Minimum

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Ti pairing produces a wide performance spread across the tested presets in Minimum, with the data showing that the choice of settings dramatically alters the experience from a smooth, high-refresh-rate one to a nearly unplayable slog. The measured results indicate a system that is heavily constrained by the graphics card, where the CPU’s substantial capabilities are largely held in reserve.

Settings Recommendations

Based strictly on the measured FPS rows, the Low preset at 1920x1080 provides the only reliably high-refresh experience, delivering an average of 131 FPS. This is the best choice for competitive play or for users prioritizing maximum fluidity, as it is the only tested configuration that breaks the 120 FPS threshold. The Medium preset at 1080p is the most balanced option for a traditional 60 Hz display, with an average of 100 FPS and a minimum of 85 FPS, ensuring that the frame rate stays well above the common v-sync ceiling without sacrificing all visual fidelity.

For users with 1440p monitors, the Low preset remains the most viable, averaging 84 FPS. This is a significant step down from 1080p Low, but it is still comfortably playable. The Medium preset at 1440p, averaging 65 FPS with a minimum of 55 FPS, is acceptable for slower-paced gameplay, though it may dip below the refresh rate of faster panels. The High preset at 1440p, at 54 FPS, is borderline, and Ultra at 41 FPS is best avoided.

At 4K, the data shows a starkly different situation. No preset achieves a consistent 60 FPS. The Low preset at 4K is the only one that approaches playability with an average of 45 FPS, but the Medium preset’s minimum of 30 FPS indicates that even this setting can experience severe stutter. The High preset at 29 FPS and Ultra at 22 FPS are essentially unplayable for an action-oriented third-person shooter. The data strongly suggests that 4K is not a viable target for this combination, regardless of the settings chosen.

GPU Role

The GeForce GTX 1660 Ti is clearly the primary bottleneck in this configuration. The GPU’s 6 GB of GDDR6 memory over a 192-bit bus, providing 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth, is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p at lower presets, but the performance collapse at 4K points to a fundamental lack of memory bandwidth and raw compute power for that resolution. The card’s boost clock of 1770 MHz and its 1536 shading units produce a peak FP32 throughput of 5.437 TFLOPS, which is simply inadequate for the pixel count of 3840x2160.

This interpretation is reinforced by the GPU’s percentile rank of 41, placing it below the median of all tested GPUs. Its nearest rivals in the benchmark database include the AMD Radeon 540 (0.7% faster), the AMD Radeon Pro WX 3100 (1.9% faster), and the AMD Radeon R7 250 (2.2% faster). The fact that the GTX 1660 Ti is clustered so closely with these much older, lower-tier cards highlights its modest standing in the current performance hierarchy. The data implies that the GPU’s 6 GB frame buffer may also be a limiting factor at higher settings, as the jump from Medium to High at any resolution produces a significant FPS drop, suggesting that the card is struggling to manage the increased texture data and shader complexity.

FAQ

*Q: Is the AMD Ryzen 9 9900X + GTX 1660 Ti combo capable of running Minimum at 4K?*

A: The measured data indicates that 4K is not a practical target. The best result at 3840x2160 is 45 FPS on Low settings, while High and Ultra presets fall to 29 FPS and 22 FPS respectively. The Medium preset averages 35 FPS with a 30 FPS minimum, showing that the system cannot maintain a stable frame rate at this resolution.

Q: What is the best settings preset for a 60 Hz 1080p monitor?

A: The Medium preset at 1920x1080 is the most suitable, as it delivers an average of 100 FPS with a minimum of 85 FPS. This provides a significant performance buffer above the 60 FPS target, ensuring smooth gameplay even in demanding scenes. The High preset also works at 84 FPS, but the Medium preset offers a better balance of visual quality and headroom.

Q: How much performance is gained by dropping from Ultra to Low at 1080p?

A: The measured data shows a substantial gain. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 131 FPS, while the Ultra preset averages 64 FPS. This represents an improvement of 67 FPS, or more than double the frame rate, when moving from the highest to the lowest presets.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more responsible for the performance limits in this game?

A: The data strongly points to the GPU as the limiting factor. The performance scales dramatically with resolution and settings, which are primarily GPU-bound workloads. For example, the FPS drops from 84 at 1440p High to 29 at 4K High, a 65% reduction, while the CPU’s capabilities remain constant. The GTX 1660 Ti’s low percentile rank of 41 further supports the conclusion that it cannot keep pace with the Ryzen 9 9900X.

