Inside

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 7800 XT delivers overwhelming performance for Inside, a puzzle platformer that has modest system demands. The benchmark data shows that this combination produces high frame rates across all tested settings and resolutions, though the scaling patterns reveal notable bottlenecks that vary depending on where you look.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is significant, but the magnitude depends heavily on the quality preset. At Low settings, the average FPS falls from 280.7 at 1920x1080 to 185.4 at 3840x2160, a reduction of approximately 34%. At Medium settings, the drop is steeper, going from 258.1 at 1080p down to 148.8 at 4K, a 42% decrease. High settings show a similar pattern, with 206.8 at 1080p falling to 94.4 at 4K, a 54% decline. Ultra settings present the largest relative drop, from 195.1 at 1080p to 89.2 at 4K, a 54% reduction.

These scaling numbers tell a clear story about the limiting component. At 1080p Low, the system is hitting a ceiling that is not purely GPU-bound. The 280.7 FPS at Low settings versus 258.1 at Medium shows only an 8% gap, suggesting the CPU or some other system limit is starting to cap the output. At 4K, the differences between presets become much wider, with Low hitting 185.4 and Ultra hitting 89.2. That 96.2 FPS spread indicates the GPU is the primary constraint at higher resolutions, as the render load increases with each quality tier.

The transition from 1440p to 4K is particularly punishing. At High settings, 147.7 at 1440p becomes 94.4 at 4K, a 36% loss. The jump from 1080p to 1440p at High settings only costs about 29% of the frame rate, from 206.8 to 147.7. This non-linear scaling is typical of a GPU that has to work progressively harder as pixel count rises, but it also shows that the RX 7800 XT has enough headroom at 1080p to make the CPU the more visible bottleneck.

GPU Role

The RX 7800 XT brings 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, yielding 624.1 GB/s of bandwidth. That memory configuration is substantial for a game like Inside, which does not feature demanding texture streaming or large open-world assets. The benchmark results show that even at 4K Ultra, the GPU sustains 89.2 FPS, which is far above the refresh rate of most displays.

The clocks on this card are worth noting. The base clock sits at 1295 MHz, while the boost clock reaches 2430 MHz, with a game clock of 2124 MHz. That boost behavior explains why the GPU can scale so well across resolutions. The memory runs at 2438 MHz, or 19.5 Gbps effective, which helps feed the 256-bit bus. The 3840 shading units and 240 TMUs provide ample geometry and texture throughput for a game with Inside's visual style.

The GPU's benchmark scores reinforce this picture. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 4157 and Passmark G3D score of 24176 place it in the 76th percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA P104-100, which scores 32747 and trails by 0.4%, and the AMD FirePro S9300 X2, which scores 32540 and leads by 0.2%. Those are close margins, but the RX 7800 XT's real-world gaming performance in Inside shows it is clearly not the limiting factor at 1080p or 1440p with this CPU.

CPU Role

The Ryzen 5 5500 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Zen 3 architecture, running on the AM4 socket. Its base clock is 3.60 GHz, boosting to 4.20 GHz. That clock speed is modest by modern standards, but the architecture's efficiency compensates. The 16 MB of L3 cache and 51.2 GB/s memory bandwidth are adequate for a title that does not scale heavily with thread count.

The CPU benchmark data shows a processor that is capable but not exceptional. The Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 16429, while the single-core score is 2319. The 3DMark single-thread score is 836, and the max-thread score is 5411. The Passmark single-thread score is 3058, with a multithread score of 19330. These numbers place the CPU in the 79th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 20875.

Its nearest rivals are tightly clustered. The Intel Core i5-12500 scores 20897, just 0.1% ahead, while the AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 4655GE scores 20900, also 0.1% ahead. The AMD EPYC 7J13 scores 20845, 0.1% behind. This tight grouping means the 5500 is not leaving performance on the table relative to its peers, but it is also not a standout.

