Evolve

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9060 produces a set of measured results in Evolve that clearly delineate where each component’s influence begins and ends. This combination sits at rank 1664 out of 2872 tested combos in this game, placing it in the lower-middle portion of the database, yet the frame rate data across three resolutions and four quality presets reveals a system that is more capable at 1080p and 1440p than its overall rank might suggest, while 4K performance exposes the GPU’s limitations.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for this combo shows a predictable and steep decline as resolution increases, but the rate of that decline varies significantly depending on the quality preset. At Low settings, the average frame rate drops from 176 FPS at 1920x1080 to 118 FPS at 2560x1440, a reduction of 58 FPS, and then further down to 67 FPS at 3840x2160. That represents a 62% drop from 1080p to 4K on Low settings. The scaling from 1440p to 4K on Low is particularly sharp, losing 51 FPS, which suggests that at this preset the GPU is becoming the primary bottleneck as pixel count rises.

Moving to Medium settings, the averages are 137 FPS at 1080p, 92 FPS at 1440p, and 52 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 45 FPS, and from 1440p to 4K it is 40 FPS. The min FPS values at Medium also tell a story: at 1080p the minimum is 116 FPS, at 1440p it is 78 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 44 FPS. The gap between average and minimum FPS widens at higher resolutions, indicating less consistent frame pacing as the render load increases. At 4K Medium, the minimum of 44 FPS is substantially below the average of 52 FPS, which could produce noticeable stutter in busy scenes.

High settings show a similar pattern with averages of 107 FPS at 1080p, 72 FPS at 1440p, and 41 FPS at 4K. The percentage drops are consistent: 1080p to 1440p loses 35 FPS, and 1440p to 4K loses 31 FPS. This linearity suggests that at High settings, the scaling is primarily driven by resolution rather than any sudden change in component behavior. Ultra settings produce the lowest averages across the board: 74 FPS at 1080p, 50 FPS at 1440p, and 28 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result of 28 FPS is barely playable, and the drop from 1440p Ultra at 50 FPS represents a 44% reduction.

The limiting component shifts based on resolution. At 1080p, the CPU’s performance headroom is evident because even at Ultra the combo reaches 74 FPS, which is respectable for a demanding preset. The CPU’s benchmark scores support this interpretation. The Ryzen 5 8400F achieves a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 20851 and a single-core score of 2943, with a PassMark single-thread score of 3685. These numbers indicate a processor capable of feeding the GPU at lower resolutions. However, at 4K, the GPU’s raw throughput becomes the ceiling. The RX 9060’s PassMark G3D score of 17631 and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 are modest figures, and the 4K results reflect that. The data clearly shows that 1080p and 1440p are the sweet spots for this pairing, while 4K requires dropping to Low settings just to reach 67 FPS, which is the only 4K preset that exceeds 60 FPS.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured rows, the best experience for this combo depends entirely on the target resolution, but the data points to Medium as the most balanced preset overall. At 1080p, Medium delivers 137 FPS average with a minimum of 116 FPS, which provides a smooth and responsive experience for a fast-paced FPS like Evolve. The jump from Medium to High at 1080p costs 30 FPS (from 137 to 107), while the jump from High to Ultra costs another 33 FPS (from 107 to 74). The visual gains from Medium to Ultra are unlikely to justify the frame rate sacrifice when the minimum FPS at Ultra is not recorded but the average drops to 74, which is still playable but noticeably less fluid than the 137 FPS average at Medium.

At 1440p, Medium again emerges as the recommended preset. The 92 FPS average with a minimum of 78 FPS is comfortably above the 60 FPS threshold and provides enough headroom for intense combat sequences. High at 1440p drops to 72 FPS, which is still acceptable but leaves less margin for frame drops in chaotic moments. Ultra at 1440p falls to 50 FPS, which is below the ideal range for a competitive shooter. Low at 1440p reaches 118 FPS, but the visual quality reduction is severe and unnecessary given that Medium provides a significantly better image with only 26 FPS less.

For 4K, the recommendations become more constrained. Low is the only preset that achieves a playable frame rate, with 67 FPS average. Medium at 4K produces 52 FPS with a minimum of 44 FPS, which is borderline for a game that benefits from consistent frame delivery. High and Ultra at 4K are not viable for smooth gameplay, with averages of 41 FPS and 28 FPS respectively. If a user insists on 4K, Low settings are the only option that maintains fluidity. However, the data suggests that this combo is not intended for 4K gaming in Evolve, and users should target 1080p or 1440p for the best balance of visual quality and performance.

