Greedfall

The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 combo delivers a highly playable experience in Greedfall, but the data reveals a clear narrative about which component dictates performance at different resolutions. This pairing, ranking 1224th out of 2938 tested combinations, shows that while the CPU provides ample headroom, the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck as resolution and graphical demands increase.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for this combo shows a classic scaling pattern where the GPU’s workload becomes more demanding as resolution increases, while the CPU’s role diminishes. At 1080p with Low settings, the system achieves an average of 204 FPS, which drops to 141 FPS at 1440p and further to 84 FPS at 4K. This represents a 59% reduction in frame rate from 1080p to 4K at Low settings, indicating that the GPU is being pushed progressively harder.

The scaling becomes more pronounced at higher settings. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 146 FPS at 1080p to 101 FPS at 1440p, and finally to 60 FPS at 4K. That is a 59% performance drop from 1080p to 4K, nearly identical to the Low settings scaling. The consistency of this drop across settings suggests that the RTX 3070’s rendering capabilities are the limiting factor, not the CPU.

Looking at the Ultra settings, the pattern shifts dramatically. At 1080p Ultra, the combo produces 93 FPS, which drops to 64 FPS at 1440p and plummets to 38 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result represents a 59% decrease from 1080p Ultra, but the absolute numbers are much lower, indicating that the GPU is overwhelmed by the combination of high resolution and maximum graphical fidelity.

The 4K results reveal the GPU’s limits most clearly. With a mere 38 FPS at Ultra and 60 FPS at High, the system falls below the 60 FPS threshold at the highest settings. The jump from 60 FPS at High to 66 FPS at Medium at 4K shows that even modest setting reductions can restore playability. The data suggests that at 4K, users should target Medium settings to maintain a smooth experience, as the 66 FPS average with a 56 FPS minimum provides a more consistent frame pacing than the higher settings.

The CPU’s influence is most apparent at 1080p, where the frame rates exceed 200 FPS at Low settings. This high ceiling indicates that the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 has sufficient processing power to feed the GPU at lower resolutions. As the resolution increases, the GPU’s pixel throughput becomes the bottleneck, and the CPU’s advantage is no longer relevant. The scaling pattern across all settings confirms that this is a GPU-limited scenario at 1440p and 4K, while at 1080p the system operates in a more balanced state.

FAQ

Q: What is the best setting for 4K gaming with this combo?

A: At 4K, Medium settings provide the best balance with an average of 66 FPS and a minimum of 56 FPS. High settings drop to 60 FPS average, while Ultra falls to 38 FPS, which is below the playable threshold for most users.

Q: How does the RTX 3070 compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 3070 has an average benchmark score of 17208, which is 0.7% higher than the AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT and 1% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690. It trails the NVIDIA Tesla K40c by 1.5%. This places it in the 61st percentile of all GPUs.

Q: Is the CPU a bottleneck at 1080p?

A: No. At 1080p Low settings, the combo achieves 204 FPS, suggesting the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 provides ample headroom. The CPU’s single-thread performance, evidenced by its Cinebench R23 score of 3655, is sufficient to avoid limiting the GPU at this resolution.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between High and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 1440p, High settings produce an average of 101 FPS, while Ultra settings drop to 64 FPS. This represents a 37% performance loss for the visual upgrade from High to Ultra.

Q: What does the combo’s rank of 1224 out of 2938 indicate?

A: This rank places the combo in the upper-middle tier of all tested combinations. The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 sits in the 85th percentile of all CPUs, while the RTX 3070 is in the 61st percentile of all GPUs, indicating the CPU is a stronger component relative to its peers.

Q: Can the RTX 3070 handle 1440p with this CPU?

A: Yes. At 1440p, the combo delivers 101 FPS on High settings and 141 FPS on Low settings. Even at Ultra, it maintains a 64 FPS average, making 1440p the sweet spot for this pairing.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 5 225 is a 10-core, 10-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, manufactured on a 3 nm process by TSMC. It has a base clock of 3.30 GHz and a boost clock of 4.90 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The chip includes 20 MB of shared L3 cache and 3 MB of L2 cache per core, which contributes to its strong synthetic performance.

In Cinebench R23, the CPU scores 25891 in multi-core and 3655 in single-core tests. These scores place it in the 85th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 36938. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F, scores 36945, a negligible 0% difference. The Intel Core i9-12900T is 0.5% behind, while the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450 is 0.4% behind. This indicates the Ultra 5 225 is well-matched against its peers in general processing tasks.

For Greedfall, an Action RPG, the CPU’s role is to handle game logic, AI, and physics calculations. The measured FPS data shows that the CPU is not a limiting factor in most scenarios. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 204 FPS, which is a high ceiling that demonstrates the processor’s capability to drive the GPU at lower resolutions. The 10 cores and 10 threads provide sufficient parallelism for modern game engines, while the high boost clock of 4.90 GHz ensures strong single-thread performance where it matters.

