Inside

# Inside Performance Analysis: AMD Ryzen 5 8400F + AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT delivers a remarkably fluid experience in Inside, a puzzle platformer that scales gracefully across resolutions and settings. The benchmark data shows this combination handles the game's atmospheric 2.5D environments with ease, producing frame rates that range from a playable 72 FPS at 4K Ultra to an explosive 337 FPS at 1080p Low. This analysis breaks down the measured performance, the roles of each component, and how this pairing stacks up against other tested configurations.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling across resolutions reveals a system that is primarily GPU-bound at higher settings, but the CPU's influence becomes apparent at lower resolutions and settings. At High settings, the average frame rate drops from 168 FPS at 1920x1080 to 121 FPS at 2560x1440—a 28% reduction—and then to 76 FPS at 3840x2160, which is a 37% drop from 1440p. This pattern indicates that the Radeon RX 6700 XT's rendering workload increases substantially with pixel count, as expected.

However, the Low settings data tells a different story. At 1080p Low, the system produces 337 FPS, but this falls to 242 FPS at 1440p Low and 152 FPS at 4K Low. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p here is a 28% decrease, which is proportionally similar to the High settings drop. Yet the jump from 1440p to 4K at Low settings shows a 37% reduction, identical to the High settings pattern. This consistency suggests that while the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions, the CPU still has headroom to push very high frame rates at 1080p.

The Medium settings data, which includes minimum and maximum frame rates, offers additional insight. At 1080p Medium, the average is 269 FPS with a minimum of 229 FPS and a maximum of 310 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 194 FPS with a minimum of 165 FPS and a maximum of 223 FPS. At 4K Medium, the average is 122 FPS with a minimum of 103 FPS and a maximum of 140 FPS. The minimum frame rates scale more steeply than the averages, indicating that occasional frame time spikes become more pronounced at higher resolutions.

The Ultra settings data shows the heaviest load: 160 FPS at 1080p, 115 FPS at 1440p, and 72 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result of 72 FPS remains above the 60 FPS threshold, making it fully playable, but the 55% drop from 1080p Ultra to 4K Ultra highlights how resolution scaling taxes the GPU. Overall, this data suggests that the Ryzen 5 8400F provides ample compute headroom at lower resolutions, while the RX 6700 XT becomes the bottleneck as resolution increases.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT, built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with the Navi 22 chip, provides the graphical horsepower for this pairing. Its 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus delivers 384.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which proves sufficient for Inside's art style at all tested settings. The GPU's base clock of 2321 MHz and boost clock of 2581 MHz, with a game clock of 2424 MHz, allow it to sustain high frame rates across the board.

The GPU's pixel rate of 165.2 GPixel/s and texture rate of 413.0 GTexel/s are key metrics for a game like Inside, which relies heavily on detailed textures and lighting effects in its monochromatic world. The 2560 shading units, 160 TMUs, and 64 ROPs provide the compute resources needed to render the game's intricate shadow work and particle effects. The 40 ray accelerators, while not explicitly used by this game, indicate the architecture's modern feature set.

At 4K Ultra, the RX 6700 XT produces 72 FPS, which demonstrates its capability at the highest resolution and settings. The jump from Ultra to High at 4K—from 72 FPS to 76 FPS—is modest, suggesting that the Ultra preset's additional effects are not particularly demanding in this title. Conversely, at 4K Low, the GPU delivers 152 FPS, showing that when graphical load is reduced, the card can push well beyond 120 FPS even at 4K.

The GPU's benchmark scores corroborate its mid-range positioning. With a PassMark G3D score of 19786 and a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2435, the RX 6700 XT sits in the 72nd percentile among all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Mobile, has an average benchmark score of 27435 versus the RX 6700 XT's 27425, a negligible 0% difference. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 scores 27565, placing it just 0.5% higher, while the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 20 is 1.5% higher at 27839. This tight clustering indicates that the RX 6700 XT performs at a level comparable to much more expensive hardware in synthetic benchmarks.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 8400F, a Zen 4 (Phoenix) architecture processor on the AMD Socket AM5 platform, provides the computational foundation for this system. With 6 cores and 12 threads, running at a base clock of 4.20 GHz and a boost clock of 4.70 GHz, this CPU delivers strong single-threaded and multi-threaded performance. The 16 MB of shared L3 cache, alongside 64 KB L1 and 1 MB L2 per core, ensures low-latency access to frequently used data.

Inside is not a heavily multi-threaded title, but the CPU's 12 threads handle the game's physics, AI, and scene management without issue. The 4.70 GHz boost clock is particularly relevant for single-threaded tasks, and the CPU's Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2943 and multi-core score of 20851 reflect its capability. The PassMark single-thread score of 3685 and multi-thread score of 24389 further confirm that this processor has ample headroom for this game.

The CPU's impact is most visible at 1080p Low settings, where it achieves 337 FPS. This frame rate is high enough that the CPU's per-core performance becomes the limiting factor, as the GPU can render frames faster than the CPU can feed it draw calls. The scaling from 1080p Low to 1440p Low—a 28% drop to 242 FPS—shows that even at lower resolutions, the GPU workload increases enough to shift the bottleneck back to the graphics card.

