Microsoft Flight Simulator

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Microsoft Flight Simulator with the AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 shows a clear pattern of performance scaling as resolution increases. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combination produces 156.8 FPS, which drops to 123.4 FPS at 2560x1440 and further to 90.6 FPS at 3840x2160. This represents a 42.2% reduction from 1080p to 4K at Low settings, indicating that the GPU remains the primary scaling factor even at lower quality presets.

The scaling behavior changes noticeably when moving to higher settings presets. At High settings, the frame rate falls from 88.7 FPS at 1080p to 73.9 FPS at 1440p, then to 52.8 FPS at 4K — a cumulative 40.5% drop across the resolution range. The Ultra preset shows the steepest relative decline: 87.4 FPS at 1080p, 69.7 FPS at 1440p, and 48.6 FPS at 4K, for a 44.4% total reduction. These figures suggest that while the RX 9070 handles the resolution increase, the gap between 1440p and 4K widens as settings rise, pointing to the GPU's memory bandwidth and compute throughput becoming more constrained at higher pixel counts.

The data reveals an interesting anomaly when comparing Low and Ultra at 1080p: the difference is only 69.4 FPS (156.8 versus 87.4), which is proportionally smaller than the gap at 4K between Low and Ultra (42.0 FPS difference). This compression at higher resolutions indicates that the GPU is the limiting component across all tested settings, but the CPU's role becomes more apparent at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 120 FPS. The 4K Ultra result of 48.6 FPS sits below the 60 FPS threshold, while 4K High achieves 52.8 FPS — both indicating that smooth 4K gameplay requires settings adjustments.

GPU Role

The Radeon RX 9070 brings 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, delivering 644.6 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is directly relevant to Microsoft Flight Simulator's tendency to load large texture sets and terrain data. The benchmark results show that the GPU's 36.13 TFLOPS FP32 compute and 322.6 GPixel/s pixel rate support strong frame rates at 1080p, but the scaling data indicates that the 4K Ultra workload stresses the graphics pipeline significantly.

The GPU's clock behavior — with a base of 1330 MHz, game clock of 2070 MHz, and boost of 2520 MHz — provides context for the measured performance. The memory clock runs at 2518 MHz (20.1 Gbps effective), which when combined with the 256-bit bus produces the 644.6 GB/s bandwidth figure. In the measured results, the RX 9070 achieves 156.8 FPS at 1080p Low, but this drops to 90.6 FPS at 4K Low, a 42.2% reduction that aligns with the increased pixel throughput requirements.

The GPU's average benchmark score of 34780 places it in the 79th percentile of all GPUs, with nearest rivals including the NVIDIA A2 at 34866 (0.2% ahead) and the NVIDIA Quadro GV100 at 34677 (0.3% behind). The PassMark G3D score of 25381 and DirectX 12 score of 74 indicate strong general-purpose rendering capability. For this flight simulator, the 16 GB VRAM capacity is likely sufficient for the High and Ultra presets at 4K, as evidenced by the playable 52.8 FPS at 4K High, though the 48.6 FPS at 4K Ultra suggests that the GPU's compute resources, rather than memory capacity, become the binding constraint at maximum settings.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 provides 6 cores and 12 threads based on the Zen 3 architecture, with a base clock of 3.50 GHz and boost clock of 4.40 GHz. This CPU achieves a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 18309 and a single-core score of 2584, with a 3DMark single-thread score of 882. In the context of Microsoft Flight Simulator — a title known for heavy single-threaded simulation logic — the single-core performance is particularly relevant.

The CPU's 32 MB of shared L3 cache and DDR4-3200-class memory support (51.2 GB/s dual-channel bandwidth) provide adequate data feeding for the GPU. The benchmark results show that at 1080p Low, where the GPU is less stressed, the combination reaches 156.8 FPS — this suggests the CPU can sustain frame rates well above 150 FPS in less demanding scenarios. However, the fact that 1080p Ultra produces 87.4 FPS versus 88.7 FPS at 1080p High (a minimal 1.5% difference) indicates that the CPU maintains consistent performance regardless of graphics settings, as expected for a simulation workload.

