Downfall

# Downfall with Intel Core i5-13400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080

The Intel Core i5-13400F paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 delivers a benchmark profile that is dominated by resolution-dependent scaling, with the CPU proving sufficient to feed the GPU at lower resolutions while the GPU becomes the clear limiting factor as pixel count rises. Measured frame rates in Downfall span from a 59 FPS average at 4K Ultra to a 301.9 FPS average at 1080p Low, a spread of roughly 5.1x that illustrates the hardware's balanced yet resolution-sensitive character. The combo ranks 507th out of 1,741 tested combinations, placing it in the upper 29% of all pairings tested for this horror title.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate progression across resolutions reveals a classic GPU-bound scaling curve, with the most dramatic drops occurring between 1440p and 4K. At High settings, the transition from 1080p to 1440p costs 59.1 FPS (from 202.0 to 142.9 FPS), while the step from 1440p to 4K costs another 51.8 FPS (from 142.9 to 91.1 FPS). This pattern indicates that the RTX 3080's pixel throughput becomes increasingly taxed as resolution climbs, with the 4K High result representing a 54.9% reduction from the 1080p High figure.

The Low settings curve shows even steeper absolute drops, falling from 301.9 FPS at 1080p to 212.5 FPS at 1440p, then to 132.2 FPS at 4K. The 4K Low result is 56.2% lower than the 1080p Low result, suggesting that even at minimal graphical load, the GPU's memory bandwidth and shading resources are heavily engaged at higher resolutions. The RTX 3080's 760.3 GB/s bandwidth and 29.77 TFLOPS FP32 throughput are substantial, yet the data shows that 4K Ultra (59 FPS) demands more than the card can sustain at a high refresh rate.

Medium settings follow a similar trajectory: 245.8 FPS at 1080p, 177.5 FPS at 1440p, and 111.1 FPS at 4K. The scaling factor from 1080p to 4K at Medium is 45.2%, which is consistent with the High and Low settings' behavior. Ultra settings, however, produce the most pronounced drop-off, with 124.4 FPS at 1080p falling to 87.7 FPS at 1440p and then to 59 FPS at 4K — a total reduction of 52.6% from the 1080p baseline.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F brings 10 cores and 16 threads across a Raptor Lake architecture, with base and boost clocks of 2.50 GHz and 4.60 GHz respectively. Its 20 MB shared L3 cache and dual-channel memory support for both DDR4 and DDR5 provide a solid foundation for feeding the RTX 3080. The CPU's benchmark results show strong multithreaded capability — a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 21,279 and a Passmark multithread score of 25,032 — while single-thread performance is also respectable, with a Geekbench single-core score of 2,301 and a 3DMark single-thread score of 960.

In Downfall, a horror title released in 2016, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU at higher resolutions, but the 1080p Low result of 301.9 FPS indicates the i5-13400F can push frame rates well beyond typical display refresh rates when the GPU is not heavily burdened. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 7,314 and 8-thread score of 5,591 suggest that the CPU's thread scaling is efficient, which helps maintain high minimum frame rates in scenes with numerous enemies or dynamic lighting effects common to the horror genre.

The CPU's percentile ranking versus all CPUs is 82nd, with an average benchmark score of 25,236. Its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-13620H, scores 25,201, a delta of just 0.1% — effectively a tie in synthetic workloads. The AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D sits 0.5% higher at 25,365, while the AMD EPYC 9474F and AMD Ryzen AI 5 PRO 340 trail by 0.5% each. These tight margins indicate that the i5-13400F is well-positioned within its performance class, though the measured FPS data suggests the CPU is rarely the bottleneck in this specific game.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, built on the Ampere architecture with a GA102 chip, provides 10 GB of GDDR6X memory across a 320-bit bus, yielding 760.3 GB/s of bandwidth. Its 8,704 shading units, 272 TMUs, and 96 ROPs operate at base and boost clocks of 1440 MHz and 1710 MHz, delivering 29.77 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. The card's 68 RT cores and 272 tensor cores are present but largely irrelevant for Downfall, a 2016 title that predates widespread ray tracing adoption.

