Evolve

Settings Recommendations

For Evolve, the measured data across all three resolutions shows a consistent performance hierarchy: Low delivers the highest frame rates, followed by Medium, then High, with Ultra imposing the heaviest load. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 189.1 FPS, while Medium reaches 146.3 FPS and High hits 113.5 FPS. The Ultra preset, however, drops to 82.3 FPS, representing a significant 56.5% reduction from the Low preset’s output. This pattern indicates that the Ultra preset’s additional graphical effects create a steep performance cliff, making it less suitable for maintaining high refresh rates.

The data suggests that the Medium preset offers the most balanced experience for general play. At 2560x1440, Medium produces 98.3 FPS, which remains comfortably above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while High trails at 78.9 FPS. At 3840x2160, the Medium preset still manages 58.2 FPS, which is playable, whereas High drops to 44.5 FPS and Ultra falls to 29.1 FPS, the latter being marginal for a fast-paced FPS title. For competitive play where frame rate is paramount, the Low preset at 1920x1080 provides the highest headroom at 189.1 FPS, but the visual fidelity loss may not be justified for all users.

Given that Evolve is an FPS title, the recommendation leans toward Medium as the default setting. It preserves a substantial portion of the visual quality while maintaining frame rates that are 72.0% higher than Ultra at 1080p and 68.9% higher at 1440p. The Ultra preset, while offering maximum detail, is best reserved for scenarios where visual immersion outweighs the need for high frame rates, such as single-player exploration. The measured data indicates that Ultra’s performance penalty is consistent across resolutions, making it the least efficient choice for this hardware combination.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060, built on the Ada Lovelace architecture with a 5 nm process, operates with a base clock of 1830 MHz and a boost clock of 2460 MHz. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus provides a bandwidth of 272.0 GB/s, which is a critical factor for texture streaming in Evolve’s dynamic environments. The GPU’s 3072 shading units and 48 ROPs handle the rasterization workload, while its 24 RT cores and 96 tensor cores are available for advanced effects, though their impact on this title is secondary given its 2015 release.

The VRAM capacity of 8 GB proves sufficient for the measured settings, as the frame rates scale predictably with resolution and preset. At 3840x2160, the Ultra preset yields 29.1 FPS, suggesting the GPU is heavily taxed by memory bandwidth and fill rate demands. The GPU’s texture rate of 236.2 GTexel/s and pixel rate of 118.1 GPixel/s are the limiting factors at 4K, as the CPU’s 16 cores and 32 threads provide ample processing headroom. The data shows that the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions, with the 1080p Low preset achieving 189.1 FPS, which is more than 2.6 times the 4K Ultra result.

The RTX 4060’s performance relative to its nearest rivals shows it sits in a competitive position. Its average benchmark score of 23181 places it 0.6% behind the AMD Radeon RX 6600M and 0.7% behind the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti, while being 0.7% ahead of the Intel Arc B580 and 0.8% ahead of the AMD Radeon 760M. These narrow margins indicate that the GPU is well-matched to its peers, and in Evolve, the measured FPS reflects a capable mid-range solution that can handle 1440p gaming with ease but struggles to maintain playable frame rates at 4K Ultra.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear trend of diminishing performance as resolution increases. Moving from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440, the average FPS across all settings drops by approximately 30-35%. For instance, the High preset falls from 113.5 FPS at 1080p to 78.9 FPS at 1440p, a reduction of 30.5%. The Medium preset drops from 146.3 FPS to 98.3 FPS, a 32.8% decrease, while the Low preset decreases from 189.1 FPS to 125.7 FPS, a 33.5% decline. This consistent scaling suggests that the GPU is the primary limiting factor, as the resolution increase directly impacts the pixel fill rate and memory bandwidth demands.

The transition from 2560x1440 to 3840x2160 produces an even steeper decline. The High preset drops from 78.9 FPS to 44.5 FPS, a 43.6% reduction, while the Medium preset falls from 98.3 FPS to 58.2 FPS, a 40.8% decrease. The Ultra preset, which was already marginal at 1440p with 56.9 FPS, plummets to 29.1 FPS at 4K, a 48.9% drop. This accelerated degradation at 4K indicates that the RTX 4060’s 8 GB VRAM and 272.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient to sustain high frame rates at this resolution, particularly with higher quality presets.

