Inside

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i7-14700F paired with the AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT achieves a combo rank of 274 out of 1671 tested combinations for Inside. This places the pairing in the 84th percentile of all tested systems, indicating that this configuration delivers performance well above the median tested platform. The rank reflects the synergy between a high-end 2024 CPU and a flagship 2025 GPU, both of which are currently Active in production status. Benchmark results show this combo is positioned to handle the game's puzzle-platformer demands with substantial headroom, even at the most demanding settings tested.

The CPU itself holds a percentile rank of 94 against all processors, with an average benchmark score of 54097. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X, scores 54450, which puts the i7-14700F just 0.6% behind. Similarly, the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D leads by only 1.1% with a score of 54681. The i7-14700F actually edges out the Intel Xeon Phi 7290 by 1.2% and the AMD EPYC 7313P by 1.7%. This places the CPU in a tightly contested performance band where the differences between rivals are minimal, suggesting that the processor is not the limiting factor in this combo.

On the GPU side, the RX 9070 XT holds a percentile rank of 82 against all graphics cards, with an average benchmark score of 39647. Its closest rival, the AMD Radeon Pro 575, scores 39703, a delta of only -0.1%. The NVIDIA RTX A500 Mobile trails by 0.2%, while the AMD Radeon Pro 575X and AMD Radeon RX Vega 64 sit at -0.5% and -0.6% respectively. These margins are exceptionally tight, indicating that the RX 9070 XT's average benchmark score is representative of a well-established performance tier. However, the measured FPS in Inside suggests that the GPU's real-world gaming performance, particularly at lower resolutions, benefits significantly from the CPU's strength.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 48 chip, manufactured on a 4 nm process by TSMC. It packs 53,900 million transistors on a 357 mm² die, resulting in a transistor density of 151.0M per mm². The GPU operates with a base clock of 1660 MHz, a boost clock of 2970 MHz, and a game clock of 2400 MHz. Memory is handled by 16 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 644.6 GB/s. The card features 4096 shading units, 256 texture mapping units, and 128 render output units, along with 64 ray tracing cores.

In the context of Inside, the GPU's role is substantial but varies by resolution. The data shows that at 1080p Low settings, the combo achieves 388.6 FPS, while at 4K Ultra it drops to 100.3 FPS. This range indicates the GPU is capable of handling the game's visual effects with ease, even at the highest settings. The 16 GB VRAM is more than sufficient for a game released in 2016, and the high memory bandwidth ensures that texture streaming and shader processing do not become bottlenecks. The boost clock of 2970 MHz is notably high, which helps maintain consistent frame rates in scenes with complex lighting or particle effects common in puzzle-platformers.

The GPU's benchmark scores further contextualize its role. In 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, it scores 7260, while Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan scores are 160317 and 184026 respectively. Passmark G3D score is 26795, with GPU compute at 15864. These numbers, while not directly tied to Inside, indicate a GPU that excels in both rasterization and compute workloads. The pixel rate of 380.2 GPixel/s and texture rate of 760.3 GTexel/s provide the theoretical throughput needed to sustain high FPS, though the measured results show diminishing returns at higher resolutions due to other system factors.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K reveals a clear pattern of GPU-bound behavior at higher resolutions. At High settings, the combo delivers 230.4 FPS at 1080p, which drops to 164.5 FPS at 1440p (a 28.6% reduction) and then to 101.6 FPS at 4K (a 55.9% reduction from 1080p). This scaling is consistent with a GPU that becomes increasingly stressed as pixel count rises. The drop from 1440p to 4K is 38.2%, which is close to the expected increase in pixel count, suggesting the GPU is the primary limiter at 4K.

At Low settings, the scaling is even more dramatic. The 1080p result of 388.6 FPS falls to 330.8 FPS at 1440p (a 14.9% reduction) and then to 209.1 FPS at 4K (a 46.2% reduction from 1080p). The smaller drop from 1080p to 1440p indicates that at Low settings, the CPU is able to feed the GPU adequately, but the 4K drop shows the GPU's raw pixel throughput becoming the bottleneck. Medium settings follow a similar trajectory: 356.9 FPS at 1080p, 266 FPS at 1440p (25.5% lower), and 166.8 FPS at 4K (53.3% lower from 1080p).

