achieves 401 FPS average, while Medium reaches 350 FPS with a minimum of 297 FPS and maximum of 402 FPS. High settings produce 295 FPS, and Ultra delivers 241 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra represents a 40% performance reduction, but even the lowest 1080p result exceeds 240 Hz refresh capabilities.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains robust. Low settings produce 260 FPS, Medium averages 226 FPS (with a range of 192-260 FPS), High reaches 191 FPS, and Ultra maintains 156 FPS. The 1440p Ultra result still exceeds 144 Hz displays, making this resolution the sweet spot for high-refresh gaming with maximum quality settings.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's workload becomes the limiting factor. Low settings deliver 141 FPS, Medium drops to 123 FPS (with a 104-141 FPS range), High achieves 104 FPS, and Ultra falls to 85 FPS. The 4K results remain playable across all settings, but the Ultra preset at 85 FPS leaves less margin for demanding scenes. The Medium preset at 4K, with its 123 FPS average, represents the best balance of visual quality and performance for players targeting 120 Hz displays at this resolution.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data supports different optimal presets depending on the target resolution and refresh rate. At 1080p, the Ultra preset's 241 FPS exceeds all common display refresh rates up to 240 Hz, making it the clear choice for maximum visual quality without sacrificing smoothness. Players with 360 Hz displays could drop to High (295 FPS) or Medium (350 FPS) to approach those higher refresh rates, though the visual tradeoff may not justify the marginal smoothness gain.

For 1440p, the Ultra preset's 156 FPS comfortably saturates 144 Hz displays, making it the recommended configuration for most users. The High preset at 191 FPS serves players with 165 Hz or 180 Hz monitors who prioritize frame rate over the incremental quality improvements in Ultra. The Medium preset's 226 FPS exceeds even 200 Hz displays, but the visual downgrade from High is noticeable in Doom's detailed environments.

At 4K, the High preset at 104 FPS provides the best experience for 100 Hz-class displays, offering substantial quality improvements over Medium (123 FPS) while maintaining a comfortable margin above 60 FPS. The Ultra preset's 85 FPS remains playable and is the choice for players prioritizing image quality on 60-75 Hz displays, but the 19 FPS penalty over High (from 104 to 85) may not justify the visual differences for many users. The Medium preset at 123 FPS is the optimal choice for 120 Hz 4K displays, delivering the full refresh rate benefit while retaining respectable visual fidelity.