Microsoft Flight Simulator

# Microsoft Flight Simulator: AMD Ryzen 5 5600 + NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 pairing represents a mid-range desktop combination that places 1702nd out of 1795 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator. This is a bottom-decile result, with the measured FPS data confirming that the GTX 1650's 4 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory interface become the dominant constraint across all tested settings. The CPU's 6-core/12-thread Zen 3 architecture with a 3.50 GHz base and 4.40 GHz boost clock provides adequate single-thread throughput, but the simulator's heavy draw-call and scenery-loading workloads are ultimately throttled by the GPU's modest 2.984 TFLOPS FP32 throughput. Benchmark results indicate a system that can approach playable frame rates only at 1080p with reduced settings, while any resolution above that falls below 40 FPS even on Low.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 brings six cores and twelve threads based on the Zen 3 architecture, fabricated on TSMC's 7 nm process with 4,150 million transistors in a 74 mm² die. Its 3.50 GHz base clock and 4.40 GHz boost clock, combined with a 32 MB shared L3 cache, deliver a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 18,309 and a single-core score of 2,584. The CPU's PassMark single-thread score of 3,256 places it in the 79th percentile of all CPUs, which is relevant for Microsoft Flight Simulator's largely single-threaded rendering pipeline. The 3DMark single-thread score of 882 and 2-thread score of 1,737 further illustrate that the chip's strength lies in moderate multi-threading rather than extreme single-core performance.

The CPU's nearest rival comparisons show it operating in a tight band. It trails the Intel Core i7-11700F by 0.9% in average benchmark score (21,765 vs. 21,957), while sitting 0.6% above the Intel Xeon D-1746TER (21,635) and 0.6% below the AMD EPYC 9554P (21,899). These deltas are negligible, indicating that CPU choice is not the differentiator in this game's performance. The Ryzen 5 5600's PassMark multi-thread score of 21,541 and data compression score of 251,687 suggest ample compute for flight simulation's terrain and weather calculations, but the measured FPS data shows that the CPU is rarely the bottleneck — even at 1080p Low, where the GPU is least stressed, the 49 FPS average is more indicative of GPU limits than CPU headroom.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 is the clear performance limiter in this pairing. Built on the Turing architecture with a TU117 chip at 12 nm, it features 896 shading units, 56 TMUs, and 32 ROPs. Its 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 128.1 GB/s of bandwidth, with memory clocked at 2001 MHz (8 Gbps effective). The GPU's base clock of 1485 MHz and boost clock of 1665 MHz yield 2.984 TFLOPS FP32 and a pixel rate of 53.28 GPixel/s. The 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 305 and PassMark G3D score of 7,880 place it in the 43rd percentile of all GPUs, with the nearest rivals showing tight clustering: it trails the RTX 3050 A Mobile by 0.4% (8,713 vs. 8,746) and the Radeon 550X by 0.4%, while leading the Quadro P2200 by 0.5%.

For Microsoft Flight Simulator, the 4 GB VRAM is the most critical weakness. The game streams high-resolution terrain textures and airport scenery, and the data shows that even at 1080p Ultra, the GPU manages only 26.8 FPS — a figure that suggests VRAM capacity is being exhausted, forcing texture swapping. The 128-bit memory bus further limits bandwidth for the simulator's large texture fetches. The GPU's PassMark DirectX 12 score of 35 and DirectX 11 score of 58 indicate that API-level optimizations do little to offset the hardware's fundamental constraints. With a TDP of 75 W and no power connectors, the GTX 1650 is a low-power part, but that efficiency does not translate into playable performance in this title beyond 1080p Low.

FAQ

Q: Is this CPU-GPU combination capable of running Microsoft Flight Simulator at 1080p?

A: Yes, but only marginally. The measured FPS at 1920x1080 ranges from 49 FPS on Low settings to 26.8 FPS on Ultra, with Medium at 39 FPS and High at 29 FPS. Low settings are the only configuration that exceeds 30 FPS consistently.

Q: What is the largest FPS drop when moving from 1080p to 4K?

A: At Low settings, the FPS drops from 49 at 1080p to 26.4 at 4K, a reduction of 22.6 FPS (46%). At High settings, the drop is from 29 to 16.5 FPS, a 12.5 FPS (43%) decrease. The 4K Ultra setting yields only 19.1 FPS.

Q: How does this combo rank relative to all tested combinations?

A: It ranks 1702nd out of 1795 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 5.2% of all configurations. This suggests that the GTX 1650 is severely underpowered for this simulator's demands.

