Minecraft

The Intel Core Ultra 7 155H paired with the AMD Radeon 890M delivers a playable, though not exceptional, Minecraft experience. The data shows a combination that is heavily dependent on resolution and preset selection, with the integrated GPU acting as the primary bottleneck at higher settings. The combo ranks 1106th out of 1176 tested combinations, placing it in the lower percentile of systems, yet it still manages to provide smooth frame rates at 1080p with low to medium settings.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS this combo achieves in Minecraft?

A: The highest recorded average FPS is 192, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with the Low preset. This indicates that the system has ample headroom for competitive or high-refresh-rate play when visual demands are minimized.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested systems for Minecraft?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 155H and AMD Radeon 890M combination ranks 1106th out of 1176 tested combos. This places it in the bottom 6% of systems, suggesting it is far from a high-end configuration for this title.

Q: What is the lowest average FPS recorded for this system?

A: The lowest average FPS is 25, observed at 3840x2160 (4K) resolution with the Ultra preset. This frame rate is effectively unplayable, highlighting the extreme strain that 4K resolution places on the integrated GPU.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this setup?

A: The data suggests the GPU is the primary limiting factor. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 192 FPS, showing the CPU's capacity. However, at 4K Ultra, performance collapses to 25 FPS, a 87% drop, indicating the Radeon 890M cannot handle the increased pixel load.

Q: What is the performance difference between the Low and Ultra presets at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Low preset averages 121 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 48 FPS. This represents a 73 FPS drop, or roughly a 60% reduction in performance, demonstrating the significant cost of enabling higher graphical features.

Q: Does the system maintain a playable frame rate at 4K with any settings?

A: At 3840x2160, the system only achieves a playable average FPS with the Low preset, hitting 63 FPS. The Medium preset drops to 50 FPS, High to 40 FPS, and Ultra falls to 25 FPS, making Low the only viable option for 4K gaming.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data provides a clear hierarchy of performance across presets and resolutions. For a balanced experience that prioritizes frame rate without completely sacrificing visual fidelity, the Medium preset at 1920x1080 is the optimal choice. This configuration yields an average of 152 FPS, with a minimum of 129 FPS, ensuring smooth gameplay even during complex scene loads. The High preset at the same resolution drops to 121 FPS, which is still smooth, but the Medium preset offers a substantial 31 FPS advantage.

For users with 1440p monitors, the Medium preset remains the best option, delivering a solid 96 FPS average. The High preset at this resolution is also acceptable at 76 FPS, but the frame rate begins to dip closer to the 60 FPS threshold. At 4K, the only playable option is the Low preset, which provides a 63 FPS average. The Medium preset at 4K drops to 50 FPS, which may be tolerable for some, but the minimum FPS of 43 suggests potential stuttering. The Ultra preset should be avoided entirely, as it only achieves 25 FPS at 1080p and 48 FPS at 1440p, making it unsuitable for any resolution with this hardware.

Ultimately, the data indicates that the Ultra preset is too demanding for this integrated GPU. The performance cost is severe, and the visual improvements are not worth the significant frame rate penalty. The best experience is found by sticking to Medium settings and adjusting the resolution to match the target frame rate, with 1080p providing the most headroom.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 155H is a 16-core, 22-thread processor based on the Meteor Lake architecture. It features a base clock of 3.80 GHz and a boost clock of 4.80 GHz, with a 24 MB shared L3 cache. This is a powerful mobile processor, and its benchmark scores reflect that, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 15028 and a single-core score of 1743. In Minecraft, which can be sensitive to single-thread performance, the 155H proves to be more than capable.

The data suggests the CPU is not the bottleneck in most scenarios. At 1080p with Low settings, the system achieves 192 FPS, a high frame rate that demonstrates the CPU's ability to feed the GPU with enough draw calls. The PassMark single-thread score of 3468 and the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1743 indicate strong per-core performance, which is critical for Minecraft's primary game logic thread. However, the CPU's performance is also robust in multi-threaded tasks, as shown by the PassMark multi-thread score of 24873, which helps with chunk loading and world generation.

The system's 16 cores and 22 threads are more than sufficient for Minecraft's demands. The data shows that as resolution and settings increase, frame rates drop dramatically, which points to the GPU being the limiting factor. When comparing the CPU to its nearest rivals, the Intel Core i5-14600T has a deltaPct of 0, meaning the 155H is essentially tied in average benchmark score. The AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 360 is only 0.1% faster, and the AMD Ryzen 5 7400F is 0.2% slower. This indicates that the 155H is a mid-to-high-tier mobile processor with performance that is competitive with desktop parts in synthetic benchmarks.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core Ultra 7 155H and AMD Radeon 890M combination ranks 1106th out of 1176 tested combos for Minecraft. This is a very low rank, placing the system in the bottom 6% of all tested configurations. This ranking is a clear indicator that while the CPU is capable, the overall gaming performance is dragged down by the integrated GPU. The Radeon 890M is an integrated graphics solution, and its performance is inherently limited compared to discrete graphics cards.

