Fivem

Fivem is a demanding multiplayer modification, and the measured data for the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X paired with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER reveals a system that is consistently held back by its graphics card, especially as resolution and preset levels increase. The benchmark results show a clear hierarchy where the CPU's substantial horsepower is largely untapped in this title, making the choice of in-game settings the primary lever for achieving a playable experience.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data across different presets and resolutions indicates that the Low preset is the only reliable option for high-refresh-rate gameplay, while Medium offers a balanced compromise for smoother visual fidelity at lower resolutions. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers an average of 125.9 FPS, which is the only configuration in the entire dataset that breaks the 120 FPS threshold, making it the definitive choice for competitive or fast-paced play. This is a significant jump over the next step up, as the Medium preset at the same resolution drops to an average of 98.3 FPS, a 28% reduction in performance that may be noticeable on a 144Hz display.

For users prioritizing visual quality over raw frame rate, the Medium preset at 1080p remains the most sensible option, as it provides a substantial improvement in graphical fidelity over Low while still keeping the average FPS just under the 100 FPS mark. The High preset at 1080p yields 74.5 FPS, which is playable but introduces a more substantial performance cost for diminishing visual returns. The Ultra preset at 1080p is problematic, with an average of only 58.6 FPS, indicating that the GPU is overwhelmed by the combination of high resolution and maximum settings.

At 2560x1440, the situation becomes more constrained. The Low preset produces an average of 82 FPS, which is still smooth, but the Medium preset drops to 64.9 FPS and High to 52.5 FPS. The Ultra preset falls to 40.1 FPS, which is generally considered too low for a fluid experience in a multiplayer setting. At 3840x2160, all presets are largely unplayable, with even the Low preset only managing an average of 45.6 FPS, while High and Ultra sink to 25.7 and 22.4 FPS respectively. The data strongly suggests that this combo is best suited for 1080p gaming, with Low or Medium presets being the only viable choices for a consistently responsive experience.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution and preset combination for this CPU and GPU pairing?

A: Based on the measured data, the optimal experience is achieved at 1920x1080 with the Low preset, which delivers an average of 125.9 FPS. For improved visuals at a slight performance cost, the Medium preset at 1080p, with an average of 98.3 FPS, is also a strong choice.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Fivem?

A: No. The benchmark results show that at 3840x2160, even the Low preset only achieves an average of 45.6 FPS. The High and Ultra presets are far worse, averaging 25.7 and 22.4 FPS respectively, which is not sufficient for smooth gameplay.

Q: How does the GTX 1660 SUPER's performance compare to its closest rivals?

A: The GPU's average benchmark score of 14286 places it in a tight cluster with its nearest rivals. It is 0.2% behind the AMD Radeon RX Vega 11 and 0.5% behind the AMD Radeon Vega 11, while being 0.7% behind the AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT. These negligible differences suggest near-identical performance levels among these cards.

Q: Is the Ryzen 9 9900X a bottleneck in this configuration?

A: The data suggests the CPU is not the limiting factor in most scenarios. The GPU's performance percentile of 55 is significantly lower than the CPU's percentile of 94, and the dramatic FPS drops when increasing resolution or settings point to the graphics card as the primary constraint.

Q: What is the expected FPS difference between the Low and Ultra presets at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the Low preset averages 125.9 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 58.6 FPS. This represents a performance drop of over 53% when moving from the lowest to the highest quality preset.

Q: What is the launch MSRP of the components in this test?

A: The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X has a launch MSRP of $499, and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER has a launch MSRP of 229 USD.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER is the decisive component in this system's Fivem performance. With 6 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus providing 336.0 GB/s of bandwidth, the card has a modest memory pool that is likely a limiting factor at higher resolutions and settings. The GPU's base clock of 1530 MHz and boost clock of 1785 MHz are relatively modest, and its 1408 shading units are tasked with rendering the complex scenes typical of Fivem's multiplayer environments.

