Greedfall

Greedfall, an Action RPG from 2019, presents an interesting performance profile for the Intel Core Ultra 5 125H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile combination. The data indicates that this pairing is overwhelmingly GPU-bound at lower resolutions, with the CPU providing ample headroom, but the balance shifts significantly as resolution increases. This analysis breaks down the measured FPS data to show exactly how this combo behaves across different settings and resolutions, concluding that it is a highly capable platform for this title, though the most demanding settings impose a heavy penalty.

Resolution Scaling

The performance drop from 1080p to 4K is substantial and reveals a clear shift in bottleneck. At 1080p with High settings, the combo produces an average of 163 FPS. Moving to 1440p drops that to 113 FPS, a 30.7% decrease. The jump to 4K at High settings yields an average of 67 FPS, which is 58.9% lower than the 1080p result. This steep decline indicates that the RTX 4080 Mobile is the primary limiting factor as pixel count rises, with the CPU's role diminishing.

The scaling pattern is consistent across all settings. With Low settings, the average FPS goes from 228 at 1080p, to 158 at 1440p, and finally to 94 at 4K. This represents a 30.7% drop from 1080p to 1440p and another 40.5% drop from 1440p to 4K. The fact that even at Low settings the 4K framerate is less than half of the 1080p framerate underscores the immense workload increase on the GPU.

Ultra settings showcase the most dramatic scaling. The 1080p Ultra average is 104 FPS, which falls to 72 FPS at 1440p (a 30.8% reduction) and then plummets to 43 FPS at 4K, a 58.7% reduction from 1080p. The data shows that the gap between 1440p and 4K is consistently larger than the gap between 1080p and 1440p, regardless of settings. This suggests that the GPU's memory bandwidth and compute resources are being pushed to their absolute limit at 4K.

These results clearly indicate that at 1080p, the system is not fully utilizing the GPU's potential, as the CPU is able to feed it frames faster than it can render them. At 1440p and especially 4K, the GPU becomes the sole bottleneck. The 89.6 GB/s of CPU memory bandwidth is more than sufficient for this game, and the CPU's 18 threads are not the limiting factor in this scenario. The data points to a system where the RTX 4080 Mobile's performance is the determining factor for playability at higher resolutions.

Settings Recommendations

For a balanced experience across all resolutions, the Medium preset offers the most compelling trade-off between visual fidelity and performance. The measured data shows that at 1080p, Medium nets an average of 179 FPS, which is only 21.5% lower than the Low preset’s 228 FPS but a significant 72.1% higher than the Ultra preset’s 104 FPS. At 1440p, Medium's 124 FPS average is still exceptionally smooth and represents a 72.2% improvement over the Ultra setting's 72 FPS. Even at 4K, Medium provides a playable 74 FPS average, which is 72% higher than the 43 FPS achieved on Ultra.

The High preset is the recommended choice for users prioritizing image quality over maximum framerate. It delivers 113 FPS at 1440p and 67 FPS at 4K, both of which are solidly playable. The difference between High and Medium is a 9.7% reduction in FPS at 1440p and a 9.4% reduction at 4K. This is a relatively small cost for the likely improvement in visual detail.

The Ultra preset is not recommended for 4K gaming on this hardware, as the 43 FPS average falls below the threshold for smooth gameplay. While it achieves 104 FPS at 1080p and 72 FPS at 1440p, the performance cost is steep. The data shows that the jump from High to Ultra at 1440p costs 41 FPS (a 36.3% decrease), which is a massive hit for the final tier of settings. For most users, the High preset provides near-Ultra visuals with much better performance, making it the superior choice for a high-refresh-rate experience.

The Low preset is only recommended for competitive play at 1080p, where the 228 FPS average can take advantage of high-refresh-rate displays. However, at 4K, the Low preset still only achieves 94 FPS, which is lower than the Medium preset at 1440p. This indicates that even the lowest settings do not fully alleviate the GPU bottleneck at 4K. Therefore, for this specific hardware combination, the Medium preset at 1440p offers the best overall experience, balancing a 124 FPS average with reasonable visual settings.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 125H is a 14-core, 18-thread processor based on the Meteor Lake architecture, with a boost clock of 4.50 GHz. Its benchmark scores, such as a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 12804.5 and a single-core score of 1647.5, place it in the 79th percentile of all CPUs. The data suggests that this processor is more than capable of handling Greedfall's CPU demands, as the framerate scaling is almost entirely dictated by the GPU.

The processor's nearest rivals based on average benchmark score include the AMD Ryzen 7 5800 and Intel Core i5-12600K, with the Core Ultra 5 125H being just 0.1% and 0.3% slower, respectively. This level of performance is sufficient to prevent a CPU bottleneck in this title. The PassMark multithread score of 21100 and the PassMark single-thread score of 3399 further reinforce its capability.

In this game, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and game logic. The fact that the FPS drops by roughly 30% when moving from 1080p to 1440p, and another 40-60% when moving to 4K, is a classic sign of a GPU-bound scenario. If the CPU were the limiting factor, we would expect to see similar FPS numbers across different resolutions, as the CPU workload would not change. This is not the case, confirming that the Core Ultra 5 125H provides ample headroom.

