Downfall

# Downfall with Intel Core i5-12400 + AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT

This pairing of Intel's six-core Alder Lake processor with AMD's RDNA 2 flagship delivers a strikingly consistent experience across Downfall's four quality presets, with the measured FPS data revealing a system that scales predictably from 1080p up to 4K. The combination ranks 1160th out of 3716 tested combos, placing it comfortably in the upper third of all configurations, and the benchmark results indicate that this is a setup where the GPU carries the load at higher resolutions while the CPU keeps pace admirably at lower settings.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for Downfall shows a clear hierarchy across the four available presets, and the optimal choice depends heavily on the target resolution. At 1920x1080, the High preset delivers 195 FPS average, while Medium reaches 238 FPS and Low pushes to 291 FPS — but Ultra drops to 122 FPS. The gap between High and Medium is 43 FPS, which represents a substantial 22% improvement from simply stepping down one quality tier. However, at 2560x1440, the High preset produces 139 FPS, which remains well above the 144 Hz refresh rate that many monitors offer, making High the sensible default for competitive play at this resolution.

For 4K gaming at 3840x2160, the data tells a different story. High averages 87 FPS, Medium drops to 106 FPS (a counterintuitive result worth examining), and Ultra falls to 54 FPS. The Medium preset at 4K offers the best balance, with a measured minimum of 90 FPS and maximum of 121 FPS, suggesting that this setting provides the most consistent frame pacing for the resolution. The 1080p Ultra result of 122 FPS is notably lower than the 1440p High result of 139 FPS, which indicates that the Ultra preset introduces effects that disproportionately tax the GPU regardless of resolution.

The most efficient experience across all resolutions is the High preset, which maintains 195 FPS at 1080p, 139 FPS at 1440p, and 87 FPS at 4K. This consistency suggests that High is the intended sweet spot for this hardware combination, offering a 60% performance uplift over Ultra at 1080p while still delivering playable frame rates at 4K. The Low preset, while reaching 291 FPS at 1080p and 207 FPS at 1440p, sacrifices too much visual fidelity for a system that already clears high-refresh thresholds at more balanced settings.

GPU Role

The Radeon RX 6800 XT serves as the primary performance driver in this configuration, particularly at higher resolutions where the data shows frame rates scaling almost entirely with GPU workload. The card's 16 GB of GDDR6 memory across a 256-bit bus provides 512.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves sufficient even at 4K where the High preset maintains 87 FPS. The GPU's 4608 shading units and 128 ROPs deliver a pixel rate of 288.0 GPixel/s, and the 20.74 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is reflected in the measured results that show the card handling 4K Medium at 106 FPS.

Clock speeds play a meaningful role in the observed scaling patterns. The GPU's base clock of 1825 MHz, game clock of 2015 MHz, and boost clock of 2250 MHz indicate that the card has headroom to dynamically adjust its frequency based on workload demands. The benchmark results show that at 1080p Low, the system reaches 291 FPS, which suggests the GPU is operating at or near its boost ceiling to maintain such high frame rates. Moving to 4K Ultra, the frame rate collapses to 54 FPS, a 61% drop from 4K High, which implies that the Ultra preset's additional effects (likely including ray tracing, given the card's 72 RT cores) overwhelm the GPU's compute resources.

The GPU's benchmark percentile of 85 places it well above average among all graphics cards, and its nearest rival comparisons show it trailing the RTX 5070 Ti by 3% and the RX Vega 64 by 3%, while leading the RTX A1000 Mobile by 1.5%. These margins are narrow enough that the RX 6800 XT's real-world game performance is competitive with its direct peers, and the Downfall data confirms this — the card delivers playable frame rates at every resolution except 4K Ultra, where 54 FPS still meets the minimum threshold for many players.

