Minimum

# Minimum — AMD Ryzen 5 5500 + AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT delivers a playable experience in Minimum, a 2014 Third-Person Shooter, but the data reveals a configuration that is heavily dependent on graphics settings and resolution. At 1080p, this combo produces a very fluid frame rate across all tested presets, with the Low preset hitting 166 FPS average. The 4K Ultra preset, however, falls to 28 FPS, making that combination nearly unplayable. The measured results show a system where the GPU is the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions, while the CPU's six Zen 3 cores provide sufficient headroom at lower resolutions. This analysis breaks down the measured FPS data, the role of each component, and how this specific pairing ranks against other tested combinations.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data strongly suggests that the Medium preset offers the most balanced experience for this hardware combination. At 1920x1080, Medium produces an average of 127 FPS with a minimum of 108 FPS and a maximum of 147 FPS, which represents a substantial improvement over the High preset's 107 FPS while only sacrificing a modest amount of visual fidelity. The frame time consistency at Medium, indicated by the narrow min-to-max range, suggests a stable experience without severe stuttering. At 2560x1440, Medium delivers 82 FPS average with a 70 FPS minimum, which remains well within smooth gameplay territory for a third-person shooter. The 4K Medium result of 44 FPS average, with a 38 FPS minimum, is borderline but may be acceptable for slower-paced sections of the game.

For players prioritizing maximum frame rates, the Low preset is the clear choice. It yields 166 FPS at 1080p, 107 FPS at 1440p, and 58 FPS at 4K. The jump from Low to Medium at 1080p is a 39 FPS reduction (166 to 127 FPS), indicating that the Medium preset imposes a significant load increase on the GPU. The Ultra preset, by contrast, shows diminishing returns: at 1080p, it delivers 82 FPS, which is 45 FPS less than Medium, yet the visual improvement in a game from 2014 may not justify that frame rate penalty. At 4K, Ultra drops to 28 FPS, which is below the threshold for comfortable gameplay. The data indicates that High sits between Medium and Ultra in performance, with 107 FPS at 1080p and 69 FPS at 1440p, but the 4K High result of 37 FPS is still too low for smooth action. Given the measured rows, Medium at 1080p or 1440p provides the best combination of playability and quality, while Low at 4K is the only viable option for 4K displays.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT, built on the RDNA 1.0 architecture with a 7 nm TSMC process, houses 2560 shading units, 160 texture mapping units, and 64 raster operation pipelines. Its memory configuration includes 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s. The GPU's base clock is 1605 MHz, with a game clock of 1755 MHz and a boost clock of 1905 MHz. These specifications, combined with the FP32 performance of 9.754 TFLOPS, explain the GPU's behavior in the Minimum benchmarks. The GPU's 59th percentile ranking among all GPUs and its average benchmark score of 16361 place it in the mid-range tier, which aligns with the measured FPS results.

The GPU's 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for Minimum at all tested settings and resolutions, as the game's 2014 release date suggests modest texture memory requirements. The measured FPS data shows that the RX 5700 XT is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. At 4K, the frame rate drops to 37 FPS on High and 28 FPS on Ultra, indicating that the GPU's compute and memory bandwidth are saturated. The pixel rate of 121.9 GPixel/s and texture rate of 304.8 GTexel/s provide context: at 4K, the GPU must process over 8 million pixels per frame, which taxes the 64 ROPs and 160 TMUs. The boost clock of 1905 MHz allows the GPU to maintain reasonable performance at 1080p, but the scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a consistent decline that highlights the GPU's limitations at higher resolutions.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of resolution scaling that identifies the GPU as the primary bottleneck. From 1920x1080 to 2560x1440, the average FPS on Medium drops from 127 to 82, a 35% reduction. From 1440p to 4K, the Medium average falls further to 44 FPS, another 46% reduction. This scaling is not linear with pixel count (1440p has 1.78x the pixels of 1080p, while 4K has 2.25x the pixels of 1440p), but the frame rate drops are steeper than the pixel increases, indicating that the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth become more constrained as resolution rises. At Low settings, the pattern is similar: 166 FPS at 1080p, 107 FPS at 1440p (36% drop), and 58 FPS at 4K (46% drop from 1440p).

The scaling behavior suggests that the CPU is not the primary limiter at higher resolutions. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 166 FPS, which is a high frame rate that could potentially be CPU-limited if the Ryzen 5 5500's six cores were insufficient. However, the fact that the frame rate drops significantly at each higher resolution step indicates that the GPU is the dominant constraint. The 1080p Ultra result of 82 FPS, versus 166 FPS at 1080p Low, shows that even at the same resolution, the GPU load varies dramatically with settings. The data points to a system where the CPU provides adequate headroom for the GPU to operate at its full potential at 1080p, but the GPU's performance ceiling is reached quickly as resolution increases.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 + AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT combination ranks 2758 out of 3712 tested combos in Minimum, placing it in the 25.7th percentile of all tested configurations. This ranking reflects the mid-range nature of both components. The GPU's 59th percentile ranking among all GPUs is higher than the combo's overall ranking, suggesting that the CPU pairing may be holding back the system slightly in this game. The CPU's 73rd percentile ranking among all CPUs is notably higher than the combo's rank, which implies that the GPU is the limiting factor in most scenarios, particularly at higher resolutions.