Ultra settings show the most consistent scaling across resolutions. The 219.8 FPS at 1080p drops to 154.1 FPS at 1440p (29.9% lower) and then to 100.3 FPS at 4K (54.4% lower from 1080p). This consistency suggests that at Ultra settings, the workload is more balanced between CPU and GPU, with neither component dominating the performance curve. The data indicates that for this combo, 1080p and 1440p are largely CPU-limited at lower settings, while 4K is consistently GPU-limited across all settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four quality presets. Starting at 1920x1080, the combo achieves 388.6 FPS on Low settings, 356.9 FPS on Medium, 230.4 FPS on High, and 219.8 FPS on Ultra. The gap between Low and Medium is relatively small at 8.2%, but the jump from Medium to High is a significant 35.4% reduction, indicating that High settings introduce more demanding effects. Ultra only adds a 4.6% reduction over High, suggesting diminishing returns in visual fidelity versus frame rate cost.

Moving to 2560x1440, the results are 330.8 FPS on Low, 266 FPS on Medium, 164.5 FPS on High, and 154.1 FPS on Ultra. The Low to Medium drop is 19.6%, which is more pronounced than at 1080p. The Medium to High reduction is 38.2%, while High to Ultra is only 6.3%. This pattern shows that at 1440p, the GPU begins to feel the load of higher settings, but the combo still maintains framerates well above 150 FPS even on Ultra.

At 3840x2160, the performance settles at 209.1 FPS on Low, 166.8 FPS on Medium, 101.6 FPS on High, and 100.3 FPS on Ultra. The Low to Medium drop is 20.2%, while Medium to High is a substantial 39.1% reduction. Interestingly, High to Ultra is only 1.3%, meaning that the Ultra preset adds almost no additional GPU load over High at 4K. This suggests that the game's Ultra settings may not scale as aggressively at higher resolutions, or that the GPU is hitting a performance plateau. The minimum FPS values are not provided in the data, so the analysis relies solely on average framerates.

FAQ

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested systems for Inside?

A: The Intel Core i7-14700F and AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT combination ranks 274th out of 1671 tested combos, placing it in the top 16.4% of all configurations tested for this game.

Q: What is the difference in performance between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the combo achieves 388.6 FPS on Low settings and 219.8 FPS on Ultra, representing a 43.4% reduction in average FPS when moving from the lowest to the highest quality preset.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more likely to be the bottleneck at 4K Ultra?

A: The data shows that at 3840x2160 Ultra, the combo delivers 100.3 FPS. The minimal difference between High (101.6 FPS) and Ultra (100.3 FPS) at 4K, combined with the large drop from Medium (166.8 FPS) to High (101.6 FPS), indicates the GPU is the limiting component at higher settings.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rival in average benchmark score?

A: The i7-14700F has an average benchmark score of 54097, which is 0.6% lower than the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X's score of 54450, and 1.1% lower than the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X3D's score of 54681.

Q: What is the GPU's VRAM capacity and memory bandwidth?

A: The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT features 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing a memory bandwidth of 644.6 GB/s.

Q: How does the frame rate scale from 1440p to 4K at Medium settings?

A: At Medium settings, the combo drops from 266 FPS at 2560x1440 to 166.8 FPS at 3840x2160, a 37.3% reduction in average FPS when moving up to 4K resolution.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-14700F is a 20-core, 28-thread processor based on the Raptor Lake architecture, specifically the Raptor Lake-R codename. It operates with a base clock of 2.10 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, with a TDP of 65 W. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration, and it features an L3 cache of 33 MB shared across the cores. Built on Intel's 10 nm process with a die size of 257 mm², the processor is designed for desktop use and is currently Active in production.

In the context of Inside, the CPU's role is most evident at lower resolutions and settings. The measured FPS at 1080p Low (388.6 FPS) and Medium (356.9 FPS) suggests that the CPU is capable of driving the GPU to very high frame rates, far beyond the refresh rates of most displays. The boost clock of 5.40 GHz is particularly effective for a game like Inside, which may rely on single-threaded performance for physics and game logic. The 20 cores and 28 threads provide ample headroom for background tasks and streaming, but the game's simple geometry and lighting mean that the CPU is rarely the bottleneck.

The CPU's benchmark scores support its high-end positioning. In Cinebench R23, it scores 35443 in multicore and 5003 in single-core tests. Geekbench results are 16571 for multicore and 2711 for single-core. Passmark tests show a multithread score of 41765 and a single-thread score of 4261. The CPU's percentile rank of 94 against all processors indicates that it outperforms the vast majority of CPUs on the market. However, the data shows that in Inside, the CPU's influence on FPS diminishes as resolution increases, with the GPU becoming the primary limiter at 4K. This is expected for a game with modest CPU demands, and the i7-14700F's performance ensures that it does not hold back the RX 9070 XT at any tested resolution or settings combination.