CPU Role

The Core i5-12400 provides a solid foundation with 6 cores and 12 threads, running at a base clock of 2.50 GHz and boosting to 4.40 GHz. The processor's 18 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB L2 per core help maintain consistent frame delivery, particularly at lower resolutions where CPU overhead becomes more significant. The benchmark data reveals that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 291 FPS, which is a demanding scenario for the CPU to feed the GPU with draw calls and game state updates. The i5-12400's single-thread performance, evidenced by its 3DMark single-thread score of 910 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2257, indicates sufficient per-core throughput for Downfall's horror-game workloads.

The processor's multithreading capabilities come into play during scene loading and physics calculations, with Cinebench R23 multicore scoring 15989 and Geekbench multicore reaching 8564. These scores suggest that the six-core configuration handles the game's background tasks without becoming a bottleneck, even when the GPU is producing over 200 FPS at 1080p. The CPU's 3DMark max-threads score of 5890 and 16-thread score of 5873 are nearly identical, which is expected given the 6-core/12-thread design — the small delta indicates that the additional virtual threads provide minimal benefit beyond the physical cores.

The i5-12400's 72nd percentile ranking among all CPUs places it in the upper quartile, and its nearest rival comparisons show it nearly matching the AMD EPYC 7643 (0.1% behind) and Intel Core i7-1355U (0.3% behind), while edging out the Core i3-14100F by 0.9%. These margins are negligible, and the Downfall results confirm that the CPU is not the limiting factor in this system — the FPS differences between presets and resolutions track more closely with GPU workload than with CPU capability.

How This Combo Ranks

The combined rank of 1160 out of 3716 tested configurations places this pairing in the 68.8th percentile of all combos in the database for Downfall. This is a strong showing, though not exceptional — the GPU's 85th percentile ranking and CPU's 72nd percentile ranking suggest that the combination slightly underperforms what the individual component percentiles would imply. The data indicates that the RX 6800 XT is capable of more than the i5-12400 can fully feed at very high frame rates, but the system still delivers excellent absolute performance.

Comparing this combo to the component-level rivals provides context. The GPU trails the RTX 5070 Ti by 3% in average benchmark score, yet the measured Downfall results show the combo achieving 139 FPS at 1440p High — a figure that would be competitive with many higher-ranked configurations. The CPU's near-tie with the EPYC 7643 (0.1% difference) is notable because that EPYC is a server-class chip with far more cores, suggesting that Downfall's workload is not highly threaded beyond what six cores can provide.

The rank of 1160 also reflects the fact that many combos above this one likely pair higher-end GPUs with similar or better CPUs. The RX 6800 XT's 16 GB VRAM and 512.0 GB/s bandwidth position it well for modern titles, but Downfall's 2016 release date means it does not fully utilize these resources. The measured FPS data shows that even at 4K Ultra, the system produces 54 FPS, which is playable but far from the 87 FPS seen at 4K High — indicating that the Ultra preset's demands are what push this combo down the rankings rather than any fundamental hardware limitation.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution to play Downfall with this hardware?

A: The data shows that 2560x1440 at High settings delivers 139 FPS average, which is the best balance of visual quality and performance. At 4K, the High preset drops to 87 FPS, while 1080p High reaches 195 FPS — but 1440p High offers the highest frame rate that still benefits from the GPU's 16 GB VRAM and 4608 shading units.

Q: Why does the 4K Medium preset have a higher average FPS than 4K High?

A: The measured data shows 4K Medium at 106 FPS versus 4K High at 87 FPS, a 19 FPS difference. This counterintuitive result likely stems from the Medium preset's reduced shading complexity, allowing the GPU's boost clock of 2250 MHz to maintain higher sustained frequencies, whereas High settings may trigger thermal or power limits that reduce clock speeds.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the bottleneck in this system?

A: At 1080p Low, the system reaches 291 FPS, and the CPU's Cinebench R23 multicore score of 15989 suggests it can keep up with the GPU's output. At 4K Ultra, the frame rate drops to 54 FPS, indicating the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. The CPU's single-thread score of 2257 in Cinebench R23 shows adequate per-core performance for the game's demands.

Q: How does this combo compare to the RTX 5070 Ti pairing?