The lack of hyperthreading (10 cores, 10 threads) means the CPU relies on physical cores for multitasking, but this does not appear to hinder gaming performance based on the measured results. The PassMark single-thread score of 4412 and multi-thread score of 30459 further confirm that the CPU has no trouble keeping up with the GPU in this game. The data indicates that at 4K, where the GPU is clearly the bottleneck, the CPU has significant headroom remaining.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo of the Intel Core Ultra 5 225 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 ranks 1224th out of 2938 tested combinations in Greedfall. This places it in the 58th percentile of all combos, meaning it outperforms more than half of the tested systems while trailing the top performers.

The rank reflects the balance between the CPU and GPU. The CPU is in the 85th percentile of all CPUs, while the GPU is in the 61st percentile of all GPUs. This disparity suggests that the combo is somewhat CPU-heavy, though the GPU still provides solid performance. The RTX 3070’s average benchmark score of 17208 is modest compared to top-tier GPUs, but its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are adequate for Greedfall’s requirements.

In the context of the benchmark database, a rank of 1224 out of 2938 means the combo is solidly mid-pack. It does not reach the heights of high-end systems but outperforms a majority of configurations. The measured FPS data supports this ranking, as the system delivers playable frame rates at 1440p across all settings and at 4K with medium settings. The combination’s strength lies in its consistency, offering 60+ FPS at 4K High and 100+ FPS at 1440p High, which covers the needs of most gamers.

The rank also highlights the GPU’s limitations. At 4K Ultra, the system falls to 38 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target. This is consistent with the GPU’s 61st percentile ranking, indicating that it is a capable but not top-tier card. Users seeking 4K Ultra performance would need a more powerful GPU, but for 1440p gaming, this combo is well-positioned.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 is based on the Ampere architecture, built on Samsung’s 8 nm process. It features 5888 shading units, 184 texture mapping units, and 96 ROPs, along with 46 ray tracing cores and 184 tensor cores. The GPU has a base clock of 1500 MHz and a boost clock of 1725 MHz, with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus providing 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

The RTX 3070’s synthetic benchmarks show a mixed picture. Its PassMark G3D score is 22214, with a DirectX 12 score of 85 and a DirectX 11 score of 182. The Geekbench OpenCL score is 112821, while the Vulkan score is 21022. These numbers place the GPU in the 61st percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 17208. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT, scores 17083, a 0.7% difference, while the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 is 1% behind and the AMD Radeon HD 7970M is 1.1% behind.

In Greedfall, the GPU’s role is critical at higher resolutions. The measured FPS data shows that the RTX 3070 handles 1080p effortlessly, with 204 FPS at Low settings and 146 FPS at High settings. At 1440p, it maintains 141 FPS at Low and 101 FPS at High, which are strong results. However, at 4K, the GPU begins to struggle. The 84 FPS at Low settings is acceptable, but High settings drop to 60 FPS and Ultra falls to 38 FPS. This pattern indicates that the 8 GB VRAM and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient for most scenarios, but the compute power is insufficient for 4K Ultra.

The GPU’s 1725 MHz boost clock provides solid performance, but it is not enough to overcome the demands of 4K rendering. The 20.31 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is modest by modern standards, and the 46 RT cores are underutilized in this game. The data suggests that the RTX 3070 is best suited for 1080p and 1440p gaming, where it can deliver high frame rates, while 4K requires reducing settings to maintain playability.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest frame rates. Low settings produce an average of 204 FPS, while Medium settings yield 160 FPS with a minimum of 136 FPS and a maximum of 184 FPS. High settings drop to 146 FPS, and Ultra settings fall to 93 FPS. These numbers show that the system is well above the 60 FPS threshold at all settings, making 1080p an easy task for this hardware.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance remains strong. Low settings average 141 FPS, Medium settings produce 111 FPS with a minimum of 94 FPS and a maximum of 128 FPS, and High settings average 101 FPS. Ultra settings drop to 64 FPS, which is still playable but marks a significant decrease from High. The 1440p results indicate that this resolution is the sweet spot for the combo, offering high frame rates with good visual quality.

At 3840x2160, the GPU’s limits become apparent. Low settings average 84 FPS, which is respectable, but Medium settings drop to 66 FPS with a minimum of 56 FPS and a maximum of 76 FPS. High settings average 60 FPS, and Ultra settings fall to 38 FPS. The 4K data shows a clear pattern: the system can handle 4K at Low and Medium settings, but High and Ultra settings require compromises. The 56 FPS minimum at Medium settings indicates occasional frame dips, but the overall experience remains smooth.

The breakdown reveals that the combo is most consistent at 1080p and 1440p, where it maintains high frame rates across all settings. At 4K, users must choose between visual fidelity and performance, with Medium settings being the highest playable option. The measured FPS data aligns with the combo’s rank of 1224 out of 2938, confirming that it is a capable mid-range system for Greedfall.