The Ryzen 5 5600's percentile rank of 79 against all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 21765, places it near the AMD EPYC 9554P (21899, 0.6% higher) and Intel Core i7-11700F (21957, 0.9% higher). The PassMark multithread score of 21541 and single-thread score of 3256 demonstrate balanced performance. For this game, the 6-core/12-thread configuration appears sufficient, as the measured FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K follows GPU-bound patterns rather than showing CPU bottlenecks at higher resolutions — the 4K Ultra result of 48.6 FPS is 44.4% below 1080p Ultra, which is consistent with GPU-limited rendering.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combination delivers 156.8 FPS on Low settings, 118.9 FPS on Medium, 88.7 FPS on High, and 87.4 FPS on Ultra. The gap between Medium and High is 30.2 FPS, while High to Ultra shows only a 1.3 FPS difference — indicating that the Ultra preset adds minimal performance cost over High at this resolution. The 1080p results all exceed 60 FPS, with even the most demanding Ultra preset maintaining 87.4 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the measured values are 123.4 FPS on Low, 97.2 FPS on Medium, 73.9 FPS on High, and 69.7 FPS on Ultra. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a 43.5% reduction in frame rate. At this resolution, the High-to-Ultra gap narrows further to 4.2 FPS, suggesting that the visual quality difference between these presets comes at a minimal performance cost. All 1440p results remain above 60 FPS, with Ultra still delivering 69.7 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the results drop to 90.6 FPS on Low, 70.4 FPS on Medium, 52.8 FPS on High, and 48.6 FPS on Ultra. The Medium-to-High transition costs 17.6 FPS, while High-to-Ultra costs only 4.2 FPS. Only the Low and Medium presets maintain 60+ FPS at 4K; High falls below the 60 FPS mark at 52.8 FPS, and Ultra dips to 48.6 FPS. The scaling from 1440p to 4K at each setting shows reductions of 26.6% (Low), 27.6% (Medium), 28.5% (High), and 30.3% (Ultra), demonstrating that higher settings amplify the resolution penalty.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 ranks 582nd out of 1795 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator. This places it in the 67.6th percentile of all tested configurations, meaning roughly one-third of combinations perform better. Given the component choices — a mid-range 6-core CPU paired with a high-end RX 9000-series GPU — the ranking reflects a system that is GPU-heavy but not top-tier overall.

The ranking position is consistent with the measured FPS data. The combo's ability to exceed 150 FPS at 1080p Low and maintain 90+ FPS at 1080p Ultra suggests strong performance for a flight simulator, but the 4K results (48.6 to 90.6 FPS depending on settings) show that this configuration is not optimized for maximum resolution with highest quality. The 582nd rank among 1795 combos indicates that while this setup delivers solid frame rates, there are many configurations with faster CPUs or more powerful GPUs that achieve higher scores in this simulation-heavy title.

The CPU's 79th percentile ranking and the GPU's 79th percentile ranking are aligned, suggesting a balanced pairing. However, the game's reliance on single-threaded performance means the Ryzen 5 5600's 3DMark single-thread score of 882 may limit maximum frame rates in CPU-bound scenarios, even though the measured data shows GPU-bound behavior across most settings. The combo rank of 582 reflects this balance — not a top performer, but far from the bottom of the tested field.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS rows, the Medium preset at 1920x1080 provides the best balance of visual quality and performance, delivering 118.9 FPS — well above the 60 FPS threshold and only 37.9 FPS below the Low preset's 156.8 FPS. For users prioritizing smoothness at 1080p, the High preset at 88.7 FPS is still very playable, and the Ultra preset's 87.4 FPS shows that maximum settings cost only 1.3 FPS over High, making Ultra the recommended choice for 1080p displays.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset achieves 97.2 FPS, while High delivers 73.9 FPS and Ultra 69.7 FPS. The 4.2 FPS difference between High and Ultra makes Ultra the sensible recommendation at this resolution, as it provides the best visual fidelity with only a marginal frame rate penalty. All 1440p presets exceed 60 FPS, so users can select Ultra with confidence.

For 4K displays, the decision requires more care. The Low preset delivers 90.6 FPS, but this sacrifices significant visual quality. Medium at 70.4 FPS maintains smooth performance while offering improved visuals. The High preset at 52.8 FPS falls below 60 FPS, and Ultra at 48.6 FPS further reduces smoothness. The data suggests that Medium is the optimal 4K preset for maintaining playable frame rates, while High may be acceptable for users who prioritize visuals over fluidity. The 52.8 FPS at 4K High is close to the 60 FPS target, and the 48.6 FPS at 4K Ultra represents a 7.9% reduction over High — a meaningful drop for minimal visual gain.