Downfall

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX paired with the AMD Radeon 8060S delivers a compelling, high-refresh-rate experience in Downfall, with the data showing that the combination ranks in the 57th percentile of all tested system configurations for this title (rank 1667 out of 2928 combos). The most significant finding from the measured frames is that this system is heavily GPU-limited at the highest settings, while the CPU’s strong multi-threaded headroom ensures that lower settings yield exceptionally high frame rates, particularly at 1080p and 1440p. Benchmark results indicate that the sweet spot for this hardware is the Medium preset, which offers a substantial balance between visual fidelity and performance, delivering a minimum of 65 FPS even at 4K resolution.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX is a 20-core, 20-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, built on a 3 nm process by TSMC. It operates with a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, which provides the single-thread speed necessary for game logic and physics in Downfall. The CPU’s performance potential is reflected in its Cinebench R23 scores: a multi-core score of 40642 and a single-core score of 5737. These numbers place the processor in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs, indicating that it has substantial headroom for handling the game’s background tasks and AI calculations without bottlenecking the GPU.

In Downfall, a horror title where frame pacing and minimal stutter are critical for immersion, the CPU’s consistent single-thread performance is vital. The Passmark single-thread score of 4500 and the Cinebench R15 single-core score of 578 suggest that the 265HX can maintain high minimum frame rates. However, the measured FPS data reveals that the CPU is rarely the limiting factor. For instance, at 1920x1080 with Low settings, the system achieves 210 FPS, which is a massive workload for any processor to feed. The fact that the system reaches this number indicates the 265HX is more than capable of keeping up with the Radeon 8060S even in the most CPU-intensive scenarios for this game.

When comparing to its nearest rivals, the Intel Core i7-13790F has an average benchmark score of 63080, which is only 0.1% higher than the 265HX’s average of 63173. Similarly, the AMD Ryzen AI 7 450G scores 63331, which is 0.2% higher. This places the 265HX in a dead heat with these competitors, suggesting that swapping between these CPUs would yield negligible differences in Downfall’s frame rates, provided the GPU remains the same. The data shows that the CPU’s 20 cores and 30 MB of shared L3 cache are more than sufficient for this title, as the game does not appear to scale beyond a handful of threads.

The Passmark multi-thread score of 47985 further reinforces the idea that the CPU has ample resources. Even at 4K Ultra settings, where the GPU is clearly overburdened (dropping to 39 FPS), the CPU is not the cause; it is simply waiting for the GPU to finish rendering each frame. The base and boost clocks, combined with the 55 W TDP, show that this is a high-performance mobile part that can sustain its boost clocks under gaming loads. The lack of any measured FPS data below 39 suggests that the CPU never causes a catastrophic frame drop, even in the most demanding preset.

Settings Recommendations — which preset gives the best experience per the measured rows

The measured data provides clear guidance on which preset to use for the best experience. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset delivers 88 FPS, which is playable but not optimal for a horror game where smooth motion is key. The High preset at 1080p jumps to 141 FPS, a significant improvement. However, the Medium preset at 172 FPS offers the most noticeable benefit, with a minimum FPS of 146 and a maximum of 198. This suggests that the Medium preset is the "sweet spot" for 1080p, as it provides a frame rate that is 84 FPS higher than Ultra while maintaining a minimum above 144 Hz, which is ideal for high-refresh-rate displays.

Moving to 2560x1440, the pattern holds. Ultra drops to 63 FPS, which is still technically playable but may feel sluggish for a horror title that relies on tension. High delivers 101 FPS, which is smooth, but Medium again wins out with 123 FPS and a minimum of 104 FPS. The Medium preset at 1440p offers a 60 FPS advantage over Ultra, ensuring that the game never dips below 100 FPS. This is the recommended preset for 1440p gaming, as it provides a fluid experience without the visual compromise of Low settings, which hit 150 FPS but likely sacrifice too much detail for a horror game’s atmosphere.

At 3840x2160, the situation changes. Ultra is nearly unplayable at 39 FPS, and High is only playable at 63 FPS. Medium, however, achieves 76 FPS with a minimum of 65 FPS, which is the only preset that guarantees a stable 60+ FPS experience at 4K. While 76 FPS is not as high as the 1440p Medium result, it is the best balance for 4K. The Low preset at 93 FPS is playable but likely ruins the visual fidelity that makes Downfall immersive. Therefore, the data strongly suggests that the Medium preset is the universal recommendation across all three resolutions, as it consistently provides the highest frame rates while maintaining a respectable visual quality floor.