The measured FPS values also indicate that the Medium preset provides the most consistent frame times. The range between minimum and maximum FPS at Medium is 41 FPS at 1080p (116 to 157), 27 FPS at 1440p (78 to 105), and 16 FPS at 4K (44 to 60). The narrowing range at higher resolutions is interesting because it suggests that as the GPU becomes more saturated, the frame rate variability decreases, which is contrary to what some might expect. This could be due to the CPU no longer being the source of frame pacing fluctuations at higher resolutions.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, manufactured on a 4 nm process at TSMC with 29,700 million transistors on a 199 mm² die. Its clock speeds are substantial: a base clock of 1700 MHz, a boost clock of 2990 MHz, and a game clock of 2400 MHz. The memory operates at 2250 MHz with 18 Gbps effective speed. The GPU has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is a notable factor in the 4K results, as 8 GB of VRAM can become a limitation in modern games at high resolutions, even if the raw compute performance is sufficient.

The GPU’s compute specifications include 1792 shading units, 112 texture mapping units, and 64 raster operation units, along with 28 ray tracing cores. The pixel rate is 191.4 GPixel/s and the texture rate is 334.9 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance rated at 21.43 TFLOPS. These figures place the RX 9060 in a specific performance tier, and the benchmark results confirm this positioning. The PassMark G3D score of 17631 and the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 are the key indicators. The GPU’s percentile rank among all GPUs is 59, meaning it outperforms 59% of the database’s GPUs. Its nearest rivals based on average benchmark score include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti with a deltaPct of -0.7 (meaning the RX 9060 is 0.7% slower), the AMD Radeon R9 370X with a deltaPct of 1 (1% faster), and the AMD Radeon RX 7700 with a deltaPct of 1.

The GPU’s role in Evolve is clearly dominant at higher resolutions. At 4K Ultra, the average FPS of 28 is a direct reflection of the GPU’s compute and memory bandwidth limits. The 288.0 GB/s bandwidth is modest by modern standards, and the 128-bit bus width means that memory bandwidth does not scale as well at high resolutions compared to wider-bus designs. The 8 GB VRAM capacity is also a concern for 4K textures, though the data does not explicitly measure VRAM usage. The fact that Low settings at 4K achieve 67 FPS while Ultra achieves only 28 FPS suggests that the GPU is heavily constrained by the render workload rather than any CPU bottleneck at that resolution.

At 1080p, the GPU has more headroom, but the measured FPS values still show that it is the limiting factor at Ultra settings. The 74 FPS at 1080p Ultra is respectable but not exceptional, and the GPU’s PassMark DirectX 12 score of 44 is surprisingly low, which might indicate driver overhead or specific API inefficiencies in certain workloads. The Geekbench OpenCL score of 88183 and Vulkan score of 39476 provide additional context, but the game-specific results are what matter for this analysis.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete set of measured FPS values for this combo in Evolve is as follows. At 1920x1080, Low settings produce an average of 176 FPS. Medium settings produce an average of 137 FPS with a minimum of 116 and a maximum of 157. High settings produce an average of 107 FPS. Ultra settings produce an average of 74 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra at 1080p shows a steady decline of roughly 30-40 FPS per step, with the largest single drop occurring between Medium and High (30 FPS) and between High and Ultra (33 FPS).

At 2560x1440, Low settings produce an average of 118 FPS. Medium settings produce an average of 92 FPS with a minimum of 78 and a maximum of 105. High settings produce an average of 72 FPS. Ultra settings produce an average of 50 FPS. The step from Low to Medium at 1440p costs 26 FPS, from Medium to High costs 20 FPS, and from High to Ultra costs 22 FPS. The reductions are smaller in absolute terms compared to 1080p, but the percentage losses are similar.

At 3840x2160, Low settings produce an average of 67 FPS. Medium settings produce an average of 52 FPS with a minimum of 44 and a maximum of 60. High settings produce an average of 41 FPS. Ultra settings produce an average of 28 FPS. The drop from Low to Medium at 4K is 15 FPS, from Medium to High is 11 FPS, and from High to Ultra is 13 FPS. The 4K results are the most telling for the GPU’s limitations, as even the transition from Low to Medium, which typically has a smaller performance impact than the jump to Ultra, results in a 22% frame rate reduction.

