Inside

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and AMD Radeon RX 570 pairing delivers a playable but decidedly mid-range experience in Inside, a puzzle platformer that is far more forgiving than most modern 3D titles. The data shows a combo that can handle 1080p with ease, struggles at 4K, and offers a clear path to smooth gameplay through settings adjustments.

Resolution Scaling

The measured data reveals a steep performance cliff as resolution climbs, pointing directly at the GPU as the primary bottleneck. At 1080p with Low settings, the system produces an average of 135 FPS. Moving to 1440p at the same settings, the average drops to 97 FPS, and at 4K it falls further to 61 FPS. This scaling pattern—a 28% reduction from 1080p to 1440p and another 37% reduction from 1440p to 4K—is characteristic of a GPU that is being saturated by pixel count.

The story becomes clearer when examining the High preset. At 1080p, the average is 68 FPS. At 1440p, it drops to 49 FPS, and at 4K it bottoms out at 31 FPS. The 4K High result is barely playable, suggesting the RX 570's 4 GB frame buffer and 224.0 GB/s memory bandwidth are being overwhelmed. The gap between Low and High at 4K is a massive 30 FPS (61 vs. 31), which confirms that the GPU's shading units and texture rate—159.2 GTexel/s—are working far beyond their comfortable envelope at high resolution.

Notably, the CPU does not appear to be a limiting factor at any resolution. The Ryzen 5 8400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads boosting to 4.70 GHz, provides ample headroom. The FPS drops are almost entirely attributable to the GPU's rendering load, which is typical for a game like Inside that relies on 2D-style rendering and simple geometry rather than complex physics or AI. The data indicates that if you are targeting 4K, you are firmly GPU-bound; at 1080p, the system has enough headroom to push far beyond 60 FPS, and the CPU will not hold you back.

How This Combo Ranks

In the grand scheme of tested hardware combinations, this pairing sits near the bottom. The combo rank in Inside is 3523 out of 3716 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 5% of all systems measured. This is a stark reminder that while the RX 570 was once a capable 1080p card, and the Ryzen 5 8400F is a modern 6-core processor, the combination is severely constrained by the aging GPU.

To put this in perspective, the CPU's average benchmark score is 25005, which places it at the 77th percentile of all CPUs. It sits within 0.4% of the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F (24964) and 0.3% of the Intel Core i7-11850H (24935). The GPU, however, is a different story. Its average benchmark score is 28766, which is 0.4% lower than the AMD Radeon RX 6800M (28874) and 0.8% lower than the AMD Radeon RX 470 (28996). These rival deltas are small, but the raw ranking—3523 out of 3716—tells you that the GPU is dragging the entire system down in this specific title.

The implication is clear: the Ryzen 5 8400F is not the problem. If you were to pair this CPU with a stronger GPU, the combo rank would improve dramatically. As it stands, the data shows a system that is performing at the level of its weakest link, and that link is the RX 570. The ranking is a warning that this combo will not excel in any resolution above 1080p, and even at 1080p, it is only average.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 570 is the defining component in this build, and its specifications explain the measured results. Built on the Polaris 20 chip with GCN 4.0 architecture, it features 2048 shading units, 128 TMUs, and 32 ROPs. Its base clock is 1168 MHz with a boost of 1244 MHz, and it is paired with 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

These numbers matter when interpreting the FPS data. The 4 GB frame buffer is the most likely culprit for the 4K performance collapse. At 3840x2160, the game requires more memory for textures and framebuffers, and the card's capacity is insufficient to maintain smooth operation. The drop from 49 FPS at Medium to 31 FPS at High at 4K suggests that the card is not just fill-rate limited but is also hitting memory capacity walls.

The card's pixel rate of 39.81 GPixel/s and texture rate of 159.2 GTexel/s are modest by today's standards. These figures correlate directly with the measured FPS: at 1080p, the card can push 135 FPS on Low settings, showing that its raw compute is adequate for low-resolution work. However, at 4K, the pixel throughput becomes the bottleneck, capping performance at 61 FPS on Low settings.