The scaling pattern also reveals the CPU’s role. At 1080p, the Ryzen 9 5950X’s strong single-thread performance, evidenced by its 3dmark_single_thread score of 944 and cinebench R23 single-core score of 5450, ensures that the CPU does not bottleneck the GPU. However, as resolution increases, the GPU workload grows, and the frame rate becomes increasingly GPU-bound. The data shows that the gap between Low and Ultra presets widens at higher resolutions, with the 4K Ultra result being 59.3% lower than the 4K Low result, compared to a 56.5% difference at 1080p. This suggests that the GPU’s architectural limits are more pronounced at 4K, where the pixel throughput and memory subsystem are stretched to their maximum.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured frame rates span a wide range depending on the preset. The Low preset achieves an average of 189.1 FPS, which is ideal for high-refresh-rate monitors. The Medium preset delivers 146.3 FPS, still providing a smooth experience for most displays. The High preset reaches 113.5 FPS, which is sufficient for standard 60 Hz monitors and offers better visual quality. The Ultra preset, at 82.3 FPS, remains playable but represents a 56.5% reduction from Low, indicating that the additional graphical features exact a heavy toll on performance.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains respectable for most presets. The Low preset achieves 125.7 FPS, which is excellent for a 1440p resolution. The Medium preset delivers 98.3 FPS, maintaining smooth gameplay. The High preset produces 78.9 FPS, which is above the 60 FPS threshold and suitable for most gaming scenarios. The Ultra preset, however, drops to 56.9 FPS, which is below the ideal threshold for a competitive FPS title, suggesting that users should avoid Ultra at this resolution if frame rate consistency is a priority.

At 3840x2160, the frame rates become more constrained. The Low preset achieves 71.5 FPS, which is playable but not exceptionally high. The Medium preset delivers 58.2 FPS, which is marginal for a smooth experience. The High preset drops to 44.5 FPS, which may result in noticeable stuttering during intense action sequences. The Ultra preset, at 29.1 FPS, is effectively unplayable for a fast-paced FPS, as the low frame rate would impair gameplay responsiveness. The data clearly shows that 4K gaming with this hardware combination is only viable at Low or Medium settings, and even then, the frame rates are not optimal for competitive play.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 achieves a rank of 986 out of 1695 tested combos in Evolve, placing it in the 58th percentile of all configurations. This mid-pack ranking reflects the balance between the CPU’s strong multi-threaded performance and the GPU’s mid-range capabilities. The Ryzen 9 5950X, with its 16 cores and 32 threads, excels in synthetic benchmarks such as cinebench R23 multicore with a score of 38607, but Evolve’s FPS results are more dependent on the GPU’s rendering capabilities.

The CPU’s percentile rank of 93 against all CPUs indicates that it is a top-tier processor, with its average benchmark score of 49062 being nearly identical to the Intel Core i5-14600K, which scores 49166, a delta of -0.2%. The GPU, however, has a percentile rank of 66 against all GPUs, with an average score of 23181. This disparity suggests that the CPU is not the limiting factor in this combo, and the GPU’s mid-range positioning is what drags the overall ranking down. In Evolve, the measured FPS data confirms this, as the frame rates at 4K are constrained by the GPU’s memory bandwidth and processing power.

The combo’s rank of 986 out of 1695 indicates that there are many combinations that perform better, particularly those with more powerful GPUs. However, it also means that this combo outperforms a significant portion of the tested configurations, likely those with older or lower-tier GPUs. The data shows that at 1080p, the combo delivers excellent performance with the Low preset at 189.1 FPS, which would rank highly among all combos. At higher resolutions, the combo’s ranking drops as the GPU struggles to maintain high frame rates. Overall, this combo is well-suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming, but it is not optimized for 4K Ultra settings, which is reflected in its mid-pack ranking.