Minimum

The AMD Ryzen 9 7900X paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 delivers a robust experience in Minimum, a third-person shooter released on 2014-06-25. The measured frame rates across three resolutions and four quality presets show a combination that handles high refresh rates at standard resolutions while gradually yielding to GPU limits at 4K. This analysis breaks down the settings, component roles, and where this combo stands among 3712 tested configurations, using only the benchmark data provided.

Settings Recommendations

The benchmark results indicate the Medium preset consistently offers the most balanced frame rate range with recorded minimum and maximum values at every resolution. At 1920x1080, Medium delivers an average of 175 FPS with a minimum of 149 and a maximum of 201 FPS. This is the only preset at 1080p that provides full min/max data, and its floor of 149 FPS remains well above typical high-refresh display targets. The 2560x1440 Medium preset averages 113 FPS with a minimum of 96 and a maximum of 130 FPS, keeping dips above the 60 FPS threshold. At 3840x2160, Medium is the only setting with complete min/max figures (52 min, 70 max, average 61 FPS), making it the only 4K preset that can guarantee a stable experience above 50 FPS.

High settings offer higher averages than Medium at each resolution — 147 FPS at 1080p, 95 FPS at 1440p, and 51 FPS at 4K — but the lack of min/max data in the pack means the frame variance cannot be confirmed. The Ultra preset produces the lowest averages, at 112 FPS for 1080p, 72 FPS for 1440p, and 39 FPS for 4K. Ultra at 4K drops below the 40 FPS mark, which is borderline for a third-person shooter. Low settings offer the highest averages, with 229 FPS at 1080p, 148 FPS at 1440p, and 79 FPS at 4K, but no min/max data is recorded for any Low row.

The data suggests the best experience is the Medium preset at any resolution. At 1080p, Medium's minimum of 149 FPS is nearly double the 60 FPS gold standard, and at 1440p, the 96 FPS minimum still leaves headroom. At 4K, Medium's 61 average with a 52 minimum is the only preset that stays above the 50 FPS line. Ultra is only advisable at 1440p where its 72 average is playable, but the 4K Ultra average of 39 is below the threshold for smooth gameplay in a shooter.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 carries an 8 GB GDDR6 memory buffer on a 256-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s. Its boost clock is listed at 1725 MHz, with a base of 1500 MHz. The GPU's 5888 shading units and 96 render output units process the game's visuals, and the 46 RT cores and 184 tensor cores are present but not necessarily engaged in Minimum, a 2014 title that predates the hardware's release.

The benchmark data shows that the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions. At 3840x2160, the average FPS drops from 79 on Low to 39 on Ultra, a 40 FPS reduction when the preset is pushed from Low to Ultra. This is a 50.6% fall from the Low setting's average, indicating that the RTX 3070's fill rate and memory bandwidth are the hard constraint at 4K. In contrast, at 1920x1080, the Low to Ultra delta is from 229 to 112 FPS, a reduction of 117 FPS (51.1%), but the absolute numbers are high enough that the frame time remains acceptable. The GPU's 448.0 GB/s bandwidth becomes more stressed at 4K, where the pixel throughput demands more memory transactions per frame.

The RTX 3070's position in the GPU hierarchy is modest. It ranks in the 61st percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 17208. Its nearest rivals in the benchmark database include the AMD Radeon RX 7600 XT (avg score 17083, deltaPct 0.7), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 (17037, deltaPct 1), the AMD Radeon HD 7970M (17019, deltaPct 1.1), and the NVIDIA Tesla K40c (17468, deltaPct -1.5). These scores are all within a narrow band, meaning the RTX 3070 is essentially tied with the RX 7600 XT in synthetic performance. In Minimum, the RTX 3070's 8 GB memory is sufficient to cover the frame data, as the game only uses the 4K High and Ultra settings, where the average FPS stays in the 39-51 range.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate behavior from 1080p to 4K shows a consistent pattern: the RTX 3070 is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions. At Medium settings, the average FPS scales from 175 at 1920x1080 down to 113 at 2560x1440 (a 35.4% drop), then to 61 at 3840x2160 (a 46.0% further drop from 1440p). This is a total reduction of 114 FPS (65.1%) from 1080p to 4K. The GPU's rendering load scales roughly with pixel count, but the frame rate drop is not linear, indicating memory bandwidth and fill rate limitations.

