Doom

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile delivers a robust 1080p experience in Doom, but the data reveals a clear stratification across settings and resolutions. At 1920x1080, the combination produces an average of 197 FPS on Low, 171 FPS on Medium, 145 FPS on High, and 118 FPS on Ultra. At 2560x1440, the averages drop to 127 FPS on Low, 111 FPS on Medium, 94 FPS on High, and 77 FPS on Ultra. The 3840x2160 results show 69 FPS on Low, 60 FPS on Medium, 51 FPS on High, and 42 FPS on Ultra. These figures position the combo at rank 2470 out of 3712 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the database.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data for Doom suggests that the Medium preset offers the most balanced experience across all three resolutions, particularly when considering both average and minimum frame rates. At 1920x1080, Medium yields 171 FPS average with a minimum of 146 FPS, which provides a smooth margin above typical display refresh rates while maintaining visual fidelity above the Low preset. The High preset at the same resolution delivers 145 FPS average, still highly playable but with a more noticeable 26 FPS drop from Medium. Ultra at 1080p produces 118 FPS, which remains fluid but sacrifices significant performance for marginal visual gains in a game from 2016.

For users prioritizing maximum smoothness at 2560x1440, Medium again stands out with 111 FPS average and a 94 FPS minimum. This combination ensures that even demanding scenes stay above the 90 FPS threshold, whereas High drops to 94 FPS average with no reported minimum, suggesting potential dips below that figure. At 3840x2160, the situation changes: Medium produces 60 FPS average with a minimum of 51 FPS, which is borderline for 4K gaming. Low at 4K achieves 69 FPS average, making it the only 4K preset that comfortably exceeds 60 FPS on average, though the minimum frame rate is not reported for that preset.

The data indicates that Medium is the recommended preset for 1080p and 1440p, as it provides the best compromise between the 197 FPS and 145 FPS extremes at 1080p, and the 127 FPS and 94 FPS extremes at 1440p. For 4K, users must choose between Low for playable frame rates or Medium for better visuals at the cost of occasional dips to 51 FPS. The 51 FPS minimum at 4K Medium suggests that frame pacing could become noticeable in intense combat sequences, making Low the safer choice for competitive play at that resolution.

Ultra settings appear prohibitively expensive at higher resolutions, with 4K Ultra yielding only 42 FPS average, which falls below the standard for smooth gameplay. The performance gap between Medium and Ultra is consistent across resolutions: 53 FPS at 1080p, 34 FPS at 1440p, and 18 FPS at 4K. This diminishing return suggests that the visual enhancements in Ultra are not justified by the frame rate cost, especially when Medium already provides a strong experience.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX features 20 cores and 20 threads, with a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. This Arrow Lake-HX architecture processor operates on a 3 nm process node from TSMC, with a 30 MB shared L3 cache. The CPU's benchmark results show a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 40642 and a single-core score of 5737, placing it in the 93rd percentile against all CPUs. The PassMark multithread score of 47985 and single-thread score of 4500 further illustrate its capability.

In Doom, a game from 2016 built on the id Tech 6 engine, the CPU's role is primarily to feed the GPU with draw calls and handle game logic. The 20-core configuration is overkill for this title, which was designed for systems with far fewer cores. However, the high boost clock of 5.30 GHz ensures strong single-threaded performance, which is more critical for older game engines that rely heavily on a few threads for main loop processing. The Cinebench R20 single-core score of 2409 and R15 single-core score of 578 support this, indicating that the CPU can maintain high frequency under load.

The data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo achieves 197 FPS, which is likely CPU-bound in some scenarios given the low GPU load. The gap between Low and Medium at 1080p is 26 FPS (197 to 171), while the gap between Medium and High is also 26 FPS (171 to 145). This linear progression suggests that the CPU can handle the increased draw calls and physics calculations as settings rise, without becoming a bottleneck until very high frame rates. The 20 threads provide ample headroom for background tasks and streaming, but the game itself likely uses only a fraction of the available cores.

The CPU's nearest rivals include the Intel Core i7-13790F with an average score of 63080 (0.1% delta) and the AMD Ryzen AI 7 450G with 63331 (-0.2% delta). These tiny performance differences indicate that the 265HX is well-matched to its peers in synthetic benchmarks, and the game performance differences would be negligible. The 93rd percentile ranking confirms that this CPU is among the top tier for mobile processors, making it more than sufficient for a 2016 FPS title.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Mobile is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with 3328 shading units, 104 texture mapping units, and 48 ROPs. It features 8 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing 384.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU has a base clock of 952 MHz and a boost clock of 1455 MHz, with memory running at 1500 MHz (24 Gbps effective). Its FP32 performance is rated at 9.684 TFLOPS, with a pixel rate of 69.84 GPixel/s and texture rate of 151.3 GTexel/s.