In Inside, the CPU's role becomes evident at 1080p Low settings. The 280.7 FPS result is the highest across all tested configurations, yet the gap between Low and Medium at 1080p is only 22.6 FPS, from 280.7 to 258.1. At 1440p, the gap between Low and Medium is 16.1 FPS, from 251.3 to 235.2. These smaller gaps at lower resolutions suggest the CPU is nearing its output limit, preventing the GPU from fully stretching its legs. At 4K, the gap between Low and Medium widens to 36.6 FPS, from 185.4 to 148.8, indicating the GPU is now the dominant factor.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data strongly favors Medium settings for most use cases. At 1440p Medium, the system delivers 235.2 FPS, which is only 6.4% lower than the 251.3 FPS at Low settings but offers noticeably better visual quality. At 1080p Medium, the 258.1 FPS result is within 8% of the Low preset's 280.7 FPS, making Medium a sensible default for high-refresh displays.

For 4K users, Medium is still the best choice. The 148.8 FPS average at 4K Medium is well above the 94.4 FPS at High and the 89.2 FPS at Ultra. The jump from Medium to High at 4K costs 54.4 FPS, a 37% reduction, which is a steep price for what is likely a modest visual improvement in a game with Inside's art direction. Low at 4K hits 185.4 FPS, but the visual compromise is probably not worth the extra 36.6 FPS over Medium.

Ultra settings are difficult to recommend. At 1080p Ultra, the system hits 195.1 FPS, which is still high, but the 11.7 FPS gap between High and Ultra at 1080p is small. At 1440p Ultra, the 138.5 FPS result is 9.2 FPS below High's 147.7 FPS. At 4K Ultra, the 89.2 FPS is the lowest result in the entire dataset. The performance cost of Ultra does not align with the visual return, especially when Medium offers such high frame rates across the board.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination ranks 658th out of 1671 tested combos for Inside, placing it in the 61st percentile of all systems. That is a solid mid-tier ranking, though not exceptional. The ranking reflects the CPU's relative weakness compared to the GPU. The RX 7800 XT is a high-end card, but the Ryzen 5 5500 holds it back in CPU-bound scenarios, which is exactly what happens at 1080p Low and Medium settings.

The data suggests that this combo is best suited for 1440p or 4K gaming, where the GPU takes over as the primary driver. At those resolutions, the 5500's single-thread performance is sufficient to keep the frame pipeline fed, and the RX 7800 XT's compute power shines. The ranking of 658 out of 1671 is not a reflection of poor hardware, but rather a sign that the pairing is slightly unbalanced for a game that runs so easily on modern components.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system produces 280.7 FPS on Low, 258.1 FPS on Medium, 206.8 FPS on High, and 195.1 FPS on Ultra. The spread from Low to Ultra is 85.6 FPS, with the largest single drop occurring between Medium and High at 51.3 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the results are 251.3 FPS on Low, 235.2 FPS on Medium, 147.7 FPS on High, and 138.5 FPS on Ultra. The gap between Medium and High widens to 87.5 FPS, showing that the GPU starts to feel the load more at this resolution. The difference between High and Ultra narrows to just 9.2 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the system delivers 185.4 FPS on Low, 148.8 FPS on Medium, 94.4 FPS on High, and 89.2 FPS on Ultra. The drop from Low to Medium is 36.6 FPS, from Medium to High is 54.4 FPS, and from High to Ultra is only 5.2 FPS. The small High-to-Ultra gap at 4K suggests that Ultra is not adding much render cost over High, but the Medium-to-High jump is substantial.

The overall pattern is clear. This system is overkill for Inside at 1080p, where even Ultra settings exceed 195 FPS. At 1440p, it remains highly playable across all presets. At 4K, it stays above 89 FPS in every configuration, which is more than adequate for a puzzle platformer. The Ryzen 5 5500 is the weaker link in this pairing, but it does not cause any playability issues at any tested setting. The RX 7800 XT provides enough headroom that even the most demanding settings remain smooth.