Microsoft Flight Simulator

The pairing of the Intel Core i5-13400F with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 in Microsoft Flight Simulator produces a dataset that clearly illustrates the distinct workloads imposed by the simulator at different resolutions. The benchmark results, drawn from measured FPS data, show a configuration that scales predictably, with the GPU becoming an increasingly dominant factor as resolution climbs, while the CPU’s 10-core architecture provides a solid foundation at lower settings. This analysis breaks down the performance metrics across all measured presets and resolutions, ranking the combination against other tested systems and offering guidance on the optimal settings for this specific hardware pairing.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Microsoft Flight Simulator reveals a pronounced resolution scaling curve that shifts the performance bottleneck as pixel count increases. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the system achieves 192 FPS, which drops to 179 FPS at 2560x1440, and further to 142 FPS at 3840x2160. This represents a decline of approximately 26% when moving from 1080p to 1440p, and a further 21% drop from 1440p to 4K. The pattern suggests that at 1080p, the frame rate is more likely constrained by CPU throughput, as the GPU has ample headroom to render frames quickly, leading to a smaller absolute drop when resolution increases.

However, the scaling becomes more linear and GPU-bound when examining the Ultra preset. At 1080p Ultra, the system produces 133 FPS, which falls to 107 FPS at 1440p (a 20% reduction) and then to 79 FPS at 4K (a 26% reduction). The steeper decline at higher resolutions indicates that the RTX 5090’s rendering workload, including its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory and 1.79 TB/s bandwidth, becomes the primary limiting factor, particularly when the simulator’s detailed terrain and aircraft models are rendered at maximum fidelity. The data shows that the gap between Low and Ultra settings widens with resolution, from a 59 FPS difference at 1080p to a 63 FPS difference at 4K, underscoring that the GPU’s compute capabilities are taxed more heavily by the combination of high resolution and high graphical fidelity.

Interestingly, the Medium preset at 4K yields 110 FPS with a minimum of 94 FPS and maximum of 127 FPS, which is notably closer to the High preset’s 83 FPS than to the Low preset’s 142 FPS. This suggests that the transition from Medium to High introduces a significant increase in GPU workload, likely due to more complex shading and texture filtering, while the jump from Low to Medium is less impactful on frame rate. The scaling data indicates that for users targeting 4K, the difference between Low and Ultra represents a 63 FPS swing, which is a substantial 44% performance hit, making the choice of preset critical for maintaining smooth gameplay.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 plays a pivotal role in this configuration, particularly at higher resolutions where its massive memory pool and clock speeds are fully utilized. The GPU operates with a base clock of 2017 MHz and a boost clock of 2407 MHz, and it features 32 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 1.79 TB/s. In Microsoft Flight Simulator, this memory capacity is likely leveraged for loading high-resolution textures and complex scenery, which is a hallmark of the simulator’s demanding asset streaming. The benchmark results show that at 4K Ultra, the system averages 79 FPS, which is the lowest measured value across all configurations, indicating that the GPU’s shading units (21760) and texture mapping units (680) are being pushed to their limits.

The GPU’s performance percentile of 92 versus all GPUs places it in the top tier, and its average benchmark score of 79842 is within 1.4% of the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 64X, which scores 80959, and 0.3% above the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB at 79605. These comparisons are based on the nearestRivals data, which shows the RTX 5090’s raw compute capabilities are competitive with these workstation and data center cards. In the context of this game, the GPU’s role becomes more pronounced at 4K, where the difference between Low and Medium settings yields a 32 FPS improvement (from 142 to 110 FPS), but the jump from Medium to High costs 27 FPS, suggesting that the GPU’s texture and shader processing is the bottleneck. The RTX 5090’s 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 423.6 GPixel/s pixel rate are substantial, yet the data shows that even this hardware cannot maintain 4K Ultra at high frame rates, with the 79 FPS average falling below the 83 FPS at 4K High, indicating that the Ultra preset introduces effects that significantly tax the GPU.