The Ryzen 5 8400F's 77th percentile ranking among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 25005, places it in a competitive position. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F, scores 24964, a mere 0.2% difference. The Intel Core i7-11850H scores 24935 (0.3% higher), the Intel Core i7-13620H scores 24911 (0.4% higher), and the AMD EPYC 9474F scores 25103 (0.4% lower). This clustering shows that the 8400F's performance is well within the expected range for its class, with no significant advantages or disadvantages over its closest competitors.

How This Combo Ranks

Among all tested combinations in the database, this pairing of the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F with the AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT ranks 1806 out of 3716 combos for Inside. This places it in the upper half of all configurations, at approximately the 51st percentile. Given that the database includes both much more powerful and much less capable hardware, this ranking suggests a balanced mid-range system that can deliver a smooth experience in this title.

The ranking is influenced by both components' individual performance. The CPU's 77th percentile ranking and the GPU's 72nd percentile ranking both contribute to a system that sits above the median. However, the combo rank of 1806 is lower than either component's individual percentile would suggest, indicating that Inside may be more sensitive to GPU performance than CPU performance in this configuration. The fact that this combo achieves 72 FPS at 4K Ultra—the most demanding tested scenario—shows that it can handle even the heaviest load without dropping below playable frame rates.

When compared to other combos that might pair the RX 6700 XT with a different CPU, the data suggests that the Ryzen 5 8400F provides sufficient headroom. The CPU's boost clock of 4.70 GHz ensures that it won't bottleneck the GPU in this title, even at high frame rates. Conversely, pairing a stronger CPU with the RX 6700 XT would likely yield diminishing returns, as the GPU becomes the limiting factor at higher resolutions and settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data covers three resolutions and four settings levels, providing a comprehensive view of performance. At 1920x1080, the system delivers 160 FPS on Ultra, 168 FPS on High, 269 FPS on Medium (minimum 229, maximum 310), and 337 FPS on Low. The jump from High to Medium is substantial—a 60% increase—while the jump from Medium to Low is a further 25% increase. This suggests that the Medium preset offers a sweet spot for high-refresh-rate monitors, while Low settings are only necessary for extreme frame rates.

At 2560x1440, the frame rates are 115 FPS on Ultra, 121 FPS on High, 194 FPS on Medium (minimum 165, maximum 223), and 242 FPS on Low. The scaling from 1080p shows a consistent 25-30% reduction across all settings. The Medium preset at 1440p still delivers 194 FPS, which is well above the refresh rate of most 1440p monitors. Even the Ultra preset at 115 FPS provides a comfortable margin over 60 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops to 72 FPS on Ultra, 76 FPS on High, 122 FPS on Medium (minimum 103, maximum 140), and 152 FPS on Low. The Ultra preset at 4K remains playable but leaves less headroom for frame time spikes. The Medium preset at 122 FPS is the recommended setting for 4K displays, as it provides a smooth experience with a minimum of 103 FPS. The Low preset at 152 FPS shows that the GPU has significant untapped potential when graphical effects are minimized.

The data reveals an interesting pattern across all resolutions: the difference between Ultra and High settings is minimal (typically 4-5 FPS), while the difference between High and Medium is large (typically 50-100 FPS). This indicates that the High preset includes most of the demanding effects, while the Medium preset removes significant computational load. Players seeking maximum visual fidelity can use High settings with almost no frame rate penalty compared to Ultra, while those prioritizing performance can drop to Medium for a substantial boost.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution and settings combination for a 60 FPS target?

A: All tested configurations exceed 60 FPS, with the lowest result being 72 FPS at 4K Ultra. For a 60 FPS target, even the most demanding settings at 4K are sufficient, leaving substantial headroom.

*Q: How does the RX 6700 XT's memory configuration affect performance in Inside?*

A: The 12 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 192-bit bus, providing 384.0 GB/s bandwidth, is more than sufficient for this game. The texture-heavy art style and particle effects are handled without memory capacity or bandwidth constraints at any tested resolution.

Q: Is the Ryzen 5 8400F a bottleneck for the RX 6700 XT in this game?

A: The data suggests minimal CPU bottlenecking. At 1080p Low, the 337 FPS result approaches the CPU's practical limit, but at higher resolutions and settings, the GPU becomes the limiting factor. The CPU's 4.70 GHz boost clock and strong single-threaded performance (Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2943) ensure it keeps pace with the GPU.

Q: What frame rates can I expect at 1440p with High settings?

A: The measured average is 121 FPS at 2560x1440 with High settings. This is well above the refresh rate of most 1440p monitors, providing a smooth experience. The minimum frame rate was not recorded for this configuration, but the Medium settings data shows a minimum of 165 FPS.

Q: How does this combo's ranking compare to its component parts?

A: The combo ranks 1806 out of 3716 tested configurations, placing it in the upper half. The CPU ranks in the 77th percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU ranks in the 72nd percentile of all GPUs, suggesting that the system is well-balanced for this title.

Q: Is the difference between Ultra and High settings worth the frame rate cost?

A: The frame rate difference between Ultra and High is minimal—only 4-5 FPS at each resolution. Since Ultra delivers 160 FPS at 1080p, 115 FPS at 1440p, and 72 FPS at 4K, choosing Ultra over High provides the best visual quality with virtually no performance penalty, making it the recommended choice for this game.