Inside

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 7 9700F paired with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 lands at rank 2780 out of 2887 tested combos for Inside. That places this configuration in the bottom 4% of all tested systems, a position that reflects the GPU's age more than the CPU's capability. The data shows a stark imbalance: the Ryzen 7 9700F is a top-tier processor sitting in the 94th percentile among all CPUs, while the GTX 1650 rests in the 40th percentile among all GPUs. This is a pairing where one component is clearly holding the other back, and the measured frame rates confirm that story.

The GPU's PassMark G3D score of 7880 puts it within 1% of the Intel Arc A310 (7550), and just 0.3% ahead of the AMD Radeon HD 8850M (7447). In practical terms, this GTX 1650 is competing with entry-level integrated graphics and long-discontinued mobile parts. The CPU, by contrast, scores 36,470 in PassMark multithread and 4,691 in single-thread, with an average benchmark score of 69,996 that sits within 0.9% of the Intel Core i7-14700K (69,355) and within 0.2% of the AMD Ryzen 9 7940HX (69,875). The processor is a modern 8-core, 16-thread Zen 5 part with a 5.50 GHz boost clock; the GPU is a 4 GB Turing-era card with 896 shading units and a 128-bit memory bus.

What this means for Inside is that the game's performance ceiling is dictated almost entirely by the graphics card. The CPU has far more headroom than this puzzle platformer requires, and the measured FPS numbers show the GPU saturating at every resolution. The combo rank of 2780 is not a reflection of a broken system—it is simply what happens when a 94th-percentile CPU is strapped to a 40th-percentile GPU. For a game as light as Inside, the GPU becomes the bottleneck well before the CPU breaks a sweat.

FAQ

Q: Is the Ryzen 7 9700F strong enough for this game?

A: Yes, overwhelmingly. The CPU scores in the 94th percentile of all CPUs, with a PassMark multithread score of 36,470 and a single-thread score of 4,691. The game's frame rates are consistently GPU-limited, so the processor is never the constraint.

Q: How does the GTX 1650 compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The GTX 1650's PassMark G3D score of 7880 places it 0.3% above the AMD Radeon HD 8850M (7447), 0.4% above the Intel UHD Graphics 750 (7441), 0.6% above the AMD Radeon R7 350 (7425), and 1% below the Intel Arc A310 (7550). It is essentially in the same performance bracket as those parts.

Q: What is the best resolution for smooth gameplay?

A: At 1080p with Low settings, the combo averages 134 FPS. At 1440p Low, it drops to 97 FPS. At 4K Low, it still manages 61 FPS. For a 60 FPS target, 4K Low works, but 1440p Low or 1080p Medium (107 FPS) offer more comfortable margins.

Q: Can this combo handle Ultra settings?

A: Technically yes, but not at high frame rates. At 1080p Ultra, the average is 64 FPS. At 1440p Ultra, it falls to 46 FPS, and at 4K Ultra, it drops to 29 FPS. The GPU lacks the raw throughput for consistent high-refresh Ultra gameplay at higher resolutions.

*Q: Does the CPU's 8-core, 16-thread design matter for Inside?*

A: The data suggests it does not. Inside is a puzzle platformer with modest threading requirements. The measured FPS at every settings level is far below what the CPU's PassMark physics score of 2,122 and data compression score of 421,988 would suggest the processor can handle. The GPU is the limiting factor at all tested configurations.

Q: What is the GPU's memory configuration and does it cause issues?

A: The GTX 1650 has 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing 128.1 GB/s of bandwidth. At 4K Ultra, the card averages 29 FPS, which suggests the frame buffer and bandwidth are strained. However, even at 1080p Low, the card is only hitting 134 FPS, indicating compute limits rather than just memory capacity.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data provides a clear hierarchy of playable presets. For a 60 FPS baseline, the safest choice is 1080p Medium, which averages 107 FPS with a minimum of 91 FPS and a maximum of 124 FPS. This gives a comfortable cushion above the 60 FPS threshold with no visible dips below it. At 1440p, Medium drops to 77 FPS average (66 min, 89 max), which is still acceptable for most displays. At 4K, Medium averages 49 FPS with a minimum of 41 FPS, which is borderline for smooth play on a 60 Hz panel.

For players prioritizing frame rate over visual fidelity, 1080p Low delivers 134 FPS average—more than enough for high-refresh monitors. The jump from Low to Medium at 1080p costs 27 FPS (from 134 to 107), while the jump from Medium to High costs another 40 FPS (from 107 to 67). High settings at 1080p still average 67 FPS, but the minimum is not recorded, so there is less certainty about frame pacing. Ultra at 1080p averages 64 FPS, which is technically playable but leaves no headroom.

The best overall experience, based on the measured rows, is 1080p Medium. It offers the highest average FPS with a known minimum above 90 FPS, ensuring no stutter during fast scene transitions. If the display is 1440p, Medium is the recommended preset—77 FPS average with a 66 FPS minimum is smooth for a puzzle platformer. At 4K, Low is the only preset that exceeds 60 FPS (61 average), making it the sole viable option for 4K displays without accepting sub-60 performance.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo produces its best results. Low settings deliver 134 FPS average, which is the highest score across all resolutions and settings. Medium drops to 107 FPS (91 min, 124 max), High falls to 67 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 64 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 27 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 40 FPS—a steeper penalty that suggests the High preset engages more demanding shading effects.