This low rank means that users should expect this system to struggle with high-end gaming. The data shows that it can handle 1080p gaming at medium settings with a high frame rate, but it falls behind the majority of other tested systems which likely feature discrete GPUs. In comparison, the CPU's individual ranking is much higher, at the 83rd percentile of all CPUs. This stark contrast highlights the imbalance of this combo, where the CPU is a strong performer, but the GPU holds back the entire system's gaming potential.

The rank also implies that for Minecraft, this combo is not suitable for high-refresh-rate displays at high resolutions. While it can achieve 192 FPS at 1080p Low, the experience degrades quickly. The 4K Ultra result of 25 FPS is among the lowest possible, making the system effectively unusable at those settings. This ranking serves as a warning that this is a productivity-focused processor with gaming as a secondary capability, rather than a dedicated gaming machine.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon 890M is an integrated GPU based on the RDNA 3.5 architecture, built on a 4 nm process. It features a boost clock of 2900 MHz and 1024 shading units, with a peak FP32 performance of 5.939 TFLOPS. It supports DirectX 12 Ultimate and Vulkan 1.4, ensuring compatibility with modern game APIs. However, its memory is "System Shared," meaning it uses the system's DDR5 RAM, and its bandwidth is "System Dependent," which can be a bottleneck.

The GPU's performance is the defining factor in this combo's Minecraft results. The PassMark G3D score of 8076 and the 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 590 indicate modest performance, placing it at the 45th percentile of all GPUs. The data shows that the GPU is the primary bottleneck, as performance scales poorly with resolution. At 1080p Low, the system hits 192 FPS, but at 4K Low, it drops to 63 FPS. This 67% reduction in performance is due to the GPU struggling to fill the increased number of pixels.

The GPU's nearest rival, the AMD Radeon Vega 8, has a deltaPct of -0.1% in average score, indicating they are nearly identical in performance. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960 is only 0.7% faster, and the GTX 465 is 0.9% faster. This places the 890M in a performance class comparable to older entry-level discrete GPUs. For Minecraft, this means it can handle the game, but users must be mindful of settings. The 890M's 5.939 TFLOPS of compute power is sufficient for 1080p Medium, but it is overwhelmed by 4K, particularly at higher presets which increase shader complexity and draw distances.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a detailed look at the system's performance across different resolutions and presets. At 1920x1080, the system performs admirably. The Low preset achieves an average of 192 FPS, the Medium preset hits 152 FPS with a minimum of 129 FPS, and the High preset reaches 121 FPS. The Ultra preset drops significantly to 75 FPS, showing a clear performance cliff.

At 2560x1440, the performance scales down predictably. The Low preset averages 121 FPS, which is smooth, while the Medium preset averages 96 FPS with a minimum of 82 FPS. The High preset drops to 76 FPS, which is still playable, but the Ultra preset falls to 48 FPS, making it a less desirable choice. At 3840x2160, the system struggles. The Low preset is the only one that remains playable, with an average of 63 FPS. The Medium preset averages 50 FPS, with a minimum of 43 FPS, and the High preset drops to 40 FPS. The Ultra preset is effectively unplayable at 25 FPS.

The data reveals a consistent pattern: the difference between Low and Medium is relatively small, but the jump to High and Ultra has a significant performance cost. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Medium is 40 FPS, while the difference between Medium and High is 31 FPS. The most dramatic drop is between High and Ultra, which is a 46 FPS reduction at 1080p. This suggests that the Ultra preset enables effects that are disproportionately demanding on the Radeon 890M's limited resources.

Resolution Scaling

The resolution scaling data shows how the system's performance degrades as pixel count increases. From 1920x1080 to 2560x1440, the average FPS drops by approximately 37% across all presets. For example, at Low settings, performance goes from 192 FPS to 121 FPS. This indicates that the GPU is the limiting factor, as the increased pixel count directly impacts the fill rate. The CPU is not the bottleneck here, as its load does not scale linearly with resolution.

Scaling from 2560x1440 to 3840x2160 shows an even more severe drop. At Low settings, the FPS falls from 121 to 63, a 48% reduction. At Medium settings, it falls from 96 to 50, a 48% reduction. This non-linear scaling is typical of GPU-bound scenarios, where the render target size exceeds the GPU's memory bandwidth and shading capacity. The Radeon 890M's shared memory architecture likely exacerbates this issue, as the system's DDR5 bandwidth becomes a limiting factor at higher resolutions.

The data confirms that the limiting component is the GPU. The CPU's performance remains constant regardless of resolution, but the FPS drops significantly as resolution increases. At 1080p, the system is able to leverage the CPU's strong single-thread performance to achieve high frame rates. However, at 4K, the GPU is unable to keep up, and the frame rate collapses. This analysis suggests that for a better 4K experience, a discrete GPU would be necessary, as the integrated Radeon 890M simply does not have the raw pixel throughput required for high-fidelity gaming at that resolution.