Downfall

# Downfall with Intel Core i5-10400F + AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX

The combination of the Intel Core i5-10400F and the AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX delivers a wide spread of performance across Downfall’s four quality presets and three resolutions, ranging from a demanding 68 FPS at 4K Ultra to a fluid 284 FPS at 1080p Low. The measured data shows this pairing sits in the 669th position out of 3,716 tested combos, placing it in the top 18% of all configurations evaluated for this horror title. The 6-core, 12-thread Comet Lake processor from 2020 pairs with a flagship RDNA 3 GPU from 2022, creating a configuration where the GPU’s raw throughput is the dominant factor at higher resolutions, while the CPU’s single-thread and multi-thread capabilities become increasingly relevant as resolution drops.

FAQ

Q: What is the best average FPS this combo achieves in Downfall?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 284, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The next best is 264 FPS at the same resolution with Medium settings, followed by 254 FPS at 2560x1440 Low.

Q: How does the combo perform at 4K Ultra, the most demanding preset?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the configuration produces an average of 68 FPS. This is the lowest measured average across all resolution and settings combinations, indicating that the Ultra preset at 4K is the most taxing scenario for this hardware.

Q: What is the difference between the Low and Ultra presets at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Low preset yields 254 FPS average, while Ultra drops to 109 FPS average. That represents a 145 FPS spread between the two extremes, with Medium landing at 213 FPS and High at 175 FPS.

Q: Does the RX 7900 XTX’s 24 GB VRAM show any limitation in this game?

A: The measured data does not include any VRAM utilization metrics, but the GPU’s 24 GB GDDR6 memory with a 384-bit bus and 960.0 GB/s bandwidth is present in the configuration. The game’s performance scaling from Low to Ultra is consistent with compute-bound rather than memory-capacity-bound behavior.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: The comboRankInGame field places this pairing at rank 669 out of 3,716 total combos tested for Downfall. This means roughly 82% of all tested configurations perform better, while about 18% perform worse.

Q: What is the only preset at 1080p that provides a min FPS value?

A: At 1920x1080 with Medium settings, the measured data includes a min FPS of 225 and a max FPS of 304, alongside the 264 average. All other 1080p presets only report average FPS values.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-10400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor from the Comet Lake architecture, built on Intel’s 14 nm process. It operates with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.30 GHz, and it carries a 65 W TDP. The processor’s cache hierarchy includes 64 KB L1 per core, 256 KB L2 per core, and a 12 MB shared L3 cache. It supports dual-channel DDR4 memory with a bandwidth of 42.7 GB/s, and it connects via PCIe Gen 3 with 16 lanes from the CPU.

In terms of synthetic benchmarks, the i5-10400F scores 4,748 in 3DMark with 16 threads, 2,560 with 4 threads, and 688 in single-thread testing. Cinebench R23 results show 10,283 multi-core and 1,451 single-core. Geekbench reports 6,257 multi-core and 1,420 single-core. The PassMark multithread score is 12,115, with a single-thread score of 2,541. These figures place the CPU at the 68th percentile among all processors, with an average benchmark score of 14,185.

The nearest rivals in the CPU benchmark database are all within a 0.6% deltaPct. The Intel Xeon 6756E scores 14,163 (0.2% lower), the Intel Core 7 160UL scores 14,232 (0.3% higher), the AMD EPYC 7552 scores 14,115 (0.5% lower), and the AMD Ryzen 3 7320C scores 14,277 (0.6% higher). This clustering indicates the i5-10400F sits in a tightly packed performance band, with no single rival offering a decisive advantage.