In Doom, the GPU is the primary determinant of frame rate at higher resolutions and settings. The 8 GB VRAM capacity is ample for this game, which has modest texture requirements even at Ultra settings. The 384.0 GB/s memory bandwidth supports high-resolution textures without bottlenecking, as evidenced by the smooth scaling from 1080p to 1440p. The GPU's PassMark G3D score of 18852 places it in the 67th percentile against all GPUs, with its nearest rival being the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT at 22549 (-0.5% delta) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile at 22729 (-1.3% delta).

The GPU's performance characteristics explain the frame rate patterns observed. At 1080p, the GPU delivers 197 FPS on Low, which is likely near the CPU's maximum output for this engine. As settings increase to Medium and High, the GPU becomes more engaged, with frame rates dropping to 171 and 145 FPS respectively. The Ultra preset at 118 FPS shows the GPU's limits as it processes additional lighting and shadow effects. The 4K results are more telling: Low produces 69 FPS, Medium 60 FPS, High 51 FPS, and Ultra 42 FPS. This 27 FPS spread across presets at 4K demonstrates that the GPU is the limiting factor, as the CPU has sufficient headroom at these lower frame rates.

The 45 W TDP for the GPU suggests it is a power-efficient mobile part, and the lack of external power connectors (labeled as "IGP" slot width) indicates it may be integrated into the motherboard rather than a traditional MXM module. The GPU's 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3013.5 and Geekbench OpenCL score of 96969 provide additional context for its compute capabilities, though these are less relevant for Doom's Vulkan-based rendering.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo rank of 2470 out of 3712 tested combinations places this system in the 33rd percentile of all tested hardware pairings for Doom. This ranking is notably lower than the individual component percentiles (CPU at 93rd, GPU at 67th), which suggests that the combination is not optimally balanced for this specific game. The discrepancy likely stems from the CPU being far more powerful than necessary for a 2016 title, while the GPU, while capable, is not a high-end part in the current mobile landscape.

To contextualize this rank: out of 3712 combos, this system outperforms 1242 combinations and is outperformed by 2470. This places it in the lower-middle tier, which contradicts the strong individual component scores. The reason becomes clear when examining the measured FPS: at 1080p Ultra, the system achieves 118 FPS, which is respectable but not exceptional for a modern GPU. Many older GPUs with lower specifications could achieve similar or better results in Doom, as the game is well-optimized and does not stress modern hardware heavily.

The nearest GPU rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 5700 with an average score of 22170 (1.2% delta) and the AMD Radeon RX 6700S at 22154 (1.3% delta). These desktop and mobile parts from previous generations are within 1.3% of the RTX 5060 Mobile's average benchmark score, yet they may have different performance characteristics in Doom due to architectural differences. The RTX 4060 Mobile, which is the direct predecessor, scores 22729 (-1.3% delta), indicating that the 5060 Mobile is actually slightly slower in synthetic benchmarks, though real-world gaming may differ.

The rank of 2470 suggests that for Doom specifically, this combo is not maximizing the potential of either component. The CPU's 20 cores are largely idle, and the GPU's 8 GB VRAM is underutilized. A more balanced pairing, such as a mid-range CPU with a higher-end GPU, would likely achieve a better rank. However, for users who play a variety of games, this combo offers versatility that the Doom-specific rank does not capture.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals the system's bottleneck characteristics. At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 171 at 1080p to 111 at 1440p (a 35% reduction) and then to 60 at 4K (a 46% reduction from 1440p). This scaling pattern is consistent with GPU-bound behavior, where the number of pixels increases by 2.25x from 1080p to 4K, and the frame rate drops by approximately 65% (from 171 to 60). This is close to the theoretical scaling for a perfectly GPU-bound scenario, indicating that the GPU is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions.

At Low settings, the scaling shows a similar trend: 197 FPS at 1080p drops to 127 FPS at 1440p (35% reduction) and then to 69 FPS at 4K (46% reduction from 1440p). The consistency of these percentage drops across settings suggests that the GPU is saturated even at Low settings when resolution increases. However, at 1080p Low, the 197 FPS figure may be partially CPU-limited, as the CPU's 5.30 GHz boost clock can only sustain so many draw calls per second.

