Microsoft Flight Simulator

Microsoft Flight Simulator is notoriously demanding, and the data for this AMD Ryzen 5 5600G + NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 combination confirms that pairing a mid-range 2021 CPU with a 2019 entry-level GPU yields a system that is fundamentally limited by its graphics card. The measured FPS across all resolutions and settings presets shows a configuration that can handle the game at lower fidelity targets, but will struggle to deliver a smooth experience at higher visual standards. The data indicates that this combo ranks near the bottom of the tested pool, sitting at rank 1690 out of 1795 combos, placing it in the bottom 6% of all systems tested for this title.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark results offer a clear verdict: the Low preset is the only setting that provides a consistently playable experience across typical gaming resolutions. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 51.1 FPS, which is the only measured configuration that breaks the 50 FPS threshold. The Medium preset drops to 38.9 FPS, which is playable but with noticeable dips in busy scenery. The High and Ultra presets at 1080p fall to 29.4 FPS and 25.5 FPS respectively, which are marginal for a flight simulator where smooth panning is critical.

For users with a 2560x1440 monitor, the Low preset is the only viable option, delivering 41.1 FPS. The Medium preset at this resolution drops to exactly 30 FPS, which is borderline, while High (19.9 FPS) and Ultra (23.2 FPS) are not recommended for active play. At 3840x2160, the situation is untenable; even the Low preset only manages 29.8 FPS, and the High (17.6 FPS) and Ultra (17.1 FPS) presets are essentially slideshows. The recommendation is to run the game at 1920x1080 with the Low preset for the best balance of fluidity and visual clarity. If a user insists on Medium settings, they must accept a 1080p resolution and a frame rate that will feel less responsive.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 is the primary bottleneck in this system. With 4 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 128-bit bus providing 128.1 GB/s of bandwidth, the card is simply outclassed by the demands of Microsoft Flight Simulator’s high-resolution textures. The GPU’s architecture is Turing on a 12 nm process, with 896 shading units and a boost clock of 1665 MHz, resulting in an FP32 performance of 2.984 TFLOPS. These specifications place the GPU at the 43rd percentile of all GPUs, and its benchmark scores confirm it is a low-end part.

The data shows a stark drop in performance as resolution increases, which is a classic sign of GPU memory bandwidth and fill-rate limits. The GTX 1650’s nearest rivals in benchmark scores are the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 A Mobile (0.4% slower) and the AMD Radeon 550X (0.4% slower), indicating it performs similarly to mobile-class parts. The card’s DirectX 12 benchmark score of 35 out of 100 is particularly weak, and this is reflected in the game’s poor scaling to higher presets. The 4 GB VRAM is likely a significant constraint, as the simulator tries to load large terrain and aircraft data, causing stutter and frame drops when the buffer is exceeded.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G is a far more capable component than the GPU. This 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 3 architecture (Cezanne) has a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. It sits at the 78th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 19983. Its multi-threaded performance is strong, evidenced by a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 16758, and its single-core performance is solid with a score of 2365 in the same test.

In this specific game, however, the CPU’s potential is largely untapped. The measured FPS at a given preset does not improve dramatically when lowering resolution, which indicates the CPU is not the limiting factor. For example, at High settings, the FPS goes from 29.4 at 1080p to 19.9 at 1440p and 17.6 at 4K. This scaling pattern is entirely GPU-driven. The CPU’s nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks include the Intel Core i7-11600H (0.2% faster) and the Intel Core i7-11800H (0.2% slower), showing that the 5600G is competitive with those mobile chips. The 5600G provides enough processing headroom to handle the simulation’s physics and AI calculations, but the GTX 1650 cannot keep up with the rendering workload.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Ryzen 5 5600G and the GTX 1650 achieves a rank of 1690 out of 1795 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator. This places the system in the bottom 5.9% of all configurations tested, which is a poor result. The rank reflects the GPU’s severe limitations in this title; a more balanced pairing would feature a significantly stronger graphics card to match the CPU’s capabilities.

The data suggests that this combo is a legacy or budget-oriented build that was not designed for high-end simulation. The CPU’s high percentile (78th) versus the GPU’s mid-low percentile (43rd) creates a large performance imbalance. In practical terms, the system is similar to having a high-end engine in a car with low-grip tires; the CPU can feed the GPU data, but the GPU cannot render it quickly. Users should not expect to upgrade the graphics settings without a corresponding GPU upgrade.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K clearly illustrates the GPU bottleneck. At the Low preset, the average FPS drops from 51.1 at 1920x1080 to 41.1 at 2560x1440 (a 19.6% drop), and then to 29.8 at 3840x2160 (a 41.7% drop from 1080p). At the Medium preset, the drop is from 38.9 FPS at 1080p to 30 FPS at 1440p, and finally to 24.3 FPS at 4K. The High preset shows a similar trend: 29.4 FPS at 1080p, 19.9 FPS at 1440p, and 17.6 FPS at 4K.

This pattern is indicative of a GPU that runs out of pixel throughput and memory bandwidth as resolution increases. The 4K results are particularly telling; the difference between Low (29.8 FPS) and Ultra (17.1 FPS) at that resolution is only 12.7 FPS, suggesting that even the lowest settings cannot overcome the hardware’s fundamental limits. The scaling is not linear, and the performance loss from 1440p to 4K is more severe than from 1080p to 1440p, which points to the 128-bit memory bus being saturated. The component limiting the experience is unambiguously the graphics card.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are as follows: Low preset yields 51.1 FPS, Medium yields 38.9 FPS, High yields 29.4 FPS, and Ultra yields 25.5 FPS. This is the only resolution where the Low preset provides a frame rate above 50, and the Ultra preset remains above 25 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the averages are: Low at 41.1 FPS, Medium at exactly 30 FPS, High at 19.9 FPS, and Ultra at 23.2 FPS. It is notable that the Ultra preset performs slightly better than High at this resolution (23.2 vs 19.9 FPS), which is likely a measurement anomaly or a difference in specific scene complexity, but it underscores the inconsistency at these low frame rates.

At 3840x2160, the averages are: Low at 29.8 FPS, Medium at 24.3 FPS, High at 17.6 FPS, and Ultra at 17.1 FPS. The Ultra preset at 4K is the worst-performing configuration in the entire dataset, with a frame rate that is entirely unsuitable for a flight simulator. The data confirms that this system is only usable at 1080p with Low settings, and any attempt to increase visual fidelity will result in a sub-30 FPS experience that compromises the simulation’s realism and control precision.