Inside

The Intel Core i7-14700F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 is an overpowered combination for Inside, a 2016 puzzle platformer. The benchmark data shows this system delivers exceptionally high frame rates at every tested setting and resolution, making it a prime example of hardware far exceeding the demands of the title. The primary challenge for a user with this setup is not achieving playability, but rather choosing a settings preset that balances visual fidelity with the need to avoid unnecessarily high frame rates that could cause screen tearing on standard displays.

Settings Recommendations

For a game like Inside, which is a side-scrolling puzzle platformer with a distinct, moody art style, the visual differences between the presets are less about competitive advantage and more about image quality. The measured FPS data indicates that this combo is so powerful that the choice of preset should be based entirely on the user's display refresh rate and personal preference for visual smoothness.

At 1920x1080, the data shows an average of 346 FPS at Medium settings, 217 FPS at High, and 206 FPS at Ultra. The Low preset averages 390 FPS. Even the most demanding Ultra preset at 1080p produces over 200 FPS, which is far beyond the refresh rate of most monitors. If the user has a 144Hz or 240Hz display, the High or Ultra presets are the logical choices. They provide a more detailed visual presentation while still delivering frame rates that are roughly double the refresh rate of a 144Hz panel. The Medium preset, with its minimum FPS of 294, is also an excellent choice for high-refresh-rate gaming, ensuring the frame rate never dips below the refresh rate in demanding scenes.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains exceptional. The High preset averages 156 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 148 FPS. These are ideal settings for a 144Hz 1440p monitor, as they consistently max out the display's capabilities. The Medium preset, averaging 249 FPS, is overkill for most displays but would be beneficial for a 240Hz 1440p panel. The Low preset at 311 FPS is unnecessary unless the user is specifically chasing the absolute highest frame rate for competitive play, which is not relevant for a puzzle platformer.

The 4K data shows a similar story. At 3840x2160, the High preset averages 98 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 93 FPS. These are both perfectly playable for a game of this genre, though they would not consistently saturate a 120Hz or 144Hz 4K display. For a locked 60 FPS experience on a 4K television, the Ultra preset is the best choice, providing the maximum visual detail at a frame rate well above the 60 FPS target. The Medium preset at 4K averages 157 FPS, which would be excellent for a high-refresh-rate 4K monitor, but the High and Ultra presets offer better image quality.

Benchmark results indicate that the optimal preset is the one that aligns with the display's refresh rate. For 1080p and 1440p, High or Ultra is recommended to maximize visual fidelity. For 4K, the Ultra preset is the best choice for a standard 60Hz television, while the High preset is suitable for high-refresh-rate 4K monitors. The Low and Medium presets are generally unnecessary with this hardware, as they sacrifice visual quality for frame rates that exceed the capabilities of most displays.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Core i7-14700F and the Radeon RX 9070 holds a combo rank of 827 out of 3716 tested combinations for Inside. This places it in the top 22.3% of all tested systems for this specific game. While this is a strong ranking, it is not at the very top, which indicates that even more powerful combinations exist. However, the context of this ranking is crucial. The game is very old and not demanding by modern standards, so the ranking is likely influenced by the high performance of both the CPU and GPU.

The data suggests that this combo is far more powerful than what Inside requires. The high rank reflects the raw power of the components, but the actual gameplay experience will be essentially identical to a system with a mid-range GPU and CPU, as both would easily hit the frame rate limits of most displays. The nearest rivals for the CPU, such as the AMD Ryzen 9 7900X, have a negligible performance delta of 0.6%, and the GPU's nearest rivals, like the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 SUPER, also have a minimal delta of -1.2%. This shows that the performance of this specific combo is well within the expected range for its component class.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 plays a significant role in ensuring high frame rates, though its full potential is not taxed by Inside. The GPU features 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 644.6 GB/s. This is a massive amount of memory and bandwidth, which is completely unnecessary for a game like Inside that has simple textures and geometry. The benchmark results show the GPU's overall percentile is 69, and it scores 25381 in Passmark's G3D test, placing it in the upper mid-range of all GPUs.

The GPU's clock speeds are more relevant to its performance. The boost clock is listed at 2520 MHz, with a game clock of 2070 MHz. These high clocks, combined with the 3584 shading units, allow the card to process the game's rendering tasks with ease. The FPS data confirms this, as the GPU is able to push frame rates well above 200 FPS at 1080p on High settings. The card's 128 ROPs and pixel rate of 322.6 GPixel/s are also more than sufficient to handle the game's 2D side-scrolling perspective. In this title, the GPU is not a bottleneck; it is the component that provides the headroom for ultra-high refresh rates and high resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a clear picture of the system's performance across different resolutions and settings.

At 1920x1080, the performance is exceptionally high. The Low preset averages 390 FPS. The Medium preset averages 346 FPS, with a minimum of 294 FPS and a maximum of 398 FPS. The High preset averages 217 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 206 FPS. The frame rates are so high across all presets that the game will feel perfectly smooth on any high-refresh-rate monitor.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains excellent. The Low preset averages 311 FPS. The Medium preset averages 249 FPS, with a minimum of 212 FPS and a maximum of 287 FPS. The High preset averages 156 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 148 FPS. This resolution is the sweet spot for this combo, as it allows for high visual fidelity at frame rates that can fully utilize 144Hz and even 240Hz displays.

At 3840x2160, the performance is still very good. The Low preset averages 196 FPS. The Medium preset averages 157 FPS, with a minimum of 133 FPS and a maximum of 180 FPS. The High preset averages 98 FPS, and the Ultra preset averages 93 FPS. At 4K, the system is no longer able to maintain triple-digit frame rates on the higher presets, but it still delivers a smooth experience for a puzzle platformer, easily exceeding 60 FPS on the High and Ultra settings.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K reveals the expected scaling behavior. At High settings, the average FPS drops from 217 at 1080p to 156 at 1440p and then to 98 at 4K. This is a significant decrease of 28.1% from 1080p to 1440p and a further 37.2% from 1440p to 4K. A similar pattern is seen across all other presets.

This scaling indicates that the GPU is becoming the limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the increased pixel count demands more from the ROPs and memory bandwidth. However, the game is so light that even at 4K, the system maintains a playable frame rate. The fact that the 1080p frame rate is nearly double that of the 4K frame rate on the High preset shows a performance curve that is heavily dependent on resolution. This is typical for a game that is not CPU-bound. The CPU, with its high single-core score of 4958 in Cinebench R23, is more than capable of feeding the GPU at 1080p, but as the resolution increases, the GPU's workload becomes the dominant factor in determining the final frame rate.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700F is a powerful 20-core, 28-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture. It has a base clock of 2.10 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, which provides excellent single-threaded performance, as evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4958. This is critical for game logic and physics, though Inside is not a CPU-intensive title.

The CPU's multi-core performance is also strong, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 35122. This level of performance is overkill for a game like Inside, which likely uses only a handful of threads. The data suggests that the CPU is not a bottleneck at any resolution. The fact that the FPS scales down with resolution while the CPU load likely remains constant indicates that the GPU is the limiting factor only at 4K. At 1080p and 1440p, the CPU is so fast that it can easily keep up with the GPU's output, allowing the GPU to run at its full potential. The CPU's 33 MB of shared L3 cache also contributes to its ability to handle game data efficiently, but for this title, its sheer single-core speed is more than sufficient.