Hard West

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 5 3600 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 sits at rank 523 out of 1,699 tested combinations in Hard West, placing it comfortably in the upper third of all systems evaluated. This positioning matters because Hard West is a turn-based tactics title from 2015, a genre that typically does not demand state-of-the-art hardware, yet the combo still outperforms a substantial majority of tested configurations. The rank suggests that this pairing delivers headroom beyond what the game's age would imply, making it a surprisingly capable setup for a title that launched over a decade ago.

Breaking down the components, the RTX 5070 alone ranks in the 83rd percentile among all GPUs, while the Ryzen 5 3600 sits in the 76th percentile among all CPUs. The GPU's higher percentile relative to the CPU indicates that the graphics card is the stronger contributor in this pairing, a dynamic that becomes evident in the frame rate data at higher resolutions. The combo's overall rank of 523 reflects this balance — strong enough to handle modern titles, but for a game like Hard West, the pairing is effectively overqualified, leaving performance headroom that manifests in consistently high frame rates across most settings.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 brings 12 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 192-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 672.0 GB/s. Its base clock runs at 2325 MHz with a boost clock of 2512 MHz, and the memory operates at an effective 28 Gbps. These specifications place the card in the 83rd percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 41,687 that edges out the AMD Radeon Pro 5300 by 0.2% and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 by 0.6%, while trailing the NVIDIA Tesla M40 by 0.5%.

For Hard West, the GPU's role is somewhat paradoxical. The game's turn-based tactical nature means that frame pacing is less critical than in fast-paced genres, but the measured data still shows the RTX 5070 flexing its muscle. At 1080p Ultra, the card delivers 132.7 FPS, which is 61% higher than the 4K Ultra result of 43.5 FPS. The memory bandwidth of 672.0 GB/s is likely overkill for a game of this era, but it ensures that texture streaming and any high-resolution assets are handled without bottlenecking the CPU. The GPU's 30.87 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is more than sufficient for Hard West's visual effects, which do not appear to stress the card's shading units or ray tracing cores — neither of which the game likely utilizes given its 2015 release.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data across all resolutions and settings presets reveals a clear sweet spot. At 1080p, the Medium preset yields 166.4 FPS, which is only 13.3 FPS lower than Low's 179.7 FPS but a substantial 33.7 FPS higher than Ultra's 132.7 FPS. The jump from Medium to Ultra costs 33.7 FPS, a 20% reduction, for what in a turn-based tactics game is likely marginal visual improvement. At 1440p, Medium delivers 144.9 FPS while Ultra drops to 84.9 FPS — a 60 FPS gap that makes Ultra less compelling unless the user prioritizes visual fidelity over frame rate consistency.

At 4K, the picture changes. Medium produces 76.4 FPS, which is playable, but High jumps to 60.8 FPS — still smooth for this genre — and Ultra falls to 43.5 FPS, which may feel sluggish even for turn-based play. The data suggests that Medium is the optimal preset for most users, offering a balance of visual quality and performance that stays above 60 FPS at every resolution tested. For users with high-refresh-rate monitors at 1080p, High at 152.3 FPS is also a strong choice, sacrificing only 14.1 FPS compared to Medium while providing better visuals. Ultra should be reserved for scenarios where frame rate is less critical, such as screenshotting or turn-based analysis where 43.5 FPS at 4K remains functional.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the RTX 5070 and Ryzen 5 3600 produce a tight band of results. Low settings deliver 179.7 FPS, Medium drops to 166.4 FPS, High reaches 152.3 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 132.7 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 47 FPS, indicating that the game's settings have a moderate impact at this resolution, with the GPU never becoming the limiting factor — even at Ultra, the frame rate remains well above 100 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the results show a wider gap between settings. Low produces 153.7 FPS, Medium 144.9 FPS, High 108.2 FPS, and Ultra 84.9 FPS. The gap between High and Ultra is 23.3 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 36.7 FPS, suggesting that the High preset introduces a significant visual feature that taxes the GPU more heavily. At 4K (3840x2160), the settings ladder becomes more pronounced: Low yields 91.1 FPS, Medium 76.4 FPS, High 60.8 FPS, and Ultra 43.5 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is 47.6 FPS, nearly identical to the 1080p spread, but the absolute values are much lower, indicating that resolution scaling is the dominant factor in performance degradation.