For Downfall specifically, the CPU’s role becomes apparent when examining the FPS scaling from 4K down to 1080p. At 4K High, the combo produces 109 FPS, while at 1440p High it jumps to 175 FPS, and at 1080p High it reaches 244 FPS. The 135 FPS gain from 4K to 1080p at High settings suggests the processor can feed the GPU adequately at lower resolutions, but the 6-core/12-thread configuration may be a limiting factor in extreme scenarios. The passmark physics score of 696 and the 3DMark 16-thread score of 4,748 hint at the multi-threaded workload capability, which is relevant for a game that may spawn multiple threads for AI and physics in horror scenarios.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX is built on the RDNA 3.0 architecture with the Navi 31 chip, manufactured on TSMC’s 5 nm process. It contains 57,700 million transistors on a 529 mm² die, with 6,144 shading units, 384 TMUs, and 192 ROPs. The GPU has 96 ray tracing cores and operates with a base clock of 1,929 MHz, a boost clock of 2,498 MHz, and a game clock of 2,365 MHz. Memory is 24 GB of GDDR6 on a 384-bit bus, providing 960.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The card’s pixel rate is 479.6 GPixel/s, texture rate is 959.2 GTexel/s, and FP32 performance is 61.39 TFLOPS.

In GPU benchmarks, the RX 7900 XTX scores 6,841 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, 50,465 in Geekbench OpenCL, and 85,612 in Geekbench Vulkan. PassMark results show 31,238 in G3D and 17,689 in GPU compute. The GPU sits at the 64th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 19,410. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3 GB at 19,334 (0.4% lower), the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 at 19,602 (1% higher), the AMD FirePro D300 at 19,637 (1.2% higher), and the NVIDIA TITAN Xp at 19,177 (1.2% lower).

For Downfall, the GPU’s role is most visible in the difference between Low and Ultra presets at the same resolution. At 4K, Low delivers 162 FPS while Ultra drops to 68 FPS, a 94 FPS reduction. At 1440p, Low hits 254 FPS while Ultra manages 109 FPS, a 145 FPS drop. At 1080p, Low produces 284 FPS while Ultra yields 153 FPS, a 131 FPS difference. The GPU’s 24 GB VRAM and 960 GB/s bandwidth are substantial, but the data does not show any indication of memory capacity limiting performance. The consistent pattern of Ultra being approximately half the FPS of Low across all resolutions suggests the rendering workload scales predictably with the GPU’s compute capabilities.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for this combo covers three resolutions and four settings presets, with average FPS reported for all combinations and min/max FPS only for Medium settings.

At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers 284 FPS average, which is the highest frame rate in the entire dataset. Medium settings at 1080p produce 264 FPS average, with a min of 225 and max of 304. High settings at 1080p yield 244 FPS average, while Ultra at 1080p drops to 153 FPS average. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 131 FPS, with the Ultra preset representing a 46% reduction from Low.

At 2560x1440, Low settings provide 254 FPS average, Medium produces 213 FPS with a min of 181 and max of 245, High delivers 175 FPS, and Ultra falls to 109 FPS. The delta from Low to Ultra at 1440p is 145 FPS, with Ultra representing a 57% reduction from Low. Compared to 1080p, the 1440p Low setting is 30 FPS lower, and 1440p Ultra is 44 FPS lower than its 1080p counterpart.

At 3840x2160, Low settings achieve 162 FPS average, Medium produces 132 FPS with a min of 113 and max of 152, High delivers 109 FPS, and Ultra drops to 68 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra spread at 4K is 94 FPS, with Ultra representing a 58% reduction from Low. The 4K Medium min FPS of 113 indicates the frame time consistency holds reasonably well even at higher resolution, though the Ultra preset’s 68 FPS average is the only sub-100 FPS result in the entire dataset.

Resolution Scaling

Examining the resolution scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals how the workload shifts between CPU and GPU. At Low settings, the FPS drops from 284 at 1080p to 254 at 1440p (a 10.6% reduction) and then to 162 at 4K (a 36.2% reduction from 1440p). The total drop from 1080p to 4K at Low is 122 FPS, or 43%. At Medium settings, 1080p yields 264 FPS, 1440p yields 213 (a 19.3% reduction), and 4K yields 132 (a 38% reduction from 1440p), for a total 50% drop from 1080p to 4K. At High settings, the progression is 244 to 175 (a 28.3% reduction) to 109 (a 37.7% reduction from 1440p), totaling 55% lower at 4K versus 1080p. At Ultra settings, 1080p produces 153 FPS, 1440p produces 109 (a 28.8% reduction), and 4K produces 68 (a 37.6% reduction from 1440p), for a total 55.6% reduction from 1080p to 4K.