The minimum FPS data is only available for Medium settings across all three resolutions, which provides some insight into frame consistency. At 1080p Medium, the minimum of 116 FPS is 85% of the average, indicating good consistency. At 1440p Medium, the minimum of 78 FPS is 85% of the average as well. At 4K Medium, the minimum of 44 FPS is 85% of the average of 52. The consistency ratio holds steady across resolutions, suggesting that the frame pacing issues, if any, are not exacerbated by resolution. However, the absolute minimum values at 4K are low enough that gameplay could feel stuttery during intense action.

How This Combo Ranks

This combo ranks 1664 out of 2872 tested combinations in Evolve, placing it in the 58th percentile of all combos. This ranking is notably lower than the GPU’s individual percentile of 59 and the CPU’s percentile of 77, which suggests that the pairing is not maximizing the potential of either component in this specific game. The CPU’s average benchmark score of 25005 places it near the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F, which has an avgScore of 24964 and a deltaPct of 0.2, meaning the 8400F is 0.2% faster. The Intel Core i7-11850H is 0.3% slower, and the Intel Core i7-13620H is 0.4% slower. The AMD EPYC 9474F is 0.4% faster than the 8400F. These rival comparisons are close, indicating that the CPU is well within a narrow performance band.

The GPU’s ranking is more spread out. The RX 9060’s nearest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, which is 0.7% faster, and the AMD Radeon R9 370X is 1% slower. The AMD Radeon RX 7700 is also 1% slower, and the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 is 2.1% slower. The GPU’s avgBenchmarkScore of 16014 is the basis for these comparisons. The combo’s rank of 1664 suggests that in Evolve, the combination underperforms relative to what the individual component scores might imply. This could be due to the game’s specific engine characteristics or the way the CPU and GPU interact at various settings.

The fact that the combo ranks in the lower half of the database’s tested combos for Evolve is an important data point. It indicates that there are 1208 combos that perform worse, which means this is not a bottom-tier setup, but it also means that many other combinations of CPUs and GPUs achieve higher frame rates in this game. The rank of 1664 out of 2872 is a neutral result, neither exceptional nor poor, but it does suggest that users looking for high-refresh-rate 1080p gaming in Evolve might want to consider other options or adjust settings to the Medium preset to extract the best performance.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture with the Phoenix codename, manufactured on a 4 nm process at TSMC with 25,000 million transistors on a 178 mm² die. Its base clock is 4.20 GHz and its boost clock is 4.70 GHz, with a TDP of 65 W. The cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 1 MB of L2 per core, and 16 MB of shared L3 cache. Memory support is DDR5 with dual-channel configuration and a bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s. The CPU uses AMD Socket AM5 and has a PCIe Gen 4 interface with 20 lanes. The launch MSRP is $170.

The CPU’s benchmark scores reveal its strengths. The Cinebench R23 multicore score of 20851 and single-core score of 2943 are solid for a 6-core part. The PassMark multithread score of 24389 and single-thread score of 3685 are also respectable. The 3DMark scores show scaling from 2 threads (1874) to 4 threads (3563) to 8 threads (5275) to max threads (6165), with the single-thread score at 951. The PassMark physics score of 1332 and find prime numbers score of 89 are lower than some rivals, but the integer math score of 74021 and floating point math score of 46217 indicate strong computational throughput.

In Evolve, the CPU’s role is most apparent at 1080p Low settings, where the combo achieves 176 FPS. This high frame rate suggests that the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at lower resolutions, and the GPU is not the bottleneck at that setting. However, the CPU’s influence diminishes as resolution increases. At 4K, even Low settings only reach 67 FPS, which is far below the 1080p Low result, indicating that the GPU is the dominant constraint. The CPU’s 6 cores and 12 threads are sufficient for a game from 2015, as Evolve is an older title that does not require many cores. The single-core performance, evidenced by the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2943, is adequate for the game’s main thread.

The nearest rivals for the CPU are all within a 0.4% performance band, which means that the 8400F’s performance in Evolve is unlikely to differ meaningfully from the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F or the Intel Core i7-13620H. The CPU’s percentile rank of 77 places it above the majority of CPUs in the database, but the combo’s overall rank of 1664 in Evolve is dragged down by the GPU’s mid-tier performance. The data suggests that if a user were to pair this CPU with a stronger GPU, the CPU would not be the limiting factor in Evolve, as evidenced by the high frame rates at 1080p Low. Conversely, the GPU’s 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory bus are likely the reasons why 4K performance is so constrained, and no amount of CPU headroom can compensate for that.