Minimum

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Minimum with the AMD Ryzen 5 9600X and AMD Radeon RX 9060 shows a steep and consistent performance penalty as resolution climbs. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo produces 187 FPS. Moving to 1440p Low drops that to 121 FPS, a 35% reduction. At 4K Low, the average falls to 65 FPS, which is 65% below the 1080p result. This pattern clearly indicates that the GPU becomes the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions, as the pixel count outpaces what the RX 9060 can sustain.

The scaling from 1080p to 1440p is particularly telling. At High settings, 120 FPS at 1080p drops to 78 FPS at 1440p — a 35% loss. At Medium settings, 143 FPS falls to 92 FPS, a 36% decline. The uniformity of these percentage drops across different quality presets suggests a resolution-bound scenario where the CPU is not the bottleneck at 1440p. The Ryzen 5 9600X, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, has enough headroom to feed the GPU at these settings, but the RX 9060 cannot maintain the same frame rates when the rendering load increases.

At 4K, the situation becomes more extreme. The gap between Low (65 FPS) and Ultra (32 FPS) is 33 FPS, showing that even the lowest quality preset struggles to hit 60 FPS at this resolution. The 4K Medium result, with an average of 50 FPS and a minimum of 42 FPS, confirms that the GPU is saturated. The 4K High average of 42 FPS sits right at the edge of playability, while 4K Ultra at 32 FPS is clearly not viable for smooth gameplay. The data suggests that 1440p is the practical ceiling for this combination in Minimum, with 1080p being the sweet spot for high refresh rate monitors.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060 is built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, fabricated on a 4 nm process at TSMC. It carries 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 288.0 GB/s. The memory clock runs at 2250 MHz, which translates to 18 Gbps effective. These specifications are modest by modern standards, and the benchmark results reflect that. The GPU sits at the 59th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 16014. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti, scores 16129, putting the RX 9060 just 0.7% behind. In practical terms, this means the RX 9060 trades blows with a previous-generation mid-range card.

The clock behavior of the RX 9060 is worth noting. The base clock is 1700 MHz, but the boost clock reaches 2990 MHz, with a game clock of 2400 MHz. That boost clock represents a 76% uplift over base, which is substantial. In Minimum, this clock headroom helps at lower resolutions where the GPU is not fully utilized. At 1080p Low, the 187 FPS result shows the GPU can stretch its legs. However, at 4K, the sheer pixel throughput demands more than the 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs can deliver, regardless of clock speed.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is another factor. While the FACT PACK does not provide VRAM usage data for Minimum, the resolution scaling pattern hints at potential memory pressure at 4K. The 4K Ultra result of 32 FPS is not just a compute limitation; it could also be a memory bandwidth constraint. The 288.0 GB/s bandwidth is identical to what you would expect from a 128-bit bus with 18 Gbps memory, and that is simply not enough to feed the GPU at 4K with high-quality textures. The GPU's passmark G3D score of 17631 and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 place it firmly in the mid-range category, which aligns with the observed Minimum performance.

FAQ

*Q: Can this CPU+GPU combo run Minimum at 4K smoothly?*

A: Not at higher settings. The measured data shows 4K Ultra at 32 FPS and 4K High at 42 FPS. Even 4K Low only reaches 65 FPS. For a smooth 60 FPS experience, you would need to play at 1440p, where High settings deliver 78 FPS.

Q: How does the RX 9060 compare to the RTX 3060 Ti in this game?

A: The RX 9060 has an average benchmark score of 16014, while the RTX 3060 Ti scores 16129. That puts the RX 9060 0.7% behind. In Minimum, expect near-identical performance between the two, meaning the RX 9060 will also struggle at 4K Ultra.

*Q: Is the Ryzen 5 9600X a bottleneck for the RX 9060 in Minimum?*

A: At 1080p and 1440p, no. The CPU's 3DMark single-thread score of 1253 and 2-thread score of 2456 indicate strong per-core performance, which is sufficient for this game. The FPS drops from 1080p to 1440p are consistent with GPU-bound scaling, not CPU limitations.

Q: What is the best resolution for a 144 Hz monitor with this setup?

A: 1080p. At High settings, the combo produces 120 FPS, and at Low settings it hits 187 FPS. At 1440p, even Low settings only reach 121 FPS, which is below the 144 Hz threshold.

*Q: Does the 8 GB VRAM affect 4K performance in Minimum?*

A: The data does not directly measure VRAM usage, but the 4K results are poor across all settings. The 4K Medium average of 50 FPS with a minimum of 42 FPS suggests the GPU is hitting a hard performance wall, which could be related to the 288.0 GB/s memory bandwidth rather than capacity alone.

Q: How does Ultra settings compare to High settings at 1440p?

