Microsoft Flight Simulator

Microsoft Flight Simulator pairs a 6-core AMD Ryzen 5 5600G with the RDNA 3.0-based AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT, and the measured frame rates reveal a system that behaves very differently depending on where the graphics settings dial lands. The data shows a combination that can chase high refresh rates at 1080p but settles into a more conservative, visually rich experience at 4K, with the CPU increasingly becoming the deciding factor as resolution drops.

Settings Recommendations

The measured rows show a clear pattern: the Ultra preset is the most demanding, and the Low preset is the fastest, but the most balanced experience across all three resolutions is the High preset. At 1920x1080, High delivers an average of 104 FPS, which is more than sufficient for smooth flight simulation, while Ultra only drops to 97.3 FPS — a small penalty for the visual gains. The story changes at 2560x1440, where High averages 85.8 FPS versus Ultra’s 77.7 FPS, making High the smarter choice for keeping frame rates comfortably above 60. At 3840x2160, High produces 61.9 FPS, which is just barely above the 60 FPS threshold, whereas Ultra falls to 58.4 FPS, dipping below it. For the best experience per the measured rows, High is the recommended preset: it maintains playable averages at every resolution while avoiding the steep cost of Ultra.

GPU Role

The RX 7900 XT brings a substantial amount of graphics muscle to this pairing. Its 20 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 320-bit bus provides 800.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is critical for a flight simulator that streams vast terrain and scenery data. The GPU’s boost clock is listed at 2394 MHz, with a game clock of 2025 MHz, and the architecture supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), which aligns with the game’s modern rendering requirements. The data indicates that the GPU is not the primary bottleneck at lower resolutions: at 1920x1080 Low, the combo hits 167.8 FPS, suggesting the card has headroom that the CPU cannot fully exploit. However, at 4K Ultra, the average drops to 58.4 FPS, showing that the graphics card’s raw compute — rated at 51.48 TFLOPS FP32 — is being heavily taxed by the combination of high resolution and maximum settings. The GPU’s percentile ranking of 82 against all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 38358, places it in the upper tier, but the measured FPS data reveals that in this specific game, the 20 GB frame buffer is not the limiting factor; rather, the rendering load at 4K is.

CPU Role

The Ryzen 5 5600G is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on Zen 3, with a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. Its benchmark results show a single-thread score of 2365 in Cinebench R23 and a multi-core score of 16758, which are respectable for its class, but the data suggests this CPU is the constraining element in this combo at lower resolutions. Looking at the 1920x1080 measurements, the jump from Low (167.8 FPS) to Medium (135.9 FPS) is a 31.9 FPS drop, and then to High (104 FPS) is another 31.9 FPS drop, which is a steep curve. This pattern indicates that the CPU’s 16 MB of L3 cache and 51.2 GB/s memory bandwidth are being pushed hard to feed the GPU with draw calls and physics calculations. The processor’s percentile versus all CPUs is 78, with an average benchmark score of 19983, and its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-11800H, scores 20024 with a deltaPct of -0.2, meaning the 5600G is effectively on par with that mobile chip. In this game, the CPU’s 6 cores are likely sufficient for the simulation’s main thread, but the data implies that at 1080p, the frame rate is capped by the CPU’s ability to process the game logic, not by the GPU’s rendering speed.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the benchmark database, this specific combination of the Ryzen 5 5600G and RX 7900 XT achieves a rank of 381 out of 1795 tested combos for Microsoft Flight Simulator. That places it in the top 21.2% of all configurations tested, which is a strong showing given that the CPU is a mid-range part from 2021 and the GPU is a high-end card from 2022. The rank suggests that the pairing is well-balanced for this title, but not exceptional. The GPU’s own ranking (82nd percentile) is higher than the CPU’s (78th percentile), which hints that the processor is the weaker link in the chain. When comparing to other combos, the data implies that many configurations with faster CPUs would likely score higher in this game, particularly at 1080p where the CPU bottleneck is most evident. However, the 381st rank also indicates that a significant number of lower-performing combos exist, and this pairing’s ability to hit 61.9 FPS at 4K High is a notable achievement that many rivals cannot match.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a clear and predictable scaling pattern as resolution increases. At Low settings, the average frame rate drops from 167.8 FPS at 1920x1080 to 140.2 FPS at 2560x1440 (a 16.4% decrease), and then to 105.8 FPS at 3840x2160 (a 24.5% decrease from 1440p). This scaling is more aggressive at higher settings: at Ultra, the averages go from 97.3 FPS at 1080p to 77.7 FPS at 1440p (a 20.1% drop), and then to 58.4 FPS at 4K (a 24.8% drop from 1440p). The percentage drops from 1440p to 4K are remarkably consistent across all four settings, hovering around 24-25%, which indicates that the GPU is the primary limiter at that resolution step. Conversely, the drop from 1080p to 1440p is smaller, suggesting that the CPU is still holding back performance at 1080p. This dual limiting behavior is a key insight: at 1080p, the 5600G is the bottleneck, but as resolution climbs to 4K, the RX 7900 XT’s rendering load takes over as the dominant factor.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its highest averages. Low settings produce 167.8 FPS, Medium drops to 135.9 FPS, High yields 104 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 97.3 FPS. The gap between High and Ultra is just 6.7 FPS, which is smaller than the 31.9 FPS gap between Low and Medium, suggesting diminishing returns at the top end.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 140.2 FPS on Low, 111.5 FPS on Medium, 85.8 FPS on High, and 77.7 FPS on Ultra. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p shows a consistent reduction of roughly 16-20% across settings, with Low dropping by 27.6 FPS and Ultra by 19.6 FPS.

At 3840x2160, the results are 105.8 FPS on Low, 82.5 FPS on Medium, 61.9 FPS on High, and 58.4 FPS on Ultra. Notably, the 4K Low average of 105.8 FPS is still higher than the 1080p Ultra average of 97.3 FPS, which underscores how much of a burden the Ultra preset places on the GPU regardless of resolution. The 4K Ultra result of 58.4 FPS is the only measured row that falls below the 60 FPS threshold, making it the least playable configuration in the dataset.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 1440p gaming with this combo?

A: Based on the measured rows, High is the best choice at 2560x1440, delivering 85.8 FPS, while Ultra drops to 77.7 FPS and Medium sits at 111.5 FPS.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance more at 1080p?

A: The data suggests the CPU is the limiting factor at 1920x1080, as the frame rate drops sharply from Low (167.8 FPS) to Medium (135.9 FPS), indicating the GPU is not being fully utilized.

Q: Can this combo maintain 60 FPS at 4K with maximum settings?

A: No, at 3840x2160 with the Ultra preset, the average FPS is 58.4, which is below the 60 FPS target. High settings are required to stay above 60, yielding 61.9 FPS.

Q: How does the Ryzen 5 5600G compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The 5600G has an average benchmark score of 19983, which is 0.2% higher than the Intel Core i7-11600H (19949) and 0.2% lower than the Intel Core i7-11800H (20024).

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, Low averages 167.8 FPS while Ultra averages 97.3 FPS, a difference of 70.5 FPS or roughly 42% lower performance on Ultra.

Q: Is the RX 7900 XT’s 20 GB VRAM a benefit in this game?

A: The 20 GB memory pool is present, but the measured FPS data shows that performance drops are more correlated with resolution and settings than with VRAM capacity, indicating the card’s compute power is the primary constraint.