Hard West

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The measured frame rates for this combination show a clear, predictable scaling pattern as resolution climbs, but the drop-off is steeper than a purely GPU-bound scenario would suggest. At 1080p High, the combo delivers 117 FPS average; moving to 1440p High drops that to 74 FPS (−37%), and 4K High lands at 39 FPS (−67% from 1080p). The Ultra preset tells a similar story: 88 FPS at 1080p, 55 FPS at 1440p, and 29 FPS at 4K. That 4K Ultra result is the only sub-30 reading in the entire table, and it signals that the RTX 4060's 8 GB GDDR6 frame buffer and 128-bit memory bus are being pushed to their practical limits at 3840x2160 with maximum quality settings.

What is more revealing is the Low preset scaling. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 186 FPS — a figure that is nearly double the High preset result at the same resolution. At 1440p Low, it still holds 118 FPS, and at 4K Low it manages 62 FPS. The fact that 4K Low (62 FPS) is close to 1440p High (74 FPS) indicates that the game's visual quality settings have a larger impact on the frame rate than the raw pixel count alone. The Low-to-High gap at 1080p is 69 FPS (186 vs 117), while the 1080p-to-4K gap at High is 78 FPS (117 vs 39). Both are significant, but the settings sensitivity suggests the title is not purely resolution-bound; it responds strongly to shader complexity and post-processing loads.

The Medium preset offers the only complete min/max data in the pack, and it provides a useful window into frame pacing. At 1080p Medium, the average is 152 FPS with a minimum of 129 and maximum of 175 — a 46 FPS spread that indicates some scene-to-scene variability but no catastrophic hitches. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 96 FPS with a min of 82 and max of 111, a 29 FPS spread that is tighter in relative terms. At 4K Medium, the average is 51 FPS with a min of 43 and max of 58 — the narrowest absolute spread (15 FPS) of all three resolutions, which suggests that at 4K the system is consistently saturated rather than occasionally bottlenecked.

Interpreting the limiting component: at 1080p, the Ryzen 5 7500F's six Zen 4 cores with a 5.00 GHz boost clock are capable of feeding the RTX 4060 well beyond 150 FPS in most presets, so the GPU is the primary ceiling. At 4K, the GPU's 15.11 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 272.0 GB/s bandwidth become the dominant constraint, and the CPU headroom is largely irrelevant. The 1440p results sit in an intermediate zone where both components contribute, but the scaling from 1440p High (74 FPS) to 4K High (39 FPS) is a 47% reduction, which is close to the theoretical pixel-count increase of 2.25× — meaning the GPU is doing the heavy lifting at that point. The 1080p-to-1440p High drop of 37% is smaller than the pixel-count delta, indicating that the CPU is still partially engaged at 1080p and the transition to 1440p is not purely GPU-limited.

Settings Recommendations — which preset gives the best experience per the measured rows

The data supports a clear recommendation: at 1080p, Medium is the sweet spot because it delivers 152 FPS average with a documented minimum of 129 FPS, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth turn-based tactical play and leaves ample headroom for any action sequences. The High preset at 1080p (117 FPS) is also comfortable, but the 35 FPS gap between Medium and High at the same resolution is a substantial visual-quality cost for a modest fidelity gain — and since the game is turn-based, the extra frames beyond 120 are largely superfluous. Ultra at 1080p (88 FPS) is playable but represents a 42% reduction from Medium, which is a poor trade for marginal visual improvements in a genre that does not demand twitch reflexes.

At 1440p, Medium is again the recommended preset. The 96 FPS average with an 82 FPS minimum is smooth and stable, and it is 22 FPS higher than the High preset's 74 FPS. The Low preset at 1440p (118 FPS) is faster but likely sacrifices too much visual detail for a tactical game where reading the battlefield is important. Ultra at 1440p (55 FPS) is below the 60 FPS line and will feel less fluid, especially during camera pans or unit animations, so it is not recommended unless the user prioritizes maximum visuals over responsiveness.

At 4K, the situation is more constrained. Medium is the only preset that stays above 50 FPS (51 FPS average, 43 FPS minimum), and that minimum is still playable for turn-based tactics where input latency is less critical. High at 4K (39 FPS) is borderline, and Ultra at 4K (29 FPS) is effectively a slideshow for any motion on screen. Low at 4K (62 FPS) is the only preset that clears 60 FPS at this resolution, but the visual degradation from Low settings at 4K is likely severe, and the game's art style may not benefit from the higher pixel density if all shadows and effects are stripped out. The recommendation for 4K is Medium as the best compromise, with the understanding that the 43 FPS minimum will occasionally dip below the ideal smoothness threshold.