Q: What is the combo's overall rank among all tested configurations?

A: The combo is ranked 3198 out of 3712 tested combinations in Minimum. This places it in the lower percentile of all tested systems, indicating that while it can run the game at lower resolutions and settings, it is not a high-performing configuration for this title.

Q: Does the GTX 1660 Ti have any performance advantage over its closest rivals?

A: According to the benchmark data, the GTX 1660 Ti’s average score is 7723. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon 540, has an average score of 7673, which is 0.7% lower. The GTX 1660 Ti is also 1.9% faster than the Radeon Pro WX 3100 and 2.2% faster than the Radeon R7 250. These are marginal differences, showing that the card is firmly in the entry-level performance tier.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo’s rank of 3198 out of 3712 tested combinations places it in the 14th percentile of all tested systems for Minimum. This is a low ranking, reflecting the significant performance bottleneck created by the GTX 1660 Ti. The data implies that the vast majority of other tested hardware pairings are capable of delivering higher frame rates in this game. This rank is largely consistent with the GPU’s individual percentile rank of 41, which is much lower than the CPU’s percentile rank of 92. The disparity between the component rankings is a clear indicator that the graphics card is dragging down the overall system performance, preventing the powerful processor from demonstrating its full potential in this specific title. The system is effectively a high-end CPU paired with an entry-level GPU, and the benchmark results reflect the weakest link in the chain.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear and predictable pattern of performance degradation as resolution increases, further confirming the GPU-bound nature of this configuration. At the High preset, the average frame rate drops from 84 FPS at 1920x1080, to 54 FPS at 2560x1440, and finally to 29 FPS at 3840x2160. This represents a 36% drop from 1080p to 1440p, and a further 46% drop from 1440p to 4K. The scaling is nearly linear, indicating that the GPU is being saturated by the increasing pixel count.

The trend is similar across all presets. On Low, the average FPS falls from 131 at 1080p to 84 at 1440p and 45 at 4K. On Medium, it falls from 100 to 65 to 35. The consistent pattern across all settings is that the GTX 1660 Ti’s performance is directly tied to the number of pixels it must render. This behavior is characteristic of a system where the GPU is the primary limiting component. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see less of a performance drop when increasing resolution, as the CPU’s workload would remain relatively constant. The sharp FPS declines at 4K, especially the drop to 22 FPS on Ultra, highlight the GPU’s inability to handle the increased memory pressure and fill-rate demands, making higher resolutions impractical for this pairing.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The following table details all measured average FPS values, with minimum and maximum data provided where available.

| Resolution | Settings | Avg FPS | Min FPS | Max FPS |

| :--------- | :------- | :------ | :------ | :------ |

| 3840x2160 | High | 29 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Low | 45 | - | - |

| 3840x2160 | Medium | 35 | 30 | 40 |

| 3840x2160 | Ultra | 22 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | High | 54 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Low | 84 | - | - |

| 2560x1440 | Medium | 65 | 55 | 74 |

| 2560x1440 | Ultra | 41 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | High | 84 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Low | 131 | - | - |

| 1920x1080 | Medium | 100 | 85 | 115 |

| 1920x1080 | Ultra | 64 | - | - |

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 9 9900X is a 12-core, 24-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture, with a base clock of 4.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.60 GHz. Its benchmark scores are exceptionally high, including a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 32172 and a single-core score of 2253. The CPU’s percentile rank of 92 indicates that it outperforms the vast majority of all tested processors. Its nearest rivals include the AMD EPYC 9015 (-0.1%), the AMD EPYC 7313 (0.2%), and the Intel Core i9-14900 (-1.1%), which are all server or high-end desktop parts.

However, in the context of Minimum, the CPU’s immense processing power appears to be largely irrelevant. The measured FPS data shows that the system’s performance is almost entirely dictated by the GPU and the chosen settings. The fact that the combo ranks at 3198 out of 3712, despite the CPU’s top-tier performance, shows that the processor is not the limiting factor. The CPU is able to feed the GTX 1660 Ti with data far faster than the GPU can process it. This is a classic case of a CPU being held back by a much weaker GPU. The 12 cores and 24 threads are more than sufficient for the game’s demands, and the high single-thread performance ensures that the game’s main logic thread is never starved. The data implies that upgrading the graphics card would yield a massive improvement in frame rates, while the CPU would not need to be changed for a long time.