Q: Which component is the primary bottleneck in this game?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the limiting factor. The CPU's PassMark single-thread score of 3,256 (79th percentile) is reasonable, but the GPU's PassMark G3D score of 7,880 (43rd percentile) and 4 GB VRAM create a mismatch. The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a near-linear relationship with pixel count, characteristic of GPU-bound performance.

Q: What settings are recommended for playable frame rates?

A: At 1080p, Low settings yield 49 FPS, which is the only tested configuration above 40 FPS. Medium at 1080p produces 39 FPS, while any 1440p or 4K setting falls below 37 FPS, with most below 30 FPS.

Q: How does the GPU's VRAM capacity affect the results?

A: The 4 GB GDDR5 memory appears insufficient for Ultra settings at any resolution. The 1080p Ultra result (26.8 FPS) is only 3.2 FPS higher than 1440p Ultra (21.5 FPS) despite a 33% pixel reduction, suggesting that VRAM limitations, not raw compute, cap performance at higher settings.

How This Combo Ranks

This combination's rank of 1702 out of 1795 tested combos places it in the 5th percentile of all configurations tested for Microsoft Flight Simulator. The data shows a system that is fundamentally mismatched for this title's requirements. To contextualize, the CPU alone sits in the 79th percentile of all CPUs, while the GPU rests in the 43rd percentile of all GPUs — a 36-percentage-point gap that highlights the GPU as the weak link. The combo's measured FPS averages range from a high of 49 FPS (1080p Low) to a low of 16.5 FPS (4K High), with the median across all 12 tested configurations being 27.9 FPS.

The rank becomes more understandable when examining the GPU's nearest rivals. The GTX 1650's average benchmark score of 8,713 is within 0.5% of the Radeon Pro WX 5100 (8,761) and the Quadro P2200 (8,671), yet all of these are entry-level parts. The CPU's nearest rivals, including the EPYC 9554P and i7-11700F, have average scores above 21,600, but their presence in the same performance band as the Ryzen 5 5600 confirms that CPU-side improvements would not meaningfully alter the game's outcome. The 1702nd rank is thus a direct consequence of the GPU's limitations, not the CPU's.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of GPU-bound scaling as resolution increases. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 49 FPS; at 1440p Low, it drops to 36.3 FPS (a 25.9% reduction); and at 4K Low, it falls to 26.4 FPS (a further 27.3% reduction from 1440p). This scaling is roughly proportional to pixel count, which is the signature of a GPU-limited workload. The same pattern holds for Medium settings: 39 FPS at 1080p, 32.3 FPS at 1440p, and 23.5 FPS at 4K.

However, the scaling becomes less linear at higher settings, revealing VRAM constraints. At Ultra, the 1080p result is 26.8 FPS, which drops to 21.5 FPS at 1440p (a 19.8% reduction) and 19.1 FPS at 4K (an 11.2% reduction from 1440p). The diminishing FPS loss at higher resolutions when using Ultra settings suggests that the 4 GB VRAM is already saturated at 1080p Ultra, so increasing resolution does not proportionally increase the memory pressure. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 22.2 FPS (49 vs. 26.8), but at 4K that gap narrows to 7.3 FPS (26.4 vs. 19.1), further confirming that the GPU's compute and memory resources are exhausted at 4K regardless of settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers its highest frame rates. Low settings produce 49 FPS, Medium reaches 39 FPS, High manages 29 FPS, and Ultra falls to 26.8 FPS. The 20 FPS spread between Low and Ultra indicates that settings have a substantial impact at this resolution, but even the best case (49 FPS) is only marginally above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth simulation gameplay.

Moving to 2560x1440, all settings drop below 37 FPS. Low yields 36.3 FPS, Medium 32.3 FPS, High 23.8 FPS, and Ultra 21.5 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra narrows to 14.8 FPS, suggesting that the GPU is becoming the primary constraint regardless of quality settings. The High setting at 1440p (23.8 FPS) is only 1.7 FPS faster than Ultra at 4K (19.1 FPS), highlighting the steep performance cliff.

At 3840x2160, the results are uniformly unplayable. Low settings produce 26.4 FPS, Medium 23.5 FPS, Ultra 19.1 FPS, and High 16.5 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra is just 7.3 FPS, demonstrating that the GTX 1650's 4 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory bus are overwhelmed at 4K regardless of configuration. The 4K High result (16.5 FPS) is the single worst measured performance, while 4K Low (26.4 FPS) still falls below the 30 FPS playability threshold. Across all 12 measurements, only three configurations exceed 30 FPS: 1080p Low (49), 1080p Medium (39), and 1440p Low (36.3). This data conclusively shows that the combo is only viable for 1080p gaming at Low or Medium settings, with any higher resolution or quality setting resulting in sub-30 FPS performance.