The decision is reinforced by the minimum FPS data. At every resolution, the Medium preset has a recorded minimum FPS that is at least 65 (at 4K), while the Ultra preset has no minimum data recorded, implying it may drop below the average of 39 FPS. The High preset also lacks minimum FPS data, making it risky. The Medium preset’s measured minimums (146 at 1080p, 104 at 1440p, 65 at 4K) prove its stability, which is crucial for a horror game where stutters can ruin the experience.

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The FPS scaling across resolutions reveals a classic GPU-bound scenario. At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 172 at 1080p to 123 at 1440p (a 28.5% decrease) and then to 76 at 4K (a 38.2% decrease from 1440p). This steep decline as resolution increases is a textbook indication that the AMD Radeon 8060S is the primary bottleneck. The CPU’s performance does not change with resolution, so the 96 FPS difference between 1080p and 4K at Medium settings is entirely attributable to the GPU’s rasterization and pixel throughput limits.

For High settings, the scaling is even more pronounced: 141 FPS at 1080p, 101 FPS at 1440p (a 28.4% drop), and 63 FPS at 4K (a 37.6% drop from 1440p). This consistent pattern of roughly 28% and 38% drops across settings confirms that the GPU is the limiting component. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see a smaller absolute FPS difference at higher resolutions, as the GPU would have more time to render each frame while the CPU remains busy. Instead, the FPS drops proportionally with the pixel count, which is the signature of a GPU that is maxed out.

The Ultra preset shows the most dramatic scaling, dropping from 88 FPS at 1080p to 63 FPS at 1440p (a 28.4% drop) and then to 39 FPS at 4K (a 38.1% drop from 1440p). The fact that the percentage drops are nearly identical across all presets (around 28% and 38%) suggests that the GPU’s memory bandwidth or shading units are the limiting factor, regardless of the visual complexity. The 4K Ultra result of 39 FPS is particularly telling; it shows that the Radeon 8060S simply does not have enough raw power to handle the highest fidelity at 4K.

The data also shows that the gap between Low and Ultra settings at the same resolution is significant. At 1080p, Low hits 210 FPS while Ultra hits 88 FPS, a difference of 122 FPS. At 4K, the gap narrows to 54 FPS (93 vs 39). This narrowing suggests that at 4K, the GPU is so saturated that even reducing settings does not yield the same proportional benefit as at 1080p. This is further evidence that the GPU is the primary limiter, as the CPU’s frame generation capacity is far above what the GPU can output at high resolutions.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset to use for a stable 60 FPS experience at 4K?

A: The Medium preset is the only setting that guarantees a minimum of 65 FPS at 3840x2160. The High preset averages 63 FPS but has no recorded minimum, making it risky, while Ultra drops to 39 FPS.

Q: Is the Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX a bottleneck for the AMD Radeon 8060S in this game?

A: No. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the system reaches 210 FPS, which is far above the GPU’s capability at higher settings. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 40642 and 93rd percentile ranking indicate it has ample headroom, making the GPU the limiting component.

Q: How does the 265HX compare to the Intel Core i7-13790F in average benchmark scores?

A: The Intel Core i7-13790F has an average benchmark score of 63080, which is only 0.1% higher than the 265HX’s average of 63173. This makes the two processors essentially identical in overall performance.

Q: What is the difference in FPS between the High and Medium presets at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the High preset averages 101 FPS, while the Medium preset averages 123 FPS. Medium also provides a recorded minimum of 104 FPS, whereas High has no minimum FPS data, making Medium the more stable choice.

Q: Does the Radeon 8060S perform better than the RTX 4080 in this game?

A: Based on the average benchmark score, the Radeon 8060S scores 55757, which is 2.8% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080’s score of 54247. This suggests the 8060S may have a slight performance edge in general, though game-specific results can vary.

Q: Why does the FPS drop so much from 1080p to 4K at Low settings?

A: At Low settings, the FPS drops from 210 at 1080p to 150 at 1440p and then to 93 at 4K. This 117 FPS difference is due to the GPU’s pixel throughput limits, as the CPU is capable of generating frames much faster than the GPU can render them at higher resolutions.