Across all resolutions, the pattern is consistent: Medium offers the best balance of visual fidelity and frame rate, and it is the only preset that has full min/max data confirming stable performance. The absence of min/max data for High, Low, and Ultra means those presets should be treated with slightly more caution, though the averages are consistent with the Medium preset's scaling behavior.

How This Combo Ranks — use comboRankInGame vs other tested combos

In the benchmark database for Hard West, this combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 ranks 2013 out of 3722 tested combos. That places it in the 54th percentile of all system pairings — slightly above the median, but far from the top tier. The rank reflects the fact that the RTX 4060 is a mainstream GPU (61st percentile among all GPUs in the database) paired with a strong mid-range CPU (77th percentile among all CPUs), so the combo is balanced but not exceptional for this title.

The CPU's percentile ranking is notably higher than the GPU's: the Ryzen 5 7500F sits at the 77th percentile of all CPUs, while the RTX 4060 sits at the 61st percentile of all GPUs. This asymmetry matters for Hard West, because the game is turn-based and does not heavily stress the CPU during normal play — the six-core, twelve-thread processor with a 3.70 GHz base and 5.00 GHz boost is more than sufficient for the game's logic, and the bottleneck in most measured scenarios is the GPU. The combo rank of 2013/3722 suggests that there are roughly 1,700 combos that outperform this one in Hard West, which is expected given that many tested systems pair higher-tier GPUs with similar or better CPUs.

Looking at the GPU's nearest rivals in the database, the RTX 4060's average benchmark score of 17639 is within 0.7% of the AMD Radeon Pro 460 (17509, +0.7% delta) and within 0.3% of the AMD Radeon 780M (17588, +0.3% delta). This means the RTX 4060 is statistically indistinguishable from those GPUs in synthetic benchmarks, and the measured FPS in Hard West reflects that mid-pack positioning. The CPU's nearest rivals tell a similar story: the Ryzen 5 7500F's average score of 24964 is within 0.4% of the Intel Core 5 210H (24872, +0.4% delta) and within 0.2% of the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F (25005, −0.2% delta), confirming that the processor is in a tightly contested performance band.

The practical takeaway from the combo rank is that this system is a solid 1080p and 1440p performer for Hard West, but it will struggle at 4K Ultra. The 2013rd position out of 3722 means that users with this combo should not expect top-tier 4K performance, but the measured FPS data shows that 1080p and 1440p gameplay is well within acceptable ranges for the genre.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

The measured FPS table contains 12 data points across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the Low preset averages 186 FPS, Medium averages 152 FPS (min 129, max 175), High averages 117 FPS, and Ultra averages 88 FPS. The progression from Low to Ultra is a 98 FPS drop, with the largest single-step decline occurring between Medium and High (35 FPS). The Medium preset's min/max spread of 46 FPS is the widest of any resolution-preset combination in the dataset, indicating that 1080p Medium experiences the most scene-to-scene variability — likely due to CPU involvement in certain scenes.

At 2560x1440, Low averages 118 FPS, Medium averages 96 FPS (min 82, max 111), High averages 74 FPS, and Ultra averages 55 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra drop is 63 FPS, and the Medium min/max spread narrows to 29 FPS. The step from Medium to High (22 FPS) is the largest single drop at this resolution, similar to the 1080p pattern. The Ultra preset at 1440p (55 FPS) is the first sub-60 reading in the dataset, and it signals that the RTX 4060's 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit bus are beginning to throttle at this resolution with maximum settings.

At 3840x2160, Low averages 62 FPS, Medium averages 51 FPS (min 43, max 58), High averages 39 FPS, and Ultra averages 29 FPS. The Low-to-Ultra drop is 33 FPS, and the Medium min/max spread narrows further to 15 FPS. The step from Medium to High (12 FPS) is smaller in absolute terms than at lower resolutions, but the relative impact is larger because the starting point is already low. The 4K Ultra result of 29 FPS is the only reading below 30 FPS in the entire dataset, and it confirms that this combo is not suitable for 4K Ultra in Hard West.

