Inside

# Inside — Intel Core i5-13400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti

The Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti combination delivers an exceptionally strong experience in Inside, a puzzle platformer that is far more demanding at high frame rates than its minimalist art style suggests. At 1080p, this rig pushes well beyond 300 FPS on Low settings, and even at 4K Ultra it maintains a playable 74 FPS average. The data positions this combo in the 1714th rank out of 3716 tested configurations, placing it in the upper half of all systems, with the CPU scoring in the 77th percentile and the GPU in the 59th percentile among their respective categories.

FAQ

*Q: What is the maximum average frame rate this system can achieve in Inside?*

A: The highest recorded average is 333 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. This drops to 277 FPS at Medium, 173 FPS at High, and 165 FPS at Ultra for the same resolution.

Q: How does the system perform at 4K resolution with maximum settings?

A: At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS is 74. With High settings, it reaches 78 FPS, while Medium yields 125 FPS and Low delivers 156 FPS at the same resolution.

Q: Is the RTX 3060 Ti or the i5-13400F the limiting factor in this game?

A: The resolution scaling data points to the GPU as the primary limiter. Moving from 1080p to 4K at High settings reduces average FPS from 173 to 78, a 55% drop. If the CPU were the bottleneck, this scaling would be far less pronounced.

Q: What is the best settings preset for a 144Hz monitor at 1440p?

A: Medium settings at 2560x1440 provide a 199 FPS average with a minimum of 169 FPS, comfortably exceeding 144Hz. High settings at the same resolution deliver 124 FPS, which is below the 144Hz threshold.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in overall benchmark scores?

A: The i5-13400F has an average benchmark score of 25292, placing it within 0.4% of the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS (25284) and 0.3% behind the Intel Core 5 120 (25362) and AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D (25365).

Q: What memory configuration does the i5-13400F support?

A: The CPU supports both DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration. The L3 cache is 20 MB shared across its 10 cores and 16 threads.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data strongly favors Medium settings as the optimal compromise between visual fidelity and frame rate headroom across all resolutions. At 1920x1080, Medium delivers 277 FPS average with a minimum of 235 FPS, which is 99 FPS higher than High and 112 FPS higher than Ultra. The step from Low to Medium costs 56 FPS (from 333 to 277), but the visual improvement in a game like Inside — with its moody lighting and atmospheric effects — justifies the trade-off for most users.

At 2560x1440, Medium remains the clear winner with a 199 FPS average and a 169 FPS minimum. This is the only 1440p preset that guarantees frame rates above 144Hz without any dips below that threshold. High settings at 1440p drop to 124 FPS average, which is still smooth for 60Hz displays but misses the mark for high-refresh-rate monitors. Ultra at 1440p yields 118 FPS, making it viable only for 60Hz panels or adaptive sync displays.

For 4K gaming, the recommendation shifts. Medium at 3840x2160 produces 125 FPS average with a minimum of 106 FPS, which is the only 4K preset that stays above 100 FPS. High (78 FPS) and Ultra (74 FPS) are both playable but fall into the 60-80 FPS range that is better suited for slower-paced puzzle games. Low at 4K reaches 156 FPS, but the visual compromise is substantial for a game that relies heavily on atmosphere.

The data suggests that Medium is the "sweet spot" preset for this hardware combination. It maintains a minimum frame rate above 106 FPS at every resolution tested, which ensures no perceptible stuttering. For users with 144Hz displays, Medium at 1440p is the definitive choice. For 4K users, Medium is the only preset that combines high frame rates with meaningful visual quality.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions. At Medium settings, the average FPS drops from 277 at 1920x1080 to 199 at 2560x1440 (a 28% reduction) and then to 125 at 3840x2160 (a 37% further reduction). This progressive decline is characteristic of a system where the RTX 3060 Ti's pixel throughput becomes the limiting factor as resolution increases.

At High settings, the scaling is even more pronounced: 173 FPS at 1080p drops to 124 FPS at 1440p (a 28% decrease) and then to 78 FPS at 4K (a 37% decrease from 1440p). The consistent ~30% drop per resolution tier indicates that the GPU's shading units and memory bandwidth are being fully utilized. The RTX 3060 Ti's 448.0 GB/s memory bandwidth and 16.20 TFLOPS FP32 throughput are the relevant specifications here.

The Low settings curve tells a different story. At 1080p Low, the system hits 333 FPS, which drops to 249 FPS at 1440p (25% reduction) and then to 156 FPS at 4K (37% reduction). The smaller drop at 1440p suggests that at Low settings and lower resolutions, the CPU's single-thread performance (3dmark_single_thread score of 960) begins to play a more significant role. However, the 4K drop remains GPU-dominated.