GPU Role — VRAM, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Radeon 8060S is an integrated GPU based on the RDNA 3.5 architecture, built on a 4 nm process by TSMC. It features a boost clock of 2900 MHz and a base clock of 1295 MHz, with 2560 shading units and 40 ray tracing cores. The GPU’s memory is System Shared, meaning it utilizes the system’s DDR5 RAM rather than dedicated VRAM. This shared memory configuration can be a bottleneck in theory, but the measured FPS data shows that it does not severely hamper performance at lower settings. The GPU’s FP32 performance is 14.85 TFLOPS, and its texture rate is 464.0 GTexel/s.

The GPU’s benchmark scores are impressive for an integrated part. It scores 2162 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 and 84626 in Geekbench OpenCL, placing it in the 87th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 6750 GRE 12 GB, has an average score of 55698, which is only 0.1% lower than the 8060S’s average of 55757. This indicates that the 8060S performs on par with a dedicated desktop GPU from the previous generation. The fact that it also beats the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 by 2.8% in average score (55757 vs 54247) is notable, suggesting that the 8060S is a high-end mobile solution.

In Downfall, the GPU’s role is clearly the dominant factor in determining frame rates. The measured FPS at 4K Ultra (39 FPS) is the lowest in the dataset, indicating that the GPU’s pixel rate of 185.6 GPixel/s is insufficient for the highest fidelity at 4K. However, at 1080p Low, the GPU can output 210 FPS, which shows that it is not a weak component; it simply has a finite capacity that is exhausted by higher resolutions and settings. The boost clock of 2900 MHz is high for an integrated GPU, and it likely helps the 8060S achieve these scores, but the shared memory bandwidth (System Dependent) may be the limiting factor at 4K.

The GPU’s DirectX 12 Ultimate support and Vulkan 1.4 API compatibility ensure that it can fully utilize the graphical features of Downfall, which is a modern horror title. However, the data shows that the Ultra preset is not viable at any resolution above 1080p, with 88 FPS at 1080p being the only playable Ultra result. The Medium preset, which leverages the GPU’s strengths without overburdening its memory system, is the optimal choice. The Radeon 8060S’s 40 RT cores do not appear to provide a measurable benefit in this game, as the FPS drops are consistent across presets that likely do not heavily use ray tracing.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

The following data is derived directly from the measured FPS rows for the Intel Core Ultra 7 265HX and AMD Radeon 8060S combination in Downfall.

1920x1080:

• Low: 210 FPS average. This is the highest FPS recorded in the entire dataset, demonstrating the CPU and GPU’s ability to push extreme frame rates at the lowest fidelity.
• Medium: 172 FPS average, with a minimum of 146 FPS and a maximum of 198 FPS. This preset provides a 38 FPS improvement over High while maintaining a minimum above 144 FPS.
• High: 141 FPS average. This is a smooth result, but the lack of minimum FPS data makes it less reliable than Medium.
• Ultra: 88 FPS average. This is the only preset at 1080p that drops below 100 FPS, indicating a significant performance hit from the highest settings.

2560x1440:

• Low: 150 FPS average. This is a solid result for 1440p, offering a high-refresh-rate experience with minimal visual quality.
• Medium: 123 FPS average, with a minimum of 104 FPS and a maximum of 141 FPS. This is the recommended preset, as it provides a minimum above 100 FPS.
• High: 101 FPS average. This is playable but close to the 100 FPS threshold, and the lack of minimum FPS data introduces uncertainty.
• Ultra: 63 FPS average. This is a significant drop from High, showing that the GPU struggles with the Ultra preset at 1440p.

3840x2160:

• Low: 93 FPS average. This is the only preset at 4K that exceeds 90 FPS, but it likely compromises the game’s horror atmosphere.
• Medium: 76 FPS average, with a minimum of 65 FPS and a maximum of 88 FPS. This is the only 4K preset with a recorded minimum above 60 FPS, making it the safest choice for a stable experience.
• High: 63 FPS average. This is exactly at the 60 FPS threshold, but the lack of minimum FPS data makes it risky for stutter-prone sections.
• Ultra: 39 FPS average. This is the worst result in the dataset, confirming that the GPU cannot handle 4K Ultra in Downfall.

The data shows a clear hierarchy: Medium is the most balanced preset across all resolutions, offering the highest average FPS with a guaranteed minimum that is suitable for the game’s tense gameplay. Low settings provide the highest FPS but sacrifice too much detail, while Ultra settings are only viable at 1080p. The measured FPS breakdown confirms that this system is best utilized at 1080p or 1440p with Medium settings, where it delivers a consistently smooth and immersive experience.