A: Ultra at 1440p averages 59 FPS, while High averages 78 FPS. That is a 24% performance drop for the quality increase. The 4K Ultra to High gap is even larger, with 32 FPS versus 42 FPS, a 24% difference as well.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows provide a clear hierarchy for settings optimization. At 1080p, the best balance of visual quality and performance is High settings, which delivers 120 FPS. Ultra at 1080p drops to 92 FPS, which is still playable but offers diminishing returns for the 30% performance cost. Medium at 1080p produces 143 FPS, but the visual step down from High is noticeable in a third-person shooter where environmental detail matters. For competitive play, Low at 1080p hits 187 FPS, which is well above the refresh rate of most standard monitors.

At 1440p, High settings at 78 FPS is the recommended preset for a smooth experience. This is just above the 60 FPS threshold and provides good visual fidelity. Medium at 1440p yields 92 FPS, which is better for fast-paced action, but the drop from High to Medium may reduce texture quality and shadow detail. Ultra at 1440p at 59 FPS is borderline, and the 4K Ultra result of 32 FPS suggests that Ultra is not worth the cost at any resolution above 1080p.

For 4K, the data recommends Low settings at 65 FPS as the only viable option for near-60 FPS gameplay. High at 4K at 42 FPS is playable on a console-like experience, but it is not ideal for a competitive shooter. Medium at 4K at 50 FPS sits in a middle ground, but the minimum FPS of 42 indicates potential stutters. The overall recommendation is to stick to 1080p High or 1440p High, depending on your monitor's native resolution. Ultra settings should only be used at 1080p, where the 92 FPS average is still acceptable.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The database contains twelve measured FPS entries for this combo, spanning three resolutions and four settings. At 1920x1080, the results are as follows: Low settings produce an average of 187 FPS, Medium produces 143 FPS with a minimum of 122 and a maximum of 165, High produces 120 FPS, and Ultra produces 92 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 95 FPS, which is the largest gap among all resolutions, indicating that the GPU has significant headroom at 1080p.

At 2560x1440, the averages compress. Low settings deliver 121 FPS, Medium delivers 92 FPS with a minimum of 79 and a maximum of 106, High delivers 78 FPS, and Ultra delivers 59 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 62 FPS, which is smaller than at 1080p. This compression shows the GPU becoming the limiting factor, as the settings-based performance differences shrink when the pixel count rises.

At 3840x2160, the results are the most constrained. Low settings average 65 FPS, Medium averages 50 FPS with a minimum of 42 and a maximum of 57, High averages 42 FPS, and Ultra averages 32 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is just 33 FPS. Notably, the 4K Medium minimum of 42 FPS is identical to the 4K High average, suggesting that the GPU is hitting a hard performance ceiling. The combo rank of 1677 out of 2939 combos in Minimum places this pairing in the upper-middle tier of tested hardware, which aligns with the observed 1080p and 1440p results.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 9600X is a 6-core, 12-thread processor from the 9000 series, based on the Zen 5 architecture with the Granite Ridge codename. It is built on a 4 nm process at TSMC, with a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz. The CPU has 32 MB of shared L3 cache, 1 MB of L2 cache per core, and 80 KB of L1 cache per core. It supports DDR5 memory in dual-channel mode with a bandwidth of 89.6 GB/s, and it is paired with an AMD Socket AM5 motherboard. The TDP is 65 W, which is efficient for a desktop processor.

In Minimum, the CPU's role is secondary to the GPU at most settings. The 3DMark benchmarks show a single-thread score of 1253, a 2-thread score of 2456, and a 4-thread score of 4649. These scores indicate strong single-core performance, which is typical for Zen 5. The Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2183.5 reinforces this. For a third-person shooter, single-thread performance is critical for game logic and draw call processing, and the 9600X handles this without issue.

The multi-threaded performance is also solid but not the primary driver in Minimum. The Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 17528.5 and the Geekbench multi-core score of 14438 show that the CPU can handle background tasks and streaming without interfering with game performance. The CPU sits at the 81st percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 29713. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5755GE, scores 29656, putting the 9600X 0.2% ahead. This margin is negligible, and in Minimum, the CPU is never the bottleneck — the FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K is entirely GPU-driven.

The 9600X's boost clock of 5.40 GHz is the key feature for this game. At 1080p Low, the 187 FPS result shows the CPU can feed the GPU fast enough to reach high frame rates. Even at 1080p Ultra, the 92 FPS average indicates no CPU limitation. The CPU's 65 W TDP and dual-channel DDR5 support keep it a practical choice for a gaming rig, but the measured data confirms that the RX 9060 is the component you would upgrade first to improve Minimum performance at 1440p and above.