At 1080p, the GPU’s role is less critical, as the CPU can feed frames fast enough to keep the RTX 5090 busy, but the scaling from 1080p to 4K across all presets shows a consistent trend of GPU-bound performance. The measured data for the Medium preset at 1440p shows a minimum of 127 FPS and maximum of 172 FPS, which is the widest range in the dataset, indicating variability in the GPU’s workload depending on the scene complexity. This suggests that while the RTX 5090 is exceedingly capable, Microsoft Flight Simulator’s dynamic environments can cause frame time spikes, particularly at mid-range resolutions where the GPU is neither fully saturated nor idle.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F provides the processing foundation for this pairing, with 10 cores and 16 threads running at a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.60 GHz. The CPU’s architecture, Raptor Lake, is built on a 10 nm process, and it has 20 MB of shared L3 cache, which is likely beneficial for the simulator’s complex simulation logic and AI traffic management. The benchmark data shows that the CPU achieves a single-thread score of 3634 in PassMark and a multi-thread score of 25032, placing it in the 77th percentile versus all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS with an average score of 25284 (0% delta) and the Intel Core 5 120 at 25362 (-0.3% delta), indicating that the i5-13400F’s overall compute performance is well-balanced for its class.

In Microsoft Flight Simulator, the CPU’s role is most evident at 1080p Low, where the system achieves 192 FPS, the highest measured value. This suggests that at lower resolutions, the CPU is capable of feeding the RTX 5090 enough data to keep it occupied, but the frame rate is still lower than what the GPU could theoretically achieve, implying some degree of CPU limitation. However, the CPU’s 3DMark single-thread score of 960 and 2-thread score of 1880 indicate that its single-core performance is adequate for the simulator’s primary simulation thread, which is often the bottleneck in flight simulators. The CPU’s boost clock of 4.60 GHz is likely leveraged during these single-threaded tasks, but the data shows that at 4K, the CPU’s influence diminishes, as the GPU becomes the limiting factor.

The CPU’s multi-threaded capabilities are also relevant, as the simulator can utilize multiple cores for tasks like scenery generation and weather simulation. The Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 22604 and Geekbench multi-core score of 11068 show that the CPU can handle parallel workloads, but the measured FPS at 1080p Ultra (133 FPS) versus 1080p Low (192 FPS) reveals a 59 FPS gap that is likely due to increased CPU overhead from managing more complex rendering commands. This indicates that while the CPU is not the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions, it still plays a role in determining the maximum achievable frame rate, particularly at lower settings where the GPU has excess capacity.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 ranks 119th out of 3714 tested combos in Microsoft Flight Simulator, placing it in the top 3.2% of all configurations in the database. This ranking reflects the overall balance of the system, where the CPU’s mid-range performance is compensated by the GPU’s top-tier capabilities. The combo’s rank is particularly impressive given that the CPU is not a flagship part, as its percentile of 77 versus all CPUs is lower than the GPU’s 92 percentile, suggesting that the system’s ranking is driven primarily by the RTX 5090’s dominance in graphics-bound scenarios.

Compared to other combos in the database, this pairing’s rank of 119 indicates that it outperforms the vast majority of systems, likely including those with higher-end CPUs but less powerful GPUs. The data shows that the RTX 5090’s average benchmark score of 79842 is 0.3% higher than the NVIDIA Tesla P100 PCIe 16 GB, which is a data center GPU, underscoring the consumer card’s exceptional performance. However, the combo’s rank also implies that there are 118 other configurations with better overall performance, which may include pairings of the RTX 5090 with higher-core-count CPUs like the Core i9 or Ryzen 9, which could reduce CPU bottlenecks at lower resolutions. The measured FPS data supports this, as the 1080p Low result of 192 FPS is likely lower than what a more powerful CPU could achieve with the same GPU, but the rank of 119 still indicates a highly capable system for this game.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive view of the system’s performance across all resolutions and presets. At 1920x1080, the system achieves 192 FPS on Low, 175 FPS on Medium (with a minimum of 149 and maximum of 202), 139 FPS on High, and 133 FPS on Ultra. This represents a performance spread of 59 FPS from Low to Ultra, with the Medium preset offering a balanced 175 FPS that is 36 FPS higher than High. The 1080p data shows that the system is capable of exceeding 144 Hz on all presets except Ultra, which still averages 133 FPS, making it suitable for high-refresh-rate displays even at maximum settings.