At Low settings, the drop is similar in percentage: 229 to 148 (35.4% drop) to 79 (46.6% drop from 1440p). At High, the figures are 147 to 95 (35.4% drop) to 51 (46.3% drop). Ultra shows 112 → 72 (57.1% drop) → 39 (45.8% drop). This consistency across presets — a ~35% drop from 1080p to 1440p, and a ~46% drop from 1440p to 4K — reveals that the GPU's raw throughput is the bottleneck. If the CPU were the bottleneck, the FPS would drop more steeply at lower resolutions where the CPU is more exposed. Instead, the identical proportional scaling across settings suggests a fill-rate-bound scenario.

The 4K to 1080p ratio of 39/229 for Low settings equals 0.17, which is close to the pixel ratio of 3840x2160 (8.3 million pixels) vs 1920x1080 (2.07 million), meaning the game's frame rate scales almost exactly with pixel count. This is classic GPU-bound scaling. At Medium, the ratio is 61/175 = 0.349, which is slightly worse than the pixel ratio, indicating the memory bandwidth overhead at 4K. The 448 GB/s bandwidth is the same across all resolutions, so the per-pixel memory costs go up as resolution increases.

The data implies that at 1080p, the CPU could be more involved, but the FPS values are so high that any CPU limitation is masked. At 1440p, the GPU starts to take over, and at 4K, the GPU is fully limiting the frame rate.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured averages are: Low 229 FPS, Medium 175 FPS (min 149, max 201), High 147 FPS, Ultra 112 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 117 FPS, with Ultra delivering 48.9% of the Low performance. The 149 FPS minimum on Medium is higher than the average of the High preset (147 FPS), which highlights the Medium preset's stability.

At 2560x1440, the data is:

• Low: 148 FPS
• Medium: 113 FPS (min 96, max 130)
• High: 95 FPS
• Ultra: 72 FPS

The Medium minimum of 96 FPS is still above the 60 FPS threshold, and the Ultra average of 72 FPS is close to the High at 1080p. The 1440p Medium average (113) is 35.4% lower than the 1080p Medium (175), while the 1440p Ultra (72) is 35.7% lower than the 1080p Ultra (112). This uniformity shows the pixel count scaling is consistent across that resolution.

At 3840x2160:

• Low: 79 FPS
• Medium: 61 FPS (min 52, max 70)
• High: 51 FPS
• Ultra: 39 FPS

The 4K Medium average of 61 FPS is exactly the same as the 4K High average, but the Medium has a higher minimum (52 vs no data). The 4K Ultra at 39 FPS is the only setting that drops below 40 FPS, making it the only unplayable row in the dataset. The ratio of 4K Low (79) to 1080p Low (229) is 0.345, which is lower than the pixel count ratio, indicating the GPU's memory bandwidth becomes a limiting factor at 4K Low as well. The 4K Medium min of 52 shows the frame dip is significant, but the average of 61 indicates the GPU can still hold a playable range.

How This Combo Ranks

The AMD Ryzen 9 7900X + RTX 3070 combination holds rank 1589 out of 3712 total combos in the Minimum database. This places the combo in the upper half of all tested systems, but not in the top tier. The rank of 1589 means about 57% of all combos in the database are slower, while 43% are faster. Considering the CPU is a high-end 2022 processor and the GPU is a mid-range 2020 card, the ranking reflects the game's GPU-bound nature. The combo sits at the 57th percentile, which aligns with the GPU's 61st percentile ranking among all GPUs — the RTX 3070 is the limiting factor in this pairing.

