Minimum

# Minimum — Intel Core i7-12700K + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB

The Intel Core i7-12700K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB delivers exceptionally high frame rates in Minimum, a 2014 Third-Person Shooter. Across all tested resolutions and settings, the combo never drops below 69 FPS average, and at 1080p Low it reaches 535 FPS. The data reveals a system that is heavily GPU-limited at higher settings and resolutions, while at lower settings the CPU's 12 cores and 5.00 GHz boost clock become the primary driver. This combination ranks 3rd out of 3712 tested combos in this game, placing it in the top 0.1% of all configurations.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achieved by this combo?

A: The highest recorded average frame rate is 535 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. At the same resolution, Medium settings yield 424 FPS, High settings yield 336 FPS, and Ultra settings yield 210 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The GPU's 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 2913. This is 0.1% ahead of the NVIDIA RTX PRO 4000 Blackwell SFF (2910), 0.2% ahead of the RTX 4060 Ti 16 GB (2907), and 0.7% ahead of the RTX 4010 (2893). It trails the Quadro P600 (2923) by 0.3%.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between 1080p and 4K at Ultra settings?

A: At 1920x1080 Ultra, the average FPS is 210. At 3840x2160 Ultra, the average FPS drops to 69. This represents a 67% reduction in frame rate when moving from 1080p to 4K at the highest settings.

*Q: Does the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB have enough VRAM for Minimum at 4K?*

A: The GPU has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus with 288.0 GB/s bandwidth. At 4K Ultra, the combo still achieves 69 FPS average, indicating that the 8 GB capacity is sufficient for this game's demands at all tested settings.

Q: How does the CPU's multi-threaded performance compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Core i7-12700K has an average benchmark score of 35287. It trails the Intel Core i5-13600T (35305) by 0.1%, the Core i7-12700KF (35365) by 0.2%, the Core i7-13700T (35403) by 0.3%, and the Core 5 213PE (35428) by 0.4%.

Q: What is the combo's overall ranking in this game?

A: The Intel Core i7-12700K + RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB combination ranks 3rd out of 3712 tested combos in Minimum. This places it in the 99.9th percentile of all configurations tested.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data shows a clear progression of frame rates across the four quality presets. At 1920x1080, the average FPS values are 535 (Low), 424 (Medium), 336 (High), and 210 (Ultra). The jump from Low to Medium costs 111 FPS (20.7%), while the jump from High to Ultra costs 126 FPS (37.5%). The most significant single-step drop occurs between Medium and High, which loses 88 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the pattern shifts slightly. Low delivers 338 FPS, Medium 267 FPS, High 212 FPS, and Ultra 133 FPS. The drop from High to Ultra is 79 FPS (37.3%), which is proportionally similar to the 1080p drop. At 3840x2160, Low produces 176 FPS, Medium 140 FPS, High 111 FPS, and Ultra 69 FPS. The High-to-Ultra transition costs 42 FPS (37.8%).

For the best experience balancing visual quality and frame rate, the Medium preset appears optimal across all resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the combo delivers 424 FPS with a minimum of 360 FPS — far above any display refresh rate. At 1440p Medium, 267 FPS average with a 227 FPS minimum remains exceptionally smooth. Even at 4K Medium, 140 FPS average with 119 FPS minimum exceeds typical high-refresh displays.

The Ultra preset is only advisable for users with variable refresh rate displays that can handle frame dips. At 4K Ultra, the 69 FPS average is playable but represents a substantial quality-for-performance tradeoff. Low settings offer diminishing returns: the difference between Low and Medium at 1080p is 111 FPS, but both are already far beyond what any monitor can display.

Resolution Scaling

The data shows how frame rate scales as resolution increases from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At Low settings, the progression is 535 FPS (1080p) → 338 FPS (1440p) → 176 FPS (4K). This represents a 36.8% drop from 1080p to 1440p and a 47.9% drop from 1440p to 4K. The total reduction from 1080p to 4K is 67.1%.

At Medium settings, the progression is 424 FPS → 267 FPS → 140 FPS. The drops are 37.0% (1080p to 1440p) and 47.6% (1440p to 4K). At High settings, the progression is 336 FPS → 212 FPS → 111 FPS, representing drops of 36.9% and 47.6% respectively. At Ultra settings, the progression is 210 FPS → 133 FPS → 69 FPS, with drops of 36.7% and 48.1%.

The consistency of these percentage drops across all settings is striking. Regardless of quality preset, moving from 1080p to 1440p costs roughly 37% of frame rate, and moving from 1440p to 4K costs roughly 48%. This uniform scaling pattern indicates that the limiting factor is purely pixel throughput — the rendering resolution itself — rather than any specific setting's computational load.

