Evolve

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates for Evolve with the Intel Core i5-12400 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 show a steep and predictable decline as resolution climbs, but the shape of that curve reveals where the bottleneck lives. At 1080p High, the combo delivers 81.1 FPS. Stepping up to 1440p High drops that to 53.6 FPS, a 34% reduction. Moving to 4K High yields just 32.2 FPS, another 40% cut from 1440p. This is a classic GPU-limited scaling pattern: the frame rate falls almost proportionally with the pixel count increase, which means the GTX 1070 is doing the heavy lifting at every step above 1080p.

The Low preset tells the same story with even more clarity. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 131.5 FPS. At 1440p Low, it falls to 89.8 FPS, and at 4K Low it lands at 48.4 FPS. The fact that even the lowest settings cannot hold 60 FPS at 4K is decisive: the GPU is saturated regardless of visual complexity. If the CPU were the limiting factor, we would expect to see much smaller differences between resolutions, particularly at Low settings where the GPU has less work to do. The data shows the opposite—resolution scaling remains harsh even on Low, confirming the GTX 1070 is the primary constraint.

The gap between High and Low at 4K is also telling. High produces 32.2 FPS while Low produces 48.4 FPS, a 50% improvement from dropping settings. At 1080p, the same settings change yields 81.1 to 131.5 FPS, a 62% gain. The diminishing returns at higher resolutions further indicate that the GPU is running out of raw throughput rather than being held back by any particular setting. The Core i5-12400, with its 6 cores and 12 threads boosting to 4.40 GHz, has ample headroom to feed the GTX 1070 at all tested resolutions.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data points to Medium as the sweet spot for this combination, provided the target is a smooth 60 FPS experience. At 1080p Medium, the system produces 104.2 FPS, which is 28% higher than High and only 21% below Low. This gives substantial visual improvement over Low while keeping frame rates well above the 60 FPS threshold. At 1440p Medium, the score is 66.6 FPS, still comfortably playable, whereas High at 1440p drops to 53.6 FPS—noticeably below the 60 FPS line. For 4K, no preset reaches 60 FPS; even Low tops out at 48.4 FPS, so users must accept either a lower frame rate or a lower resolution.

Ultra is the outlier in every resolution. At 1080p Ultra, the combo manages 56 FPS, which is 46% lower than Medium and barely above the 30 FPS floor. At 1440p Ultra, it falls to 39.9 FPS, and at 4K Ultra, it collapses to 19.6 FPS. The jump from Medium to Ultra costs more than half the frame rate at every resolution, with no proportional visual return suggested by the data. Benchmark results indicate that Ultra is only viable for users who prioritize image quality over responsiveness and are willing to accept sub-40 FPS at 1440p or sub-20 FPS at 4K.

The recommendation hierarchy is clear: Medium at 1080p for the best balance, Medium at 1440p for a still-playable experience, and Low at 4K if resolution is non-negotiable. High sits in an awkward middle—it beats 60 FPS only at 1080p, and the margin over Medium is slim compared to the performance cost. The data suggests that High is a reasonable choice for 1080p displays, but Medium offers a better experience-to-performance ratio across the board.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 is the defining component in this pairing for Evolve. Its 8 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 256.3 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for the game's textures at 1080p and 1440p, but the 4K results show the limits of this memory subsystem. The GPU's 1920 shading units and 64 ROPs deliver a peak pixel rate of 107.7 GPixel/s, yet the 4K Ultra result of 19.6 FPS indicates that raw fill rate is not the only constraint—the shader throughput of 6.463 TFLOPS is simply insufficient for Evolve's demands at that resolution.

The GTX 1070's boost clock of 1683 MHz (base 1506 MHz) is modest by modern standards, and the benchmark data reflects this. The GPU sits at the 51st percentile among all GPUs in the database, placing it squarely in the middle of the pack. Its nearest rivals in aggregate benchmark score include the NVIDIA Quadro K4200 (0.7% ahead) and the GeForce GTX 1650 SUPER (1.4% ahead), which shows that the GTX 1070 is competitive with much newer mainstream cards despite its 2016 vintage. The Pascal architecture's 16 nm process from TSMC, with 7,200 million transistors on a 314 mm² die, remains a capable baseline, but Evolve's 4K Ultra preset demands more than this hardware can provide.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is never explicitly tested as a limiting factor in the measured data, but the scaling pattern suggests that memory bandwidth, not capacity, is the more pressing issue at higher resolutions. The 256.3 GB/s bandwidth is shared across all resolutions, and the steep FPS drops from 1440p to 4K—roughly 40% at every setting—align with the pixel count increase rather than any memory allocation ceiling. The GPU's DirectX 12 support (12_1) is adequate for Evolve, which predates the GTX 1070's release by over a year, so API overhead is not a factor in these results.

How This Combo Ranks

In the full database of tested combinations for Evolve, this pairing of the Core i5-12400 with the GTX 1070 ranks 1427 out of 1695 combos. That places it in the bottom 16% of all tested systems, which is a sobering verdict for a CPU that performs admirably in isolation. The CPU alone sits at the 77th percentile among all processors, with an average benchmark score of 19850 that puts it 0.1% ahead of the Intel Core i7-9700 and 0.4% ahead of the Core i5-11600K. The GPU, however, pulls the combo down dramatically.