At 2560x1440, the pattern repeats with lower absolute numbers. Low averages 97 FPS, Medium hits 77 FPS (66 min, 89 max), High drops to 48 FPS, and Ultra falls to 46 FPS. The difference between High and Ultra at 1440p is only 2 FPS, indicating that the Ultra preset's additional features are mostly negated by the GPU's memory bandwidth limit. The drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low settings is 37 FPS (from 134 to 97), a 28% reduction.

At 3840x2160, the GPU is clearly struggling. Low averages 61 FPS, Medium averages 49 FPS (41 min, 56 max), High averages 30 FPS, and Ultra averages 29 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 12 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 19 FPS. At 4K, even Low settings barely clear 60 FPS, and the High-to-Ultra difference is just 1 FPS, showing that the GPU has exhausted its computational resources.

Across all settings, the min FPS values are only recorded for Medium presets. At 1080p Medium, the min is 91 FPS; at 1440p Medium, it is 66 FPS; at 4K Medium, it is 41 FPS. These minima represent the worst-case frame times and suggest that Medium settings maintain the most consistent pacing, with the 4K Medium minimum of 41 FPS being the only sub-60 dip in the entire dataset.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals the GPU-bound nature of this pairing. At Low settings, 1080p yields 134 FPS, 1440p yields 97 FPS, and 4K yields 61 FPS. That is a 54% reduction from 1080p to 4K (134 to 61 FPS). At Medium settings, the drop is from 107 FPS at 1080p to 77 FPS at 1440p to 49 FPS at 4K—a 54% reduction as well. At High settings, the numbers go from 67 FPS at 1080p to 48 FPS at 1440p to 30 FPS at 4K, a 55% reduction. At Ultra, the drop is from 64 FPS at 1080p to 46 FPS at 1440p to 29 FPS at 4K, a 55% reduction.

The consistency of these percentage drops—54-55% across all settings—is a textbook sign of a GPU bottleneck. If the CPU were limiting performance, the drop from 1080p to 4K would be much smaller, because the CPU workload would stay constant while the GPU workload increases. Instead, the frame rate scales almost linearly with pixel count, meaning the GTX 1650's shading units, texture units, and memory bandwidth are fully saturated at every resolution.

The Ryzen 7 9700F, with its 8 cores and 16 threads boosting to 5.50 GHz, is nowhere near its limits. The CPU's PassMark data compression score of 421,988 and integer math score of 120,788 indicate massive computational headroom. The game's physics (PassMark physics score of 2,122 on the CPU) and logic are trivial for this processor. The limiting component is unambiguously the GPU: 896 shading units running at a 1,665 MHz boost clock with 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus simply cannot push more pixels, regardless of the CPU's capability.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 9700F is a Zen 5 architecture part built on TSMC's 4 nm process, with a die size of 70.6 mm² containing 8,315 million transistors. It runs at a 3.80 GHz base clock and boosts to 5.50 GHz, drawing a 65 W TDP. The processor supports DDR5 memory on a dual-channel bus with 89.6 GB/s bandwidth and connects via PCIe Gen 5 with 24 lanes. Its production status is active, and it launched on 2025-09-15 at an MSRP of $289.

In the context of Inside, the CPU's role is almost entirely preparatory—it feeds the GPU with draw calls and game logic, but the measured frame rates show that the GPU is the sole performance limiter. The CPU's PassMark single-thread score of 4,691 is in the 94th percentile, and its multithread score of 36,470 is within 0.7% of the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (69,515 avg benchmark score). When comparing the CPU's nearest rivals, the Ryzen 7 9700F's average benchmark score of 69,996 sits 0.2% above the AMD Ryzen 9 7940HX (69,875), 0.7% above the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X (69,515), and 0.9% above the Intel Core i7-14700K (69,355). It is also 0.2% below the Intel Core i7-14700KF (70,163).

The 8-core, 16-thread configuration with 32 MB of shared L3 cache is overkill for a puzzle platformer. The game's genre does not demand heavy multi-threading, and the data confirms this: the FPS at 1080p Low is 134, which is likely near the game's engine limit rather than a reflection of CPU throughput. The CPU's L1 cache is 80 KB per core, L2 is 1 MB per core, and it supports ECC memory, but none of these features materially affect Inside's performance. The processor is simply along for the ride, waiting for the GTX 1650 to catch up.

The GPU's 75 W TDP and lack of power connectors (relying solely on the PCIe slot) underscore its entry-level positioning. With a suggested PSU of 250 W, this combo is power-efficient, but efficiency does not translate to frame rate in a game where the GPU's 2.984 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is the hard ceiling. The CPU's 65 W TDP and 4 nm process make it a far more capable part than the GPU, and any upgrade path would require replacing the graphics card first to unlock the CPU's potential.