This scaling pattern confirms that the i5-13400F is more than adequate for this game. The CPU's 10 cores and 16 threads provide sufficient headroom, and its 4.60 GHz boost clock ensures strong single-threaded performance. The bottleneck only emerges when the GPU's fill rate is saturated at 4K, particularly at High and Ultra presets where the difference between 1440p and 4K is a consistent 37% reduction in frame rate.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system demonstrates its peak performance. Low settings produce a 333 FPS average, Medium delivers 277 FPS with a 235 FPS minimum and 318 FPS maximum, High reaches 173 FPS, and Ultra settles at 165 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium (56 FPS) is larger than the gap between High and Ultra (8 FPS), suggesting that the Ultra preset adds marginal visual effects over High.

Moving to 2560x1440, the overall pattern remains but with reduced absolute numbers. Low hits 249 FPS, Medium averages 199 FPS with a 169 FPS minimum and 229 FPS maximum, High drops to 124 FPS, and Ultra reaches 118 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 169 FPS is particularly notable — it is 45 FPS higher than the High preset's average, making Medium the clear choice for consistent high-refresh-rate gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the GPU's limits become evident. Low settings still manage 156 FPS, but Medium drops to 125 FPS with a 106 FPS minimum and 144 FPS maximum. High falls to 78 FPS, and Ultra dips to 74 FPS. The 4K Medium results show a minimum frame rate that is just above 100 FPS, which is adequate for most displays but shows the system approaching its ceiling. The difference between High (78 FPS) and Ultra (74 FPS) at 4K is only 4 FPS, indicating that the Ultra preset's additional effects have minimal cost — and minimal benefit — at this resolution.

The data shows that this system never drops below 74 FPS at any settings combination tested. This means that even the most demanding configuration (4K Ultra) remains above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while the least demanding (1080p Low) achieves frame rates that exceed the refresh rates of all but the most extreme gaming monitors.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is the decisive component in this system's Inside performance. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is critical for the game's high-resolution texture streaming and particle effects. The GPU's boost clock of 1665 MHz and base clock of 1410 MHz allow it to sustain high utilization across all tested settings.

The GPU's 4864 shading units and 80 ROPs deliver a pixel rate of 133.2 GPixel/s, which explains the relatively small performance gap between High and Ultra presets. The 152 texture mapping units provide a texture rate of 253.1 GTexel/s, ensuring that the game's environmental details are rendered without hiccups. The RTX 3060 Ti's 16.20 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is more than sufficient for Inside, which is not a graphically intensive title by modern standards.

The GPU's percentile ranking of 59 among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 16129, places it near the AMD Radeon RX 9060 (16014, 0.7% higher) and AMD Radeon Pro 5600M (16351, 1.4% lower). This mid-range positioning is consistent with the measured results: the GPU handles 1080p and 1440p with ease but begins to show strain at 4K with higher settings.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is not a limiting factor in Inside at any tested resolution. The game's art style, while atmospheric, does not require large texture caches. The GPU's memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is the more relevant specification, as it directly impacts the frame rate scaling observed between 1440p and 4K.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F provides ample processing power for Inside, with its 10 cores and 16 threads ensuring that the game's logic and physics never become a bottleneck. The CPU's 2.50 GHz base clock and 4.60 GHz boost clock deliver strong single-threaded performance, which is critical for a puzzle platformer where game logic and collision detection are often serialized.

The CPU's benchmark results confirm its capability. In cinebench_r23_multicore, it scores 22604, while the single-core score is 3191. The passmark_multithread score of 25032 and passmark_single_thread score of 3634 both indicate a processor that is well above average for gaming workloads. The 3dmark_single_thread score of 960 and 3dmark_16_threads score of 7314 further demonstrate balanced performance across thread counts.

With a 77th percentile ranking among all CPUs and an average benchmark score of 25292, the i5-13400F sits within 0.3% of the Intel Core 5 120 (25362) and AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D (25365), and 0.4% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 7 6800H (25201). This tight clustering indicates that the CPU is not a differentiator in this game — any of these processors would yield similar results.

The CPU's 20 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB per-core L2 cache provide ample data storage for the game's assets. The dual-channel memory support for both DDR4 and DDR5 means the system can take advantage of high-bandwidth memory configurations, though the measured FPS data does not distinguish between memory types. The CPU's 65 W TDP and Intel Socket 1700 compatibility make it a straightforward choice for mainstream builds, though these specifications do not directly impact Inside performance.