Microsoft Flight Simulator

# Microsoft Flight Simulator — AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D + AMD Radeon RX 580

The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D paired with the AMD Radeon RX 580 produces a profoundly GPU-limited experience in Microsoft Flight Simulator, with the measured frame rates showing a clear ceiling imposed by the graphics card across all resolutions and settings. The combination ranks 3376th out of 3714 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 9% of configurations, which aligns with the RX 580's modest 53rd percentile standing among all GPUs while the CPU sits at a strong 83rd percentile among all processors. The data indicates that this pairing delivers playable, albeit not smooth, performance only at 1080p with reduced settings, with higher resolutions and quality presets pushing average frame rates below 30 FPS.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a steep and consistent decline as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160, revealing that the RX 580 is the dominant bottleneck at every step. At Low settings, the average frame rate drops from 54 FPS at 1080p to 43 FPS at 1440p, a 20.4% reduction, and then to 32 FPS at 4K, a further 25.6% cut from 1440p. This scaling pattern is characteristic of a GPU that is saturated even at 1080p, as the frame rate loss from resolution scaling closely tracks the increase in pixel count rather than showing a plateau that would indicate CPU limitation.

At Medium settings, the same trend holds: 42 FPS at 1080p falls to 34 FPS at 1440p (a 19% drop) and then to 25 FPS at 4K (a 26.5% drop). High settings show 31 FPS at 1080p, 25 FPS at 1440p (19.4% lower), and 19 FPS at 4K (24% lower). Ultra settings follow with 30 FPS at 1080p, 24 FPS at 1440p (20% lower), and 18 FPS at 4K (25% lower). The near-uniform percentage drops across all settings indicate that the scaling is purely resolution-driven and that the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth are the limiting factors, not the CPU or any software-side constraint.

The absolute numbers tell a stark story: at 4K, no settings preset achieves an average above 32 FPS, and the Ultra preset bottoms out at 18 FPS average. Even at 1440p, only Low settings exceed 40 FPS, and Ultra stays at 24 FPS. The 1080p results are the only ones where any preset reaches a playable threshold, with Low at 54 FPS and Medium at 42 FPS. The scaling behavior suggests that the RX 580's 256-bit memory bus and 256.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for the high-resolution textures and draw distances that Microsoft Flight Simulator demands, making 4K effectively unplayable regardless of quality settings.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 580 is the decisive performance limiter in this configuration, and its specifications explain why. The GPU features 8 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus with 256.0 GB/s bandwidth, paired with a base clock of 1257 MHz and a boost clock of 1340 MHz. Its 2304 shading units and 32 ROPs deliver a pixel rate of 42.88 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 193.0 GTexel/s, with FP32 compute at 6.175 TFLOPS. These figures place the RX 580 at the 53rd percentile among all GPUs, with a PassMark G3D score of 8813 and an average benchmark score of 12928.

The GPU's nearest rivals in benchmark scores are the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Mobile (12940, 0.1% higher), NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER (12986, 0.4% higher), AMD Radeon 740M (12870, 0.5% lower), and AMD FirePro W5100 (12847, 0.6% lower). This clustering shows that the RX 580 sits in a performance tier that is competitive with entry-level mobile GPUs and older mid-range desktop cards, but that tier is simply not adequate for a simulator as demanding as Microsoft Flight Simulator at high resolutions. The 8 GB VRAM capacity is not the primary issue at 1080p, but the memory bandwidth becomes a limiting factor as resolution increases, which is consistent with the observed FPS scaling.

The PassMark DirectX scores are telling: DirectX 11 scores 60, DirectX 12 scores 43, and DirectX 10 scores 46, with DirectX 9 at 124. These low API-specific scores relative to the G3D score of 8813 suggest that the GPU struggles with modern graphics API workloads, which Microsoft Flight Simulator relies on heavily. The Polaris 20 chip, built on GlobalFoundries' 14 nm process with 5,700 million transistors, is an end-of-life product that was released in 2017, and its GCN 4.0 architecture lacks the hardware features that newer GPUs use to accelerate geometry processing and shading in complex scenes. The result is that even at Low settings, the GPU cannot maintain frame rates above 60 FPS at 1080p, and at Ultra settings it falls to 30 FPS at 1080p and 18 FPS at 4K.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D is a high-end desktop processor that is clearly not the limiting factor in this pairing. Its 8 cores and 16 threads are built on Zen 4 architecture (Raphael) using TSMC's 5 nm process, with a base clock of 4.20 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz. The 96 MB of shared L3 cache is substantial, and the CPU's benchmark scores reflect its strength: Cinebench R23 multicore scores 16817, Geekbench multicore scores 15610, and PassMark multithread scores 34293, with a single-thread PassMark score of 3759. The CPU sits at the 83rd percentile among all processors, with an average benchmark score of 33079.

The nearest CPU rivals in average benchmark score are the AMD Ryzen 7 8700G (33089, 0% delta), Intel Core i7-13650HX (33089, 0% delta), AMD Ryzen 7 7745HX (33091, 0% delta), and AMD Ryzen 9 PRO 6950H (33201, -0.4% delta). This tight clustering indicates that the 7800X3D's compute performance is on par with other high-end 8-core parts, and its 3D V-Cache design provides exceptional gaming performance in CPU-bound scenarios. However, in this configuration, the CPU's capabilities are effectively wasted because the RX 580 cannot feed it enough frames to become the bottleneck.

