Minecraft: Java Edition

# Minecraft: Java Edition — AMD Ryzen 5 4600G + NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER

This combo ranks 1510th out of 1727 tested CPU-GPU pairings for Minecraft: Java Edition, placing it in the lower half of the database. The ranking reflects a pairing where the GPU is the primary constraint at higher settings, while the CPU's single-thread performance keeps frame rates competitive at lower settings. The measured data covers 12 distinct resolution/settings combinations, offering a complete picture of how this system scales across the most common gaming scenarios.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 1510 out of 1727 places it in the 12.5th percentile of all tested combinations for this game. This is a modest standing, but it masks significant variability depending on resolution and quality settings. At 1080p with Low settings, the system achieves nearly 300 frames per second, a result that would rank far higher than the overall position suggests. Conversely, at 4K Ultra, the average frame rate drops to 41.4 FPS, pulling the composite score down substantially.

The CPU sits at the 75th percentile among all processors, with an average benchmark score of 17489. Its nearest rivals include the AMD Ryzen 3 PRO 5355GE (score 17482, delta 0%), the Intel Core i5-12450H (score 17475, delta 0.1%), the Intel Core i3-14100T (score 17636, delta -0.8%), and the Intel Core i3-13100F (score 17665, delta -1%). The Ryzen 5 4600G is essentially tied with these processors, trailing the fastest rival by just 1% in aggregate benchmarks.

The GPU, by contrast, sits at the 55th percentile among all graphics cards, with an average benchmark score of 14286. Its nearest rivals are the AMD Radeon RX Vega 11 (score 14314, delta -0.2%), Intel Iris Xe MAX Graphics (score 14315, delta -0.2%), AMD Radeon Vega 11 (score 14352, delta -0.5%), and AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT (score 14389, delta -0.7%). The GTX 1660 SUPER trails these competitors by less than 1%, making it statistically indistinguishable from them in raw compute terms.

The combination of a 75th-percentile CPU with a 55th-percentile GPU explains the overall rank. The system is not bottlenecked by the processor in most scenarios, but the graphics card limits performance at higher resolutions and quality settings.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 4600G is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 2 architecture (Renoir codename), manufactured on a 7 nm process at TSMC. It operates with a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU supports DDR4 memory in a dual-channel configuration, providing 51.2 GB/s of memory bandwidth.

Minecraft: Java Edition is notoriously single-thread bound, particularly for world generation and entity updates. The Ryzen 5 4600G's single-core performance is reflected in its benchmark scores: 726 in 3DMark single-thread, 193 in Cinebench R15 single-core, 805 in Cinebench R20 single-core, and 1919 in Cinebench R23 single-core. These scores place it at the 75th percentile overall, which is adequate for this game's demands.

Multi-threaded performance, while less relevant for Minecraft's core loop, shows the CPU's capability: 4863 in 3DMark 16-thread, 4889 in 3DMark max-threads, 5709 in Cinebench R20 multi-core, and 13593 in Cinebench R23 multi-core. The 8 MB shared L3 cache and 512 KB L2 per core help with chunk loading and modded gameplay, where multiple threads can be utilized.

At 1080p Low settings, the system achieves 298.9 FPS average, indicating the CPU is not limiting at this configuration. However, the gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p (298.9 vs 120.1 FPS) suggests the GPU is the primary constraint even at lower resolutions when settings are increased. The CPU's 12 threads and 6 cores provide sufficient headroom for background tasks and Java's garbage collection overhead, which can cause frame hitches in this game.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER is built on the Turing architecture (TU116 chip) using a 12 nm process at TSMC. It features 1408 shading units, 88 texture mapping units, and 48 render output units. The GPU operates at a base clock of 1530 MHz with a boost clock of 1785 MHz, and its 6 GB of GDDR6 memory runs at 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective) across a 192-bit bus, delivering 336.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

The GPU's compute capabilities include 5.027 TFLOPS FP32, 10.05 TFLOPS FP16 (2:1 ratio), a pixel rate of 85.68 GPixel/s, and a texture rate of 157.1 GTexel/s. These specifications place it at the 55th percentile among all GPUs, with a PassMark G3D score of 12699 and a PassMark GPU compute score of 5076. Its DirectX 12 score of 50 and Vulkan score of 59933 (Geekbench) indicate moderate API performance.