At 2560x1440, the frame rates drop to 179 FPS on Low, 149 FPS on Medium (with a minimum of 127 and maximum of 172), 112 FPS on High, and 107 FPS on Ultra. The performance spread at 1440p is 72 FPS from Low to Ultra, which is wider than at 1080p, indicating that the GPU is becoming more of a limiting factor. The Medium preset at 1440p delivers 149 FPS, which is 37 FPS higher than High, suggesting that the Medium preset offers a good balance of visual quality and performance for users with 1440p monitors. The 4K resolution shows the most significant drops, with 142 FPS on Low, 110 FPS on Medium (with a minimum of 94 and maximum of 127), 83 FPS on High, and 79 FPS on Ultra. The 4K performance spread is 63 FPS from Low to Ultra, and the Ultra preset’s 79 FPS average is the only configuration that falls below 80 FPS, indicating that 4K Ultra is demanding even for the RTX 5090.

Across all resolutions, the Medium preset consistently offers the best balance, with the 4K Medium result of 110 FPS being 27 FPS higher than High and 31 FPS lower than Low, but with a minimum FPS of 94 that ensures smoother gameplay than the Low preset’s potential frame spikes. The data also shows that the High preset at 4K (83 FPS) is only 4 FPS higher than Ultra (79 FPS), suggesting that the visual difference between High and Ultra is not justified by the performance cost at this resolution.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this CPU-GPU combo in Microsoft Flight Simulator?

A: Based on the measured data, 2560x1440 offers the best balance, with the Medium preset achieving 149 FPS and a minimum of 127 FPS, which is both high and stable. At 1920x1080, all presets exceed 133 FPS, making it suitable for high-refresh displays, while 3840x2160 Ultra averages 79 FPS, which may be below the threshold for very smooth gameplay.

Q: How does the RTX 5090’s 32 GB of VRAM affect performance in this game?

A: The 32 GB of GDDR7 memory, paired with 1.79 TB/s bandwidth, is likely sufficient for the simulator’s high-resolution textures and scenery. The measured FPS data shows that the GPU is not memory-limited at any resolution, as even 4K Ultra maintains 79 FPS, indicating that the memory capacity is adequate for the game’s demands.

Q: Is the Core i5-13400F a bottleneck for the RTX 5090 in this title?

A: The data indicates that the CPU may be a limiting factor at 1080p Low, where the system achieves 192 FPS, but the GPU’s performance percentile of 92 versus the CPU’s 77 suggests that the GPU is the primary driver of the combo’s rank. At higher resolutions, the CPU’s influence diminishes, and the GPU becomes the clear bottleneck.

Q: What is the performance difference between High and Ultra presets at 4K?

A: At 3840x2160, the High preset averages 83 FPS, while Ultra averages 79 FPS, a difference of only 4 FPS. This suggests that the Ultra preset’s additional visual effects have a minimal impact on frame rate, making High the more efficient choice for 4K gaming.

Q: How does this combo compare to other systems in the database?

A: The combo ranks 119th out of 3714 tested configurations, placing it in the top 3.2% of all systems. This is driven by the RTX 5090’s top-tier performance, which is within 1.4% of the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 64X, while the CPU’s mid-range performance is offset by the GPU’s dominance.

Q: Does the Medium preset provide a smooth experience at 4K?

A: Yes, the 4K Medium preset averages 110 FPS with a minimum of 94 FPS, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay. This makes Medium the recommended preset for 4K users who want a high frame rate without sacrificing too much visual quality.

Settings Recommendations

For users of this specific configuration, the measured FPS data provides clear guidance on the optimal settings for each resolution. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset is recommended, as it averages 133 FPS, which is above 120 FPS and provides the best visual fidelity while maintaining a high frame rate. The Medium preset at 1080p offers 175 FPS, which is suitable for 144 Hz monitors, but the Ultra preset’s 133 FPS is still smooth and offers a significant visual upgrade. For 2560x1440, the Medium preset is the best choice, delivering 149 FPS with a minimum of 127 FPS, which ensures a consistent experience. The High preset at 1440p drops to 112 FPS, which is still playable, but Medium offers a 37 FPS improvement with likely minor visual compromises.

At 3840x2160, the Medium preset is strongly recommended, as it achieves 110 FPS with a minimum of 94 FPS, which is the only 4K configuration that maintains a frame rate above 90 FPS. The High preset at 4K averages 83 FPS, which is acceptable, but the 27 FPS difference between Medium and High makes Medium the more balanced option. The Ultra preset at 4K (79 FPS) is not recommended for users who prioritize smoothness, as the 4 FPS gain over High is negligible. The data indicates that the Medium preset across all resolutions provides the best experience, balancing visual quality with high and stable frame rates, making it the default recommendation for this CPU-GPU pairing.