The CPU's own benchmark position is much stronger. The Ryzen 9 7900X has an average benchmark score of 53288, which puts it in the 91st percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals are the AMD EPYC 7313P (avg 53206, deltaPct 0.2), Intel Xeon Phi 7290 (53469, deltaPct -0.3), Intel Xeon 634 (52974, deltaPct 0.6), and Intel Core i7-14700F (53620, deltaPct -0.6). These rivals are all within 0.6% of the 7900X's score, essentially making them performance equals, but the 7900X's 91st percentile shows the CPU is not the constraint. In Minimum, the 12-core/24-thread CPU does not throttle the RTX 3070, because the GPU is the bottleneck at all resolutions.

The combo's rank of 1589 out of 3712 defines it as a solid mid-to-high-tier system for this game, but the 4K Ultra setting at 39 FPS is the only place where the combo falls below the 40 FPS threshold.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 7900X is a 12-core, 24-thread processor based on the Zen 4 architecture, with a base clock of 4.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.60 GHz. It is built on a 5nm process with 13,140 million transistors and has 64 MB of shared L3 cache. This CPU is a desktop part with a 170W TDP.

In Minimum, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and game logic. The benchmark data shows that the CPU is not the bottleneck at any resolution. At 1080p, the FPS ranges from 229 on Low to 112 on Ultra, which is a 117 FPS drop across settings. If the CPU were the limiting factor, the FPS would remain constant across resolutions or at least not scale linearly with pixel count. The linear scaling in the FPS drop from 1080p to 1440p across all four settings (about 35-36% drop) confirms the GPU is the limit. The CPU's multi-threaded performance, as measured by Cinebench R23 multicore score of 29300, is sufficient for the game's workload.

The CPU's 4.70 GHz base clock is high, and its 5.60 GHz boost clock is among the fastest in the 7000 series. This high clock speed minimizes single-thread latency, which is beneficial for a third-person shooter that relies on the main thread for physics and AI. The CPU's passmark single-thread score of 4238 and 3DMark single thread score of 1093 indicate strong IPC, but the game's frame rates at 4K are only 51-79, which is far below what the CPU can deliver. The CPU's 3DMark max threads score of 12536 shows the multi-thread headroom, but the game does not seem to utilize the 24 threads fully.

The Ryzen 9 7900X's nearest rivals in CPU benchmarks, all within 0.6% delta, do not change the fact that the CPU is not the limiting factor. The game's 2014 release date means it is unlikely to scale beyond 4-8 threads, and the CPU has 24 threads, leaving plenty of performance. Therefore, the CPU role is to provide stable, high single-core performance to avoid any frame drops, which it does successfully.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for 1080p?

A: The Medium preset at 1920x1080 offers an average of 175 FPS, with a minimum of 149 and a maximum of 201, making it the most stable preset with recorded min/max data. The High preset averages 147 FPS, while Low averages 229, but Low lacks min/max data.

*Q: How does the RTX 3070 handle 4K in Minimum?*

A: At 3840x2160, the RTX 3070 achieves an average of 61 FPS on Medium, 51 on High, and 39 on Ultra. The Medium setting is the only 4K preset with a minimum of 52 FPS, making it the only playable option in 4K.

Q: Is the Ryzen 9 7900X a bottleneck in this system?

A: No. The CPU's 12-core/24-thread design and 5.60 GHz boost clock are sufficient. The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K (e.g., 175 to 61 on Medium) shows the GPU is the limiting factor, not the CPU.

Q: What settings should be avoided?

A: Ultra at 4K provides only 39 FPS, which is below the 40 FPS threshold for a third-person shooter. The 4K Ultra setting is the only row that drops below 40 FPS in the entire dataset.

Q: What is the combo's ranking among tested systems?

A: The Ryzen 9 7900X + RTX 3070 combo is ranked 1589 out of 3712 total combos in Minimum, which is the 58th percentile.

Q: Why is the Medium preset the best choice?

A: The Medium preset has the only min/max FPS data at all three resolutions (1080p: min 149, 1440p: min 96, 4K: min 52), and its average exceeds the 60 FPS threshold at every resolution. It provides a better stability than High or Ultra, which lack min data in the pack.