A: The RX 6800 XT trails the RTX 5070 Ti by 3% in average GPU benchmark score, with the RTX 5070 Ti scoring 49957 versus the RX 6800 XT's 48477. However, this combo ranks 1160th out of 3716, and the measured Downfall FPS figures at 1080p High (195 FPS) and 1440p High (139 FPS) indicate that the real-world difference in this game is minimal.

Q: What settings should I use for consistent 144+ FPS gameplay?

A: At 1080p, Medium settings deliver 238 FPS with a minimum of 202 FPS, while High produces 195 FPS. At 1440p, only Low (207 FPS) and Medium (170 FPS, minimum 144 FPS) exceed the 144 FPS threshold. The 4K resolution cannot maintain 144 FPS at any setting, with the best result being Low at 129 FPS.

Q: Does the Ultra preset ever outperform High in terms of frame consistency?

A: No — the data shows Ultra produces 122 FPS at 1080p, 87 FPS at 1440p, and 54 FPS at 4K, all lower than the corresponding High preset results of 195, 139, and 87 FPS. The Ultra preset's additional visual effects consistently reduce average FPS by 37-38% across resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured results show a clear progression across settings. Low averages 291 FPS, Medium 238 FPS (with a minimum of 202 and maximum of 273), High 195 FPS, and Ultra 122 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 169 FPS, representing a 58% reduction in frame rate when moving from the lowest to highest quality preset. The Medium preset's frame time consistency, evidenced by the 202-273 FPS range, indicates that this setting allows the GPU to maintain stable clock behavior.

At 2560x1440, the pattern repeats with lower absolute numbers. Low produces 207 FPS, Medium 170 FPS (144-195 FPS range), High 139 FPS, and Ultra 87 FPS. The drop from 1080p to 1440p at each settings level is consistent: Low loses 84 FPS, Medium loses 68 FPS, High loses 56 FPS, and Ultra loses 35 FPS. This decreasing absolute loss at higher settings suggests that the GPU becomes more the limiting factor as quality increases, with the CPU's role diminishing.

At 3840x2160, the results show Low at 129 FPS, Medium at 106 FPS (90-121 FPS range), High at 87 FPS, and Ultra at 54 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 90 FPS is particularly notable — it maintains a floor above 60 FPS even in demanding scenes, while High's average of 87 FPS would likely dip lower in heavy moments. The 4K results demonstrate that this combo can handle 4K gaming at reasonable settings, with Low exceeding 120 FPS and Medium maintaining a 90 FPS floor.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS degradation from 1080p to 4K reveals important characteristics about this hardware pairing. At Low settings, the drop from 1080p (291 FPS) to 1440p (207 FPS) is 84 FPS (29%), and from 1440p to 4K (129 FPS) is 78 FPS (38%). At High settings, the corresponding drops are 56 FPS (29%) and 52 FPS (37%). This consistent ~29% reduction from 1080p to 1440p and ~37-38% from 1440p to 4K indicates that the scaling is primarily GPU-bound, as the pixel count increases by 78% from 1080p to 1440p and by 125% from 1440p to 4K.

The fact that FPS does not drop proportionally to pixel count suggests that the system is not purely GPU-limited at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the 291 FPS result is likely constrained by CPU draw-call throughput rather than GPU rendering capability — the i5-12400's 6 cores and 12 threads can only generate so many frames per second. This is supported by the CPU's 3DMark max-threads score of 5890, which is modest compared to higher-core-count processors.

At 4K, the limiting factor shifts entirely to the GPU. The RX 6800 XT's 512.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 20.74 TFLOPS compute become the bottleneck, as evidenced by the 54 FPS result at Ultra. The data implies that upgrading the CPU would yield minimal gains at 4K, while upgrading the GPU would provide substantial improvements at both 1440p and 4K. However, at 1080p, a faster CPU with higher single-thread performance (the i5-12400 scores 910 in 3DMark single-thread) could push frame rates closer to the GPU's theoretical maximum, as indicated by the 291 FPS Low result being well below the GPU's capabilities.