The rank disparity between the CPU and the combined system underscores the GPU-bound nature of this pairing in Evolve. A top-quartile processor is mated to a mid-pack GPU (51st percentile), and the game's measured performance reflects the weaker link. The combo's position at 1427 of 1695 suggests that many other tested systems—even those with lesser CPUs—achieve higher frame rates simply by pairing them with stronger graphics cards. The data does not show any other combos in the immediate vicinity, but the percentile gap between the CPU's 77th and the combo's 16th is the clearest signal.

The takeaway is that this rank is not a condemnation of the Core i5-12400, which shows it can drive the GTX 1070 to its limits, but rather a reflection of the GPU's age and tier. For Evolve specifically, the combo's results are consistent with a mid-range 2016 GPU paired with a modern 2022 CPU: the CPU never holds the GPU back, and the GPU sets the ceiling for playability.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 brings substantial computational resources to this pairing, and the measured FPS data shows it is never the limiting factor in Evolve. With 6 cores and 12 threads running at a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, the CPU has the single-thread performance that Evolve, a 2015 FPS title, relies on. The single-core Cinebench R23 score of 2249 and the 3DMark single-thread score of 910 confirm strong per-core capability. The 18 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB L2 per core provide ample on-die storage for the game's working set.

The CPU's multithreaded performance is equally robust, with a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 15935 and a Passmark multithread score of 18747. Evolve, however, is not a heavily threaded game by modern standards, and the data shows that even the GPU-bound frame rates at 1080p Low (131.5 FPS) do not expose any CPU weakness. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 5873 and 8-thread score of 4745 indicate that the CPU scales well with additional threads, but the game does not appear to need them to achieve the measured results.

The 65 W TDP and Alder Lake architecture (10 nm process, 163 mm² die) make this an efficient processor, but efficiency is secondary to the verdict here: the CPU is a non-factor in limiting Evolve's performance. The evidence is in the resolution scaling—if the CPU were struggling, we would see frame rates plateau across resolutions rather than drop consistently with pixel count. The data shows no such plateau, meaning the Core i5-12400 has headroom to spare even at 1080p Low where the GPU is pushed hardest.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its strongest results across all settings. Low produces 131.5 FPS, Medium produces 104.2 FPS, High produces 81.1 FPS, and Ultra produces 56 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra costs 75.5 FPS, a 57% reduction, which is the largest absolute spread of any resolution. This indicates that at 1080p, the GTX 1070 has enough throughput to render even Ultra settings above 30 FPS, though barely.

At 2560x1440, the results step down noticeably. Low yields 89.8 FPS, Medium 66.6 FPS, High 53.6 FPS, and Ultra 39.9 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 49.9 FPS, a 56% reduction. Medium remains the only setting above 60 FPS, and High dips below the 60 FPS threshold, making it marginal for competitive play. The 4K results at 3840x2160 are the weakest: Low hits 48.4 FPS, Medium 39.3 FPS, High 32.2 FPS, and Ultra 19.6 FPS. No setting reaches 60 FPS, and only Low and Medium clear the 30 FPS playability baseline.

The pattern across all resolutions is consistent: each step up in settings costs roughly 20-25% of the frame rate, and each step up in resolution costs roughly 35-40%. The 4K Ultra result of 19.6 FPS is the single worst measurement, and it is the only data point below 30 FPS aside from the 4K High result of 32.2 FPS. For users targeting 60 FPS, the data supports 1080p Medium or better, or 1440p Medium as the maximum viable option.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo run Evolve at 60 FPS on a 1440p monitor?

A: Yes, but only on Medium settings. The measured 1440p Medium result is 66.6 FPS, while High drops to 53.6 FPS and Ultra falls to 39.9 FPS. Low reaches 89.8 FPS.

Q: What is the best 4K setting for this hardware?

A: Low is the only setting that provides a playable experience, with an average of 48.4 FPS. Medium drops to 39.3 FPS, High to 32.2 FPS, and Ultra to 19.6 FPS, which is below the playability threshold.

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

A: The GPU is the bottleneck. Resolution scaling shows frame rates dropping proportionally with pixel count at every setting, which is characteristic of GPU-limited performance. The CPU has a 77th percentile ranking among all processors, while the GPU sits at the 51st percentile.

Q: How does the GTX 1070 compare to its nearest rivals in aggregate benchmarks?

A: The GTX 1070's average benchmark score of 12331 is 0.7% ahead of the Quadro K4200, 1.3% behind the GTX 880M, and 1.4% behind the GTX 1650 SUPER. These differences are minimal in real-world terms.

Q: Is 8 GB of VRAM sufficient for Evolve at 4K?

A: The data does not show a VRAM capacity limit, but the 4K results are poor across all settings. The memory bandwidth of 256.3 GB/s is more likely the constraint, as frame rates fall consistently with pixel count rather than showing sudden drops from capacity exhaustion.

Q: What frame rate can be expected at 1080p Ultra?

A: The measured 1080p Ultra average is 56 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target. Medium at 104.2 FPS or High at 81.1 FPS are better choices for a smoother experience.