The benchmark results clearly show the GPU's influence. When comparing the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K, the performance falls off a cliff. For instance, at High settings, the average FPS drops from 74.5 at 1080p to 52.5 at 1440p and then to 25.7 at 4K. This pattern is consistent across all presets, indicating that the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth are being saturated as the pixel count increases. The card's PassMark G3D score of 12699 and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1278 further contextualize its position in the lower-midrange tier of graphics hardware, a position that is reflected in its overall performance percentile of 55 vs all GPUs.

The GPU's compute capabilities, as shown by its PassMark GPU Compute score of 5076, are sufficient for the game's rendering tasks, but the card is clearly not designed for high-resolution or ultra-quality settings. The data suggests that the GTX 1660 SUPER's 6 GB VRAM is a critical bottleneck at 4K, where the game likely requires more memory for textures and geometry. This is evidenced by the fact that the difference between Low and High presets at 4K is a substantial 20 FPS, whereas at 1080p, the difference is only 51 FPS, but the absolute frame rates are more acceptable. In essence, the GPU is the primary determinant of the experience, and its limitations define the entire performance envelope of this combo.

How This Combo Ranks

In the grand scheme of all tested combinations, this pairing of the Ryzen 9 9900X and GTX 1660 SUPER ranks at position 1574 out of 1792 combos. This places it in the bottom 12% of all systems tested for Fivem, which is a poor showing reflective of the significant mismatch between the high-end CPU and the entry-level GPU. The combo's rank is dragged down almost entirely by the graphics card, as the CPU is a top-tier performer in its own right.

The CPU's data reinforces this disparity. The Ryzen 9 9900X has an average benchmark score of 54450, placing it in the 94th percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals, such as the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D, are within a 0.4% performance delta, indicating that the CPU is performing as expected at a very high level. In contrast, the GTX 1660 SUPER's average score of 14286 puts it in the 55th percentile, and its rivals like the Intel Iris Xe MAX Graphics are within a 0.2% delta, showing it is also performing as expected, but at a much lower tier.

This stark contrast in component performance is the story of this combo's ranking. The CPU is a 9000-series flagship with 12 cores and 24 threads, capable of massive multi-threaded workloads, as shown by its Cinebench R23 multicore score of 46438. However, in Fivem, this power is largely irrelevant because the GPU cannot keep up. The low frame rates at 4K and on Ultra presets are not due to a lack of CPU processing power but rather the GPU's inability to render frames fast enough. This combo is a textbook example of a CPU-bottleneck-in-reverse, where the graphics card severely limits the system's overall gaming potential, causing its rank to plummet.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K is the clearest indicator of where the system's bottleneck lies. The data shows a severe and consistent drop in average FPS as resolution increases, which is the classic signature of a GPU-bound system. At the Low preset, the average FPS goes from 125.9 at 1080p to 82 at 1440p and then falls to 45.6 at 4K. This is a reduction of 34.9% when moving from 1080p to 1440p, and a further 44.4% reduction when moving from 1440p to 4K.

This pattern is even more pronounced at higher settings. At the Ultra preset, the FPS drops from 58.6 at 1080p to 40.1 at 1440p and then to 22.4 at 4K. The percentage drops are similar, but the absolute frame rates at 4K are extremely low. If the CPU were the limiting factor, we would expect to see a much smaller difference between 1080p and 1440p, as the CPU's workload would remain relatively constant while the GPU's workload increases. Instead, the FPS scales almost linearly with the pixel count, which is a definitive sign that the GTX 1660 SUPER is the sole performance ceiling.

The data implies that this system has virtually no headroom for higher resolutions. While the Ryzen 9 9900X has the raw compute power to handle complex game logic and physics at any resolution, the GPU's 6 GB of VRAM and limited processing power simply cannot handle the increased pixel throughput. The only way to achieve a playable frame rate at 1440p is to use the Low preset, and 4K is entirely out of the question. This severe resolution scaling confirms that any user of this combo should remain firmly at 1080p to get the most out of the hardware, as the CPU's potential is wasted at higher resolutions where the GPU becomes the absolute and insurmountable barrier to performance.