The GPU's 150 W TDP and 1x 6-pin power connector are also worth noting, as they indicate that this is an older, less efficient design. The card's 14 nm process node from GlobalFoundries is a generation behind, but for a game like Inside, which is not graphically demanding, it can still deliver playable results if settings are managed appropriately. The data shows that the GPU is the absolute ceiling for performance, and no amount of CPU headroom will overcome its limitations.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS, the best experience is found at 1080p with Medium settings. This configuration yields an average of 108 FPS with a minimum of 92 FPS and a maximum of 124 FPS. The minimum frame rate is well above the 60 FPS threshold, ensuring a smooth and consistent experience without any noticeable stutter. The jump from Low to Medium costs only 27 FPS (135 to 108) while providing a significant visual upgrade, making it the sweet spot for this hardware.

At 1440p, Medium settings are also viable, producing an average of 78 FPS with a minimum of 66 FPS. This is still a playable experience, and the visual fidelity at 1440p is better than at 1080p. However, the margin for error is thinner, and the 66 FPS minimum is closer to the edge of what most players would consider smooth. If you prefer a locked 60 FPS experience, High settings at 1440p (49 FPS average) are not recommended, as they will dip below that threshold.

Avoid Ultra settings at all resolutions. At 1080p, Ultra yields an average of 64 FPS, which is only marginally above the 60 FPS line and will be prone to dips. At 1440p, Ultra drops to 46 FPS, and at 4K it falls to 29 FPS. The performance cost of Ultra over High is not justified by the visual gains in a game like Inside. For 4K, Low settings are the only option that remains playable, averaging 61 FPS, but you will sacrifice visual quality. The practical recommendation is to stick with 1080p Medium for the best balance of frame rate and image quality.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The data provides a complete matrix of performance across three resolutions and four settings levels. At 1920x1080, the system averages 135 FPS on Low, 108 FPS on Medium (with a range of 92-124 FPS), 68 FPS on High, and 64 FPS on Ultra. This demonstrates that at 1080p, the GPU has enough headroom to handle even High settings, though Ultra pushes it to the limit.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages drop to 97 FPS on Low, 78 FPS on Medium (range of 66-89 FPS), 49 FPS on High, and 46 FPS on Ultra. The gap between Medium and High at 1440p is 29 FPS, which is a significant jump that reflects the increased shading load. The High and Ultra results are both below 60 FPS, making them unsuitable for smooth gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the performance is largely marginal. Low settings average 61 FPS, which is just playable. Medium averages 49 FPS (range of 42-56 FPS), High averages 31 FPS, and Ultra averages 29 FPS. The 4K results are consistent with a GPU that is overwhelmed; the difference between Medium and High is 18 FPS, and the difference between High and Ultra is only 2 FPS, indicating that the card has hit a hard ceiling. The minimum FPS of 42 at 4K Medium is particularly telling, as it shows that even the "playable" preset can stutter under load.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F is a modern 6-core, 12-thread processor from the 8000 series, built on Zen 4 architecture (Phoenix codename) using a 4 nm process from TSMC. Its base clock is 4.20 GHz with a boost of 4.70 GHz, and it has 16 MB of shared L3 cache. In the context of Inside, this CPU is overkill.

The game's simple puzzle-platformer mechanics do not require significant multi-threaded performance. The CPU's Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 20851 and single-core score of 2943 are far above what this game demands. The measured FPS data confirms this: there is no scenario where the CPU limits performance. Even at 1080p Low, where the GPU is producing 135 FPS, the CPU is not a bottleneck.

The CPU's nearest rivals in the benchmark database are the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F (0.2% higher score), Intel Core i7-11850H (0.3% higher), and Intel Core i7-13620H (0.4% higher). These deltas are negligible and have no impact on Inside's frame rates. The CPU's 77th percentile ranking among all CPUs further underscores that it is not the weak link in this system.

If you were to upgrade the GPU, this CPU would have ample headroom to support a much faster card. The data suggests that the Ryzen 5 8400F is a future-proof component for this game, but it is currently held back by the RX 570. For Inside specifically, the CPU's role is to stay out of the way, and it does so admirably, leaving all performance decisions to the GPU.