In Minecraft: Java Edition, the GTX 1660 SUPER's 6 GB VRAM is sufficient for all tested configurations, as the game's texture requirements are modest even at Ultra settings. The GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth become the limiting factors at higher resolutions. At 4K Ultra, the system drops to 41.4 FPS, while at 1440p Ultra it manages 76.4 FPS, and at 1080p Ultra it reaches 120.1 FPS. This scaling pattern clearly shows the GPU struggling as pixel count increases.

The GPU's nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX 5500 XT, has an average score of 14389, just 0.7% higher. This tight grouping suggests that users with any of these competing cards would see nearly identical performance in this game.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured data provides 12 data points across three resolutions and four quality settings. At 1080p, the system delivers 298.9 FPS on Low, 236.6 FPS on Medium, 191.2 FPS on High, and 120.1 FPS on Ultra. These figures show a steady decline as settings increase, with the drop from Low to Ultra representing a 59.8% reduction in frame rate.

At 1440p, the results are 190.7 FPS on Low, 150 FPS on Medium, 117.7 FPS on High, and 76.4 FPS on Ultra. The reduction from 1080p to 1440p at each setting is consistent: Low drops by 36.2%, Medium by 36.6%, High by 38.4%, and Ultra by 36.4%. This uniform scaling indicates the GPU is the dominant constraint at these settings.

At 4K, the system achieves 98 FPS on Low, 79.6 FPS on Medium, 59.8 FPS on High, and 41.4 FPS on Ultra. The 4K Low result of 98 FPS is notable, as it remains above 60 FPS, but the Ultra setting falls well below playable thresholds. The gap between Low and Ultra at 4K (98 vs 41.4 FPS) represents a 57.8% reduction, similar to the 1080p drop.

The most significant observation is that all four settings at 1080p exceed 120 FPS, making this system well-suited for high-refresh-rate displays at that resolution. At 1440p, only Low and Medium settings exceed 120 FPS, while High and Ultra fall below. At 4K, no setting reaches 120 FPS, and only Low exceeds 60 FPS.

Resolution Scaling

The data reveals how frame rates scale as resolution increases from 1080p to 4K. At Low settings, the system drops from 298.9 FPS at 1080p to 190.7 FPS at 1440p (36.2% reduction) and further to 98 FPS at 4K (67.2% reduction from 1080p). At Ultra settings, the progression is 120.1 FPS at 1080p, 76.4 FPS at 1440p (36.4% reduction), and 41.4 FPS at 4K (65.5% reduction from 1080p).

This scaling pattern is remarkably consistent across all settings, with each resolution step reducing frame rates by roughly one-third. The consistency indicates that the GPU is the limiting component in all scenarios, as a CPU-bound system would show less severe drops at higher resolutions where pixel count increases but CPU load remains relatively constant.

The pixel count increases by 2.25 times from 1080p to 1440p, and by 4 times from 1080p to 4K. The measured frame rate reductions are less than these pixel count increases, suggesting the GPU has some headroom in memory bandwidth and shading capacity that partially offsets the added pixel load. However, the 4K Ultra result of 41.4 FPS indicates the system is firmly GPU-limited at this extreme configuration.

The fact that Low settings at 4K (98 FPS) outpaces Ultra at 1080p (120.1 FPS) by a considerable margin demonstrates how settings affect GPU load more than resolution alone. The 6 GB VRAM capacity is never exceeded, as evidenced by the consistent scaling pattern without any sudden drops that would indicate memory swapping. The system's 12 threads and 6 cores provide enough CPU headroom to feed the GPU at all tested configurations, making the GTX 1660 SUPER the definitive performance ceiling for this pairing.