The combo rank of 2758 out of 3712 indicates that a significant majority of tested combinations outperform this pairing. This is expected given the RX 5700 XT's end-of-life production status and its 2019 release date. The GPU's nearest rivals, such as the AMD Radeon Pro 5600M with a 0.1% higher average score, and the NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell with a 0.3% lower score, illustrate that the RX 5700 XT sits at a performance plateau where small differences in benchmark scores translate to minimal real-world FPS changes. The CPU's nearest rivals, including the AMD Ryzen AI 5 430 (0.1% lower score) and the Intel Core i5-12500 (0.4% higher score), show that the Ryzen 5 5500 is similarly positioned in its performance tier. For Minimum specifically, this combo's rank suggests that while it can handle the game at 1080p and 1440p with appropriate settings, it is not a top-tier performer.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor based on the Zen 3 architecture, codenamed Cezanne, manufactured on TSMC's 7 nm process. It has a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, with a 65 W TDP. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 cache per core, 512 KB of L2 cache per core, and a 16 MB L3 cache. Memory support is dual-channel DDR4 with a bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s. The CPU's benchmark performance includes a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 16429 and a single-core score of 2319, indicating solid multi-threaded performance for a 6-core part.

In Minimum, the CPU's role is primarily to feed the GPU with draw calls and game logic. The measured FPS at 1080p Low (166 FPS) approaches the CPU's practical limit for this game, as the frame rate at this setting is so high that any additional CPU load could become a bottleneck. The 3dmark single-thread score of 836 and the Passmark single-thread score of 3058 suggest that the CPU's per-core performance is adequate for this 2014 title. The boost clock of 4.20 GHz provides the necessary single-thread speed for game logic, while the 6 cores and 12 threads handle background tasks and the game's multi-threaded aspects. The CPU's 73rd percentile ranking among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 19593, places it comfortably above the midpoint, and its nearest rivals show it performing within 0.7% of the Intel Core i5-11600KF. In this game, the CPU is not the limiting component at higher resolutions; the data shows that the GPU becomes the bottleneck as resolution increases, which allows the CPU to maintain frame rates without becoming a constraint.

FAQ

*Q: What is the best resolution and settings combination for this hardware in Minimum?*

A: The measured data shows that 1920x1080 at Medium settings provides 127 FPS average with a 108 FPS minimum, making it the best balance of visual quality and performance. For 1440p, Medium at 82 FPS average is also viable, while 4K Low at 58 FPS is the only playable 4K option.

Q: How does the RX 5700 XT perform compared to its nearest GPU rivals?

A: The RX 5700 XT's average benchmark score is 16361, which is 0.1% higher than the AMD Radeon Pro 5600M and 0.3% lower than both the NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell and the AMD Radeon PRO W7500. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 D V2 is 0.9% higher in score.

Q: Is the Ryzen 5 5500 CPU a bottleneck for the RX 5700 XT in this game?

A: At 1080p Low, the system reaches 166 FPS, which suggests the CPU can keep up with the GPU's output. At higher resolutions, the GPU becomes the limiting factor, as shown by frame rates dropping to 58 FPS at 4K Low. The CPU's 73rd percentile ranking indicates it is not the primary constraint.

Q: What is the frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K at Medium settings?

A: The average FPS at Medium settings drops from 127 at 1080p to 82 at 1440p, then to 44 at 4K. This represents a 65% reduction from 1080p to 4K, with the most significant drop occurring between 1440p and 4K.

*Q: How does this combo rank among all tested combinations in Minimum?*

A: This combo ranks 2758 out of 3712 tested combos, placing it in the lower 26th percentile of all configurations. This ranking is consistent with the mid-range performance of both the CPU and GPU.

*Q: Does the RX 5700 XT have enough VRAM for Minimum at Ultra settings?*

A: The GPU has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory, and the game released in 2014. The measured results show that Ultra settings are playable at 1080p (82 FPS) and 1440p (53 FPS), but at 4K Ultra, the average drops to 28 FPS, indicating that VRAM or compute limits, not capacity, are the issue.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1920x1080 (1080p):

• Low: 166 FPS average
• Medium: 127 FPS average, 108 FPS minimum, 147 FPS maximum
• High: 107 FPS average
• Ultra: 82 FPS average

2560x1440 (1440p):

• Low: 107 FPS average
• Medium: 82 FPS average, 70 FPS minimum, 94 FPS maximum
• High: 69 FPS average
• Ultra: 53 FPS average

3840x2160 (4K):

• Low: 58 FPS average
• Medium: 44 FPS average, 38 FPS minimum, 51 FPS maximum
• High: 37 FPS average
• Ultra: 28 FPS average

The data shows a consistent progression across all settings, with the gap between Low and Ultra widening as resolution increases. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is 84 FPS (166 to 82), while at 4K, the difference is 30 FPS (58 to 28). This pattern confirms that the GPU's performance envelope is the defining factor in this configuration. The Medium preset at all resolutions provides the best frame time consistency, as evidenced by the min and max FPS values being within 16-17 FPS of the average. The measured results indicate that players should select settings based on their display resolution, with 1080p and 1440p offering broad flexibility, while 4K requires significant compromises to maintain playable frame rates.