The data supports this conclusion: if the CPU were the limiting factor, we would expect to see frame rates that stay relatively constant across resolutions, as the CPU work per frame is similar regardless of pixel count. Instead, the FPS drops by roughly 20-25% at each resolution step, which is the signature of GPU saturation. The 3DMark scores for the CPU — 7980 for 16 threads, 6539 for 8 threads, and 959 for single-thread — show that the processor has ample headroom for the simulation's physics and flight model calculations, but that headroom goes unused because the GPU renders frames so slowly. The CPU's memory support for DDR5 and dual-channel configuration further ensures that data feeding is not a constraint, but the RX 580's 256.0 GB/s bandwidth becomes the wall.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D and AMD Radeon RX 580 ranks 3376th out of 3714 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator, placing it in the bottom 9% of all configurations. This ranking is heavily skewed by the GPU's performance, as the CPU is a top-tier part while the GPU is entry-level by modern standards. The rank suggests that this pairing is fundamentally mismatched for a demanding simulator, as the CPU's 83rd percentile standing cannot compensate for the GPU's 53rd percentile position.

The data indicates that most other tested combos — 3375 of them — outperform this configuration, which is expected given that the RX 580 is an end-of-life product from 2017. The combo's ranking is not a reflection of the CPU's capabilities but rather a consequence of pairing a high-end 8-core processor with a GPU that is now considered entry-level. In practical terms, the combo delivers frame rates that are acceptable only for low-settings 1080p play, while the CPU sits idle waiting for the GPU to complete each frame. The rank of 3376 out of 3714 implies that users would need to substantially upgrade the GPU to see meaningful performance gains, as the CPU has significant headroom that is currently untapped.

FAQ

Q: Is this combo capable of running Microsoft Flight Simulator at 4K?

A: No. The measured data shows that at 3840x2160, the highest average FPS is 32 at Low settings, with Medium at 25, High at 19, and Ultra at 18. These frame rates are below playable thresholds for a flight simulator.

Q: Which settings preset provides the highest average FPS at 1080p?

A: The Low preset at 1920x1080 achieves an average of 54 FPS, which is the highest measured value across all resolutions and settings. Medium at 1080p reaches 42 FPS, while High and Ultra achieve 31 and 30 FPS respectively.

Q: Is the AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D the bottleneck in this configuration?

A: No. The CPU has an 83rd percentile ranking among all processors, with strong multi-threaded scores. The FPS scaling pattern across resolutions indicates GPU saturation, meaning the RX 580 is the limiting component.

Q: How does the RX 580 compare to its nearest GPU rivals in benchmark scores?

A: The RX 580's average benchmark score of 12928 is nearly identical to the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Mobile (12940, 0.1% higher) and the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER (12986, 0.4% higher), while it slightly outperforms the AMD Radeon 740M (12870, 0.5% higher).

Q: What is the best resolution to play at with this combo?

A: The only resolution where any preset exceeds 40 FPS average is 1920x1080, with Low at 54 FPS and Medium at 42 FPS. At 2560x1440, only Low reaches 43 FPS, and at 4K, all presets are below 32 FPS.

Q: Does the combo's ranking in this game reflect the CPU or GPU performance?

A: The ranking of 3376th out of 3714 combos is primarily driven by the GPU. The CPU is a high-end part, but the RX 580's modest performance ceiling limits the entire system.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal experience for this combo is at 1920x1080 with the Low settings preset, which delivers an average of 54 FPS. This is the only configuration in the measured data that approaches a smooth frame rate, and it is the only one that exceeds 50 FPS. The Medium preset at 1080p offers 42 FPS average, which is playable but with noticeable stutters in dense scenery, and its minimum FPS of 36 suggests occasional dips below comfortable levels. The High and Ultra presets at 1080p, at 31 and 30 FPS respectively, are marginal at best and would likely feel sluggish during flight.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset achieves 43 FPS average, which is acceptable for less demanding scenarios but still below the 1080p Low experience. The Medium preset at 1440p drops to 34 FPS with a minimum of 29, which is borderline for a flight simulator where smooth panning is important. At 4K, all presets fall below 32 FPS, with Ultra at 18 FPS, making 4K unviable for any serious use. The data strongly suggests that users should prioritize resolution reduction over quality settings, as dropping from High to Low at 1080p yields a 74% FPS increase (from 31 to 54), which is a far larger gain than any settings adjustment at higher resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS across settings is as follows: Low achieves 54 FPS, Medium achieves 42 FPS with a minimum of 36 and maximum of 48, High achieves 31 FPS, and Ultra achieves 30 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 24 FPS, representing a 44% drop in performance when moving from the lowest to the highest quality preset.

At 2560x1440, the average FPS figures are: Low at 43 FPS, Medium at 34 FPS with a minimum of 29 and maximum of 39, High at 25 FPS, and Ultra at 24 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 19 FPS, a 44% reduction, which mirrors the percentage drop seen at 1080p and indicates consistent scaling.

At 3840x2160, the results are: Low at 32 FPS, Medium at 25 FPS with a minimum of 21 and maximum of 29, High at 19 FPS, and Ultra at 18 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra at 4K is 14 FPS, a 44% decrease, again matching the pattern. The minimum FPS values are only recorded for the Medium preset at each resolution, showing 36 at 1080p, 29 at 1440p, and 21 at 4K, which gives some indication of frame time consistency: the 4K Medium minimum of 21 FPS is barely above the Ultra average of 18 FPS, suggesting that even the lowest preset at 4K struggles to maintain usable frame rates. The data shows that for every 1.78x increase in pixel count from 1080p to 1440p, the FPS drops by approximately 20%, and the same relative drop occurs from 1440p to 4K, confirming the GPU-bound nature of the entire measured dataset.