FAQ

Q: Is this combo capable of running Hard West at 4K?

A: Yes, at 4K High settings the combo delivers 60.8 FPS, and at Medium it reaches 76.4 FPS. Only the Ultra preset falls below 60 FPS, at 43.5 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 5070 compare to its nearest rivals in benchmark scores?

A: The RTX 5070's average benchmark score is 41,687, which is 0.2% higher than the AMD Radeon Pro 5300, 0.6% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090, and 0.5% lower than the NVIDIA Tesla M40.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1080p, Low settings produce 179.7 FPS while Ultra produces 132.7 FPS, a difference of 47 FPS. The Medium preset sits between them at 166.4 FPS.

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU in this game?

A: The data suggests no significant bottleneck. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 179.7 FPS, and at 4K Low it hits 91.1 FPS, showing that the GPU scales properly with resolution rather than being held back by the CPU.

Q: What is the best settings preset for a 144Hz monitor?

A: At 1440p, Medium delivers 144.9 FPS, which is just above the 144Hz threshold. For 1080p, even Ultra at 132.7 FPS is below 144Hz, but High at 152.3 FPS exceeds it.

Q: How does the combo rank among all tested systems for this game?

A: The combo ranks 523rd out of 1,699 tested combinations, placing it in the top 31% of all systems evaluated for Hard West.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 3600 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor built on the Zen 2 architecture, with a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz. It features 32 MB of shared L3 cache and a 7 nm process node, with a TDP of 65 W. In benchmark tests, it scores 15,045 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2,124 in single-core, while its average benchmark score of 18,129 puts it in the 76th percentile of all CPUs.

In Hard West, the CPU's role is likely minimal given the game's turn-based nature, which does not typically stress multi-threaded performance. The Ryzen 5 3600's nearest rival, the Intel Core i5-11400, scores 18,150, a mere 0.1% difference, indicating that the CPU is competitive with newer mid-range options. The single-thread score of 2,124 in Cinebench R23 is more relevant for game logic and AI calculations, and the data shows that the CPU does not bottleneck the GPU even at 1080p, where the combo still delivers 132.7 FPS at Ultra settings. The 12 threads provide ample headroom for any background processes or turn-based calculations the game might run, though the game's 2015 release likely uses only a fraction of this capability.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals where the bottleneck lies. At Medium settings, the combo produces 166.4 FPS at 1080p, 144.9 FPS at 1440p, and 76.4 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 21.5 FPS, a 13% reduction, while the drop from 1440p to 4K is 68.5 FPS, a 47% reduction. This non-linear scaling suggests that the GPU becomes increasingly dominant as resolution rises, with the CPU's influence fading at 4K.

At Low settings, the scaling is similar: 179.7 FPS at 1080p, 153.7 FPS at 1440p, and 91.1 FPS at 4K. The 4K result is 50% of the 1080p result, indicating that the GPU is the primary limiter at this resolution. Conversely, at Ultra settings, the drop from 1080p (132.7 FPS) to 1440p (84.9 FPS) is 47.8 FPS, a 36% reduction, and then to 4K (43.5 FPS) is another 41.4 FPS, a 49% reduction. This consistent ~50% drop from 1440p to 4K across all settings confirms that the RTX 5070 is the bottleneck at higher resolutions, while the Ryzen 5 3600 is sufficient to feed the GPU at 1080p and 1440p. The data implies that users targeting 4K should stick to Medium or High settings, while 1080p and 1440p users can comfortably use Ultra if they accept the frame rate trade-offs.