Comparing across resolutions for each preset: Low scales from 186 (1080p) to 118 (1440p) to 62 (4K) — a 67% reduction from 1080p to 4K. Medium scales from 152 to 96 to 51 — a 66% reduction. High scales from 117 to 74 to 39 — a 67% reduction. Ultra scales from 88 to 55 to 29 — a 67% reduction. The consistency of the 66–67% reduction across all presets indicates that resolution scaling is uniform regardless of settings, which is the signature of a GPU-bound workload at higher resolutions. The absolute FPS values, however, vary widely by preset, confirming that the game's settings have a multiplicative effect on the base performance level.

FAQ

Q: Is this combo capable of 60 FPS at 4K in Hard West?

A: Only at Low settings, where the average is 62 FPS. At Medium, the average drops to 51 FPS with a minimum of 43 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS threshold. High (39 FPS) and Ultra (29 FPS) are both well under 60 FPS.

Q: What is the best resolution for this system in Hard West?

A: The data supports 1440p Medium as the optimal choice, delivering 96 FPS average with an 82 FPS minimum. This is well above the 60 FPS line and provides a significant visual upgrade over 1080p. 1080p Medium (152 FPS) is also excellent if the user prioritizes maximum frame rates.

Q: How does the Ryzen 5 7500F compare to its nearest CPU rivals?

A: The CPU's average benchmark score is 24964, which is within 0.4% of the Intel Core 5 210H (24872, +0.4% delta) and within 0.2% of the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F (25005, −0.2% delta). It essentially trades blows with those processors, with differences that are within measurement noise.

Q: Is the RTX 4060 the bottleneck in this system for Hard West?

A: At 1080p and 1440p, the GPU is the primary limiter at High and Ultra presets, but the CPU is also engaged at 1080p Low (186 FPS) where the frame rate approaches the GPU's practical ceiling. At 4K, the GPU is unequivocally the bottleneck, as evidenced by the uniform 66–67% FPS reduction across all presets when moving from 1080p to 4K.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded for this combo?

A: The lowest minimum FPS in the dataset is 43 FPS, recorded at 4K Medium. The highest minimum is 129 FPS at 1080p Medium. The min/max data is only available for the Medium preset; other presets have no min/max values recorded.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested systems for Hard West?

A: It ranks 2013 out of 3722 combos, placing it in the 54th percentile. This is a mid-pack result, consistent with the GPU's 61st percentile and the CPU's 77th percentile rankings in their respective benchmark pools.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Ryzen 5 7500F is a six-core, twelve-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture, built on TSMC's 5 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz, with 64 KB of L1 cache per core, 1 MB of L2 per core, and 32 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU supports DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration with a bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s, and it is unlocked for overclocking. Its TDP is 65 W, and it uses the AMD Socket AM5 platform with PCIe Gen 5 (24 lanes, CPU only).

In Hard West, a turn-based tactics title, the CPU's role is primarily in game logic, pathfinding, and AI decision-making — tasks that rarely demand more than a few threads. The 3DMark multi-threaded scores show a scaling pattern: 1902 for 2 threads, 3621 for 4 threads, 5372 for 8 threads, and 6376 for 16 threads (with max threads scoring 6379). This indicates that the processor scales well up to 8 threads, but the gains from 8 to 16 threads are minimal (about 19%), which is typical for a six-core part with simultaneous multithreading. The single-thread score of 974 in 3DMark and 3218 in Cinebench R23 single-core are strong, confirming that the 5.00 GHz boost clock provides excellent per-core performance for games that are lightly threaded.

The CPU's percentile ranking of 77 among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 24964, places it in the upper quarter of processors. Its nearest rivals — the Intel Core i7-11850H (24935, +0.1% delta), AMD Ryzen 5 8400F (25005, −0.2% delta), Intel Core i7-13620H (24911, +0.2% delta), and Intel Core 5 210H (24872, +0.4% delta) — are all within 0.4% of its average score, meaning that in practical terms, the 7500F is interchangeable with those CPUs for gaming workloads.

For Hard West specifically, the measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the combo reaches 186 FPS, which is high enough that the CPU could become a secondary limiter in certain scenes (the 46 FPS min/max spread at 1080p Medium hints at occasional CPU-driven hitches). However, at 1440p and 4K, the GPU is clearly the dominant constraint, and the CPU's 12 threads are more than adequate for the game's turn-based logic. The 65 W TDP and 5 nm process mean the CPU runs cool and efficient, which is beneficial for sustained gaming sessions without thermal throttling. The combination of six fast Zen 4 cores and 32 MB of L3 cache provides ample headroom for the game's AI and pathfinding calculations, and the DDR5 memory bandwidth of 83.2 GB/s ensures that data-heavy scenes do not starve the GPU.