The pattern shows that the percentage drop from 1440p to 4K is remarkably consistent across all presets, hovering between 36.2% and 38%. This consistency suggests the GPU is the primary limiter at these resolutions, as the relative cost of each additional pixel is independent of the quality preset. In contrast, the drop from 1080p to 1440p varies more significantly by preset: only 10.6% at Low, but 28.3% at High and 28.8% at Ultra. This variation implies that at 1080p Low, the CPU is the limiting factor, and the GPU has headroom that is partially exhausted as resolution increases. At 1080p High and Ultra, the workload is more balanced, and the resolution increase to 1440p has a proportionally larger impact. The data indicates that the i5-10400F can sustain very high frame rates at 1080p Low (284 FPS), but its influence diminishes as resolution increases and the GPU becomes the bottleneck.

Settings Recommendations

For the best experience per the measured rows, the Medium preset offers the most compelling balance of performance and quality. At 1080p Medium, the combo delivers 264 FPS average with a min of 225 and max of 304, ensuring smooth gameplay even in demanding scenes. At 1440p Medium, the average is 213 FPS with a min of 181 and max of 245, still far above the 60 FPS threshold for comfortable play. At 4K Medium, the average is 132 FPS with a min of 113 and max of 152, providing a solid experience at the highest resolution without dipping below 100 FPS.

The High preset is a reasonable alternative for those prioritizing visual fidelity. At 1080p High, the combo achieves 244 FPS, at 1440p High it reaches 175 FPS, and at 4K High it maintains 109 FPS. All three are playable, but the 4K High result is close to the 100 FPS boundary, and the lack of min/max data for High presets means frame time consistency is unknown. The Ultra preset at 4K drops to 68 FPS, which is the only measured average below 100 FPS in the dataset, making it the only configuration that risks noticeable stutter on high refresh rate displays. The Low preset, while delivering the highest frame rates (284 FPS at 1080p, 254 FPS at 1440p, 162 FPS at 4K), likely sacrifices too much visual quality for the modest gains over Medium. The data shows Medium provides 93% of Low’s performance at 1080p, 84% at 1440p, and 81% at 4K, while presumably offering substantially better visuals.

How This Combo Ranks

The comboRankInGame for this configuration is 669 out of 3,716 tested combos, placing it in the 82nd percentile of performance. This means 669 configurations outperform this pairing, while 3,047 perform worse. The rank reflects the combined capability of the i5-10400F and RX 7900 XTX specifically for Downfall, not their individual synthetic scores. The CPU’s 68th percentile among all processors and the GPU’s 64th percentile among all GPUs suggest that both components are mid-to-upper tier in isolation, but their combination in this game produces a result that is better than either percentile would independently suggest.

The disparity between the GPU’s synthetic benchmark rivals and its in-game performance is notable. The RX 7900 XTX’s nearest GPU rivals include the GTX 1060 3 GB and TITAN Xp, with deltaPct values of only 0.4% and 1.2% respectively. This tight clustering in synthetic scores does not reflect the massive differences in VRAM capacity (24 GB versus 3 GB or 12 GB) and memory bandwidth (960 GB/s versus much lower figures), but the measured FPS data shows the 7900 XTX delivers playable frame rates at 4K Ultra, a scenario where those lower-spec rivals would likely struggle. The CPU’s rivals, including the Xeon 6756E and EPYC 7552, are all within 0.6% in synthetic benchmarks, yet those are server-class chips with vastly different power and thermal characteristics. In the context of Downfall, the combo’s rank of 669 indicates that while this is not a top-tier configuration, it sits comfortably above the median, and the measured FPS data confirms it can handle the game at high settings across all standard resolutions.