The Ultra preset shows the steepest scaling: 118 FPS at 1080p, 77 FPS at 1440p (35% reduction), and 42 FPS at 4K (45% reduction). This consistent ~35% drop from 1080p to 1440p and ~45% drop from 1440p to 4K across all presets indicates that the limiting component is the GPU's pixel throughput. The RTX 5060 Mobile's 69.84 GPixel/s pixel rate and 151.3 GTexel/s texture rate are the constraints, as higher resolutions require more pixel and texture processing per frame.

The minimum frame rates reported only for Medium settings (51 FPS at 4K, 94 FPS at 1440p, 146 FPS at 1080p) provide additional insight. The ratio of minimum to average FPS is 0.85 at 4K, 0.85 at 1440p, and 0.85 at 1080p, indicating consistent frame pacing across resolutions. This consistency suggests that the GPU is not experiencing sudden spikes in load, which is typical for Doom's well-optimized Vulkan renderer.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system produces the following average frame rates: Low at 197 FPS, Medium at 171 FPS (minimum 146, maximum 197), High at 145 FPS, and Ultra at 118 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 79 FPS, with each settings tier costing approximately 26-27 FPS. The Medium preset's maximum FPS of 197 matches the Low preset's average, indicating that the GPU can occasionally reach the same frame rate even at higher settings, but sustains it less frequently.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low at 127 FPS, Medium at 111 FPS (minimum 94, maximum 128), High at 94 FPS, and Ultra at 77 FPS. The difference between Low and Medium is 16 FPS, between Medium and High is 17 FPS, and between High and Ultra is 17 FPS. This tighter spacing compared to 1080p suggests that the GPU is becoming more strained, and each settings increment has a smaller absolute impact. The Medium preset's maximum of 128 FPS is notably higher than the High preset's average of 94 FPS, showing that frame rates can spike significantly.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low at 69 FPS, Medium at 60 FPS (minimum 51, maximum 69), High at 51 FPS, and Ultra at 42 FPS. The scaling from 1440p to 4K shows a reduction of approximately 45-46% across all presets, which aligns with the pixel count increase. The Medium preset's minimum of 51 FPS is exactly equal to the High preset's average, indicating that the GPU's performance floor at 4K Medium is the same as its average at 4K High. The maximum FPS at 4K Medium (69) matches the Low preset's average, suggesting that Low and Medium are close in GPU load at this resolution.

Across all resolutions, the Medium preset consistently provides a minimum FPS that is approximately 85% of its average. This consistency is a positive indicator for gameplay smoothness, as it suggests that the frame time distribution is stable. The Ultra preset, while providing the highest visual quality, shows the largest absolute drops: from 118 FPS at 1080p to 42 FPS at 4K, a 76 FPS reduction that makes it unsuitable for 4K gaming.

FAQ

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

A: The data shows that 1920x1080 and 2560x1440 maintain average FPS above 60 across all presets, with the lowest being 77 FPS at 1440p Ultra. At 3840x2160, only Low (69 FPS) and Medium (60 FPS) achieve 60+ FPS averages, while High (51 FPS) and Ultra (42 FPS) fall below.

Q: How does the CPU's 20-core configuration affect Doom performance?

A: Doom, released in 2016, was designed for fewer cores, so the 20 cores are largely underutilized. The CPU's 5.30 GHz boost clock is more relevant, as the game relies on single-threaded performance for main loop processing. The PassMark single-thread score of 4500 indicates strong performance that prevents CPU bottlenecks at lower resolutions.

Q: Is the 8 GB VRAM sufficient for Doom at 4K?

A: Yes, the 8 GB GDDR7 memory with 384.0 GB/s bandwidth is more than adequate for Doom's texture requirements. The GPU's memory subsystem is not the bottleneck; rather, the pixel and texture processing rates (69.84 GPixel/s and 151.3 GTexel/s) limit performance at 4K.

Q: Why does the combo rank (2470 of 3712) seem low despite strong component scores?

A: The CPU ranks in the 93rd percentile and the GPU in the 67th percentile, but the combo rank of 2470 reflects that Doom is not demanding enough to utilize the CPU's capabilities. The GPU, while competent, is not top-tier, and many older or desktop GPUs can achieve similar FPS in this well-optimized title.

Q: What is the FPS cost of moving from Medium to Ultra at each resolution?

A: At 1080p, the cost is 53 FPS (171 to 118). At 1440p, the cost is 34 FPS (111 to 77). At 4K, the cost is 18 FPS (60 to 42). The diminishing cost at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU is already saturated, making Ultra less impactful but also less playable.

Q: How does the RTX 5060 Mobile compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 5060 Mobile has an average benchmark score of 22435, which is 1.3% lower than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Mobile (22729) and 1.2% higher than the AMD Radeon RX 5700 (22170). These small deltas suggest similar raw compute performance, though gaming results can vary.