The GPU's benchmark scores show a passmark G3D result of 25,086 and a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 4,407, with a Geekbench OpenCL score of 167,014. Its percentile ranking versus all GPUs is 80th, with an average benchmark score of 35,787. The nearest rival, AMD Radeon Pro Duo, scores 35,860 (0.2% higher), while the AMD Radeon 880M trails by 0.4% at 35,646. The AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE leads by 0.9% at 36,101, and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Mobile is 1% behind at 35,435.

In Downfall, the GPU's performance scaling with settings reveals that Ultra presets impose a significant burden. The 4K Ultra result of 59 FPS sits just at the threshold of playability, while 1080p Ultra at 124.4 FPS offers a smoother experience. The gap between High and Ultra at 4K is 32.1 FPS (91.1 versus 59.0), indicating that the Ultra preset's additional effects — likely volumetric lighting, shadows, and post-processing — exact a heavy toll on the RTX 3080's resources. The card's 10 GB VRAM capacity is adequate for this title, though the memory bandwidth becomes a factor at 4K, as evidenced by the 45.2% scaling efficiency from 1080p to 4K at Medium settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the RTX 3080 and i5-13400F combination delivers high frame rates across all settings. Low settings produce an average of 301.9 FPS, Medium 245.8 FPS, High 202.0 FPS, and Ultra 124.4 FPS. The step from Low to Medium costs 56.1 FPS, Medium to High costs another 43.8 FPS, and High to Ultra costs 77.6 FPS. The Ultra preset's 38.4% reduction from High indicates that this setting tier introduces disproportionately heavy rendering loads.

At 2560x1440, the frame rates remain strong but show more pronounced setting sensitivity. Low averages 212.5 FPS, Medium 177.5 FPS, High 142.9 FPS, and Ultra 87.7 FPS. The delta between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 124.8 FPS, representing a 41.3% drop from the Low baseline. The High to Ultra transition costs 55.2 FPS, which is a larger absolute penalty than the Medium to High step of 34.6 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the GPU becomes the dominant constraint. Low averages 132.2 FPS, Medium 111.1 FPS, High 91.1 FPS, and Ultra 59.0 FPS. The scaling from Low to Ultra at 4K is a 55.4% reduction, with the High to Ultra step alone costing 32.1 FPS. The 4K Medium result of 111.1 FPS suggests that players seeking 60+ FPS at 4K should opt for Medium or High settings, as Ultra dips below the 60 FPS threshold.

Across all resolutions, the Low-to-Medium transition yields the smallest frame rate penalties, while the High-to-Ultra transition yields the largest. This pattern is consistent with the RTX 3080's architecture, where incremental shader and texture loads scale predictably with resolution, but Ultra-specific effects create non-linear performance cliffs.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 ranks 507th out of 1,741 tested combos in Downfall, placing it in the 70.9th percentile of all tested pairings. This position reflects a capable mid-to-high tier setup that excels at 1080p and 1440p gaming but struggles to maintain high refresh rates at 4K Ultra.

The rank is influenced by both components' respective standings. The CPU's 82nd percentile versus all CPUs and the GPU's 80th percentile versus all GPUs suggest a well-matched pairing, with neither component dramatically outperforming the other in synthetic benchmarks. The 3DMark max-thread score of 7,307 and the GPU's 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 4,407 indicate that the system can handle both CPU-intensive and GPU-intensive workloads without a clear bottleneck emerging at typical gaming resolutions.

Within the 1,741 combos tested, this pairing's 507th rank implies that roughly 71% of tested configurations deliver higher average frame rates in Downfall, likely including those with more recent GPUs or higher-end CPUs. However, the measured FPS data shows that at 1080p and 1440p, this combo delivers frame rates well above 60 FPS even at Ultra settings, making it a strong performer for this horror title at mainstream resolutions. The 4K Ultra result of 59 FPS, while below a 60 FPS target, is still playable and represents the only configuration where the combo falls short of smooth performance.