The CPU's 18 threads are also a non-issue, as Greedfall is not known for heavily utilizing many cores. The data shows that a capable 14-core processor is more than enough. The performance of this CPU is effectively a non-factor in the final FPS numbers for this game. The system's performance ceiling is determined by the GPU, and the CPU simply ensures that the GPU is never waiting for data.

How This Combo Ranks

The combined performance of the Intel Core Ultra 5 125H and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile in Greedfall is strong, ranking at 1219 out of 3703 tested combos. This places it in the top third of all configurations, indicating a high level of overall performance for this specific title. This rank reflects the system's ability to deliver high framerates, especially at 1440p and 1080p.

The GPU is the dominant contributor to this high ranking. The RTX 4080 Mobile sits in the 81st percentile of all GPUs, and its nearest rivals, such as the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070, are 1.3% slower in average benchmark score. This high GPU performance is the driving force behind the system's ability to handle Greedfall's demanding visuals.

The CPU also contributes to the high rank, sitting in the 79th percentile of all CPUs. While not the primary factor in Greedfall's performance, its strength ensures that it does not drag down the overall score. The combination of a top-tier mobile GPU and a very capable mobile CPU results in a well-balanced system that performs admirably in this game.

The rank of 1219 out of 3703 means that there are 2484 other combinations that rank lower. This is a strong showing, but it also indicates that there are many more powerful combinations. The data shows that this combo is well-suited for high-refresh-rate 1440p gaming and can handle 4K with some settings adjustments, but it is not at the absolute top tier for 4K Ultra performance. The system is a high-end mobile solution that offers a premium gaming experience.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile is the undisputed performance leader in this pairing. With 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, it offers a memory bandwidth of 432.0 GB/s. Its 7424 shading units and 58 RT cores, built on the Ada Lovelace architecture, provide the raw compute power necessary for high-resolution gaming. The GPU's PassMark G3D score of 24926 and its 81st percentile ranking among all GPUs confirm its high-end status.

The GPU's role in Greedfall is critical, as it is the primary determinant of framerate at all resolutions tested. The data shows a clear relationship between resolution and FPS, which is directly tied to the GPU's workload. At 1080p, the GPU is not fully stressed, as evidenced by the 228 FPS average on Low settings. As the resolution increases, the GPU's pixel and texture processing demands grow, leading to the observed FPS drops.

The 12 GB of VRAM is a significant asset for this game, especially at 4K resolution. The data shows that even at 4K Medium settings, the GPU can maintain an average of 74 FPS, suggesting that it is not running out of memory. The 432.0 GB/s of bandwidth is also sufficient to feed the GPU's cores, as the performance scaling is consistent with a compute-bound scenario rather than a memory-bound one.

The GPU's boost clock of 1665 MHz, combined with its FP32 performance of 24.72 TFLOPS, places it in a position to handle the most demanding titles. In Greedfall, this translates to playable framerates at 4K on Medium and High settings, and excellent performance at 1440p. The data confirms that the GPU is the star of this show, and its performance ceiling is what ultimately limits the system's ability to run the game at maximum settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for this combo is comprehensive, covering four settings presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra) across three resolutions (1080p, 1440p, 4K).

1920x1080:

• Low: The average FPS is 228, which is the highest measured result for this combo. This indicates a massive performance headroom, and the system is likely CPU-limited at this point.
• Medium: The average FPS is 179, with a minimum of 152 and a maximum of 206. This shows a 21.5% drop from Low, but it is still an exceptionally smooth experience.
• High: The average FPS is 163. This is a 9% drop from Medium, maintaining excellent playability for high-refresh-rate monitors.
• Ultra: The average FPS is 104. This is a 36.2% drop from High, showing the significant cost of the highest settings. It is still a very playable framerate.

2560x1440:

• Low: The average FPS is 158, which is a 30.7% drop from the 1080p Low result. This shows the GPU is starting to work harder.
• Medium: The average FPS is 124, with a minimum of 106 and a maximum of 143. This is a 30.7% drop from the 1080p Medium result and remains a high-refresh-rate experience.
• High: The average FPS is 113. This is a 30.7% drop from the 1080p High result, showing a consistent scaling pattern.
• Ultra: The average FPS is 72. This is a 30.8% drop from the 1080p Ultra result, and it is still a smooth experience for most displays.

3840x2160:

• Low: The average FPS is 94. This is a 40.5% drop from the 1440p Low result, showing the significant burden of 4K.
• Medium: The average FPS is 74, with a minimum of 63 and a maximum of 85. This is a 40.3% drop from the 1440p Medium result and remains a playable framerate.
• High: The average FPS is 67. This is a 40.7% drop from the 1440p High result, providing a playable, though less smooth, 4K experience.
• Ultra: The average FPS is 43. This is a 40.3% drop from the 1440p Ultra result, making it the only setting where the framerate falls below the standard playability threshold.

This breakdown shows a clear and predictable pattern. The 1440p results are consistently 30% lower than the 1080p results, and the 4K results are consistently 40% lower than the 1440p results. The consistency of these scaling factors across all settings confirms that the GPU is the sole bottleneck at higher resolutions, and the CPU is not a limiting factor in any configuration.