The fact that even at 4K Low the combo still manages 176 FPS suggests that the GPU is never fully overwhelmed. However, the consistent percentage drops regardless of settings point to the GPU being the primary constraint at higher resolutions. At 1080p Low, the 535 FPS figure is likely near the CPU's maximum frame generation capability, as the GPU has relatively less work per pixel at this resolution.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo produces its highest frame rates. Low settings yield 535 FPS average, which is the single highest measured value in the entire dataset. Medium settings reduce this to 424 FPS, with a minimum of 360 FPS and maximum of 487 FPS. High settings deliver 336 FPS, while Ultra settings produce 210 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 325 FPS, indicating that settings have a massive impact at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, frame rates remain exceptionally high but begin to compress. Low settings produce 338 FPS, Medium 267 FPS (minimum 227, maximum 308), High 212 FPS, and Ultra 133 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra narrows to 205 FPS. The Medium preset's minimum of 227 FPS is still above the refresh rate of most gaming monitors.

At 3840x2160, the frame rates show the GPU working harder. Low settings yield 176 FPS, Medium 140 FPS (minimum 119, maximum 161), High 111 FPS, and Ultra 69 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 107 FPS. Even at Ultra, the 69 FPS average is playable, though it represents the only setting/resolution combination below 100 FPS.

The Medium preset is the only one with min/max data recorded at every resolution. At 1080p, the 360-487 FPS range shows tight frame pacing. At 1440p, the 227-308 FPS range maintains consistency. At 4K, the 119-161 FPS range indicates the frame time variance increases at higher resolutions, but remains well within acceptable limits.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB uses the AD106 chip on the Ada Lovelace architecture, built on a 5 nm process at TSMC. It contains 22,900 million transistors on a 188 mm² die. The GPU has 4352 shading units, 136 TMUs, and 48 ROPs, along with 34 RT cores and 136 tensor cores. Its pixel rate is 121.7 GPixel/s and texture rate is 344.8 GTexel/s.

The memory subsystem consists of 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus, with memory clocked at 2250 MHz (18 Gbps effective), yielding 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU's base clock is 2310 MHz with a boost clock of 2535 MHz. It has a TDP of 160 W and requires a 450 W power supply. The card is dual-slot, measures 240 mm in length, and uses a single 16-pin power connector.

In the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 benchmark, this GPU scores 2913. Its percentile ranking among all GPUs is 19, meaning it outperforms 19% of the database's GPUs. The nearest rivals are the RTX PRO 4000 Blackwell SFF (2910, +0.1%), RTX 4060 Ti 16 GB (2907, +0.2%), Quadro P600 (2923, -0.3%), and RTX 4010 (2893, +0.7%). The 8 GB and 16 GB variants of the RTX 4060 Ti are nearly identical in raw performance, differing by only 0.2%.

In Minimum, the GPU's role becomes increasingly prominent at higher resolutions. At 1080p Low, the 535 FPS figure suggests the GPU is not the bottleneck — the CPU likely limits frame generation. However, as resolution increases to 4K, the GPU's pixel throughput becomes the dominant constraint. The consistent ~37% and ~48% frame rate drops when scaling resolution indicate that the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth are the limiting factors at higher pixel counts.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-12700K is a 12-core, 20-thread processor from the Core 12th Gen series, based on the Alder Lake architecture. It has a base clock of 3.60 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz. The CPU features 80 KB of L1 cache per core, 1.25 MB of L2 cache per core, and 25 MB of shared L3 cache. It supports both DDR4 and DDR5 memory in dual-channel configuration, and has 20 PCIe Gen 4 lanes. The chip is built on Intel's 10 nm process with a die size of 215 mm². It has a TDP of 125 W and the multiplier is unlocked.

In synthetic benchmarks, the CPU scores include 3DMark results of 1043 (single-thread), 2065 (2-thread), 4011 (4-thread), 7202 (8-thread), 9276 (16-thread), and 9979 (max-thread). Cinebench results show 272 (R15 single-core), 3325 (R15 multi-core), 1726 (R20 single-core), 12229 (R20 multi-core), 1850.5 (R23 single-core), and 19784 (R23 multi-core). Geekbench scores are 2308 (single-core) and 15790 (multi-core).

The CPU's average benchmark score is 35287, placing it in the 84th percentile of all CPUs. Its nearest rivals are closely matched: the Core i5-13600T (35305, -0.1%), Core i7-12700KF (35365, -0.2%), Core i7-13700T (35403, -0.3%), and Core 5 213PE (35428, -0.4%). The i7-12700K essentially ties with these processors, all within 0.4% of each other.

In Minimum, the CPU's high single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 single-core of 1850.5, 3DMark single-thread of 1043) is critical for generating the extremely high frame rates seen at 1080p Low (535 FPS). At such high frame rates, the CPU's ability to process game logic and submit draw calls becomes the bottleneck. The 12 cores and 20 threads provide ample headroom for background tasks, while the 5.00 GHz boost clock ensures rapid frame generation. The 25 MB L3 cache helps maintain low latency access to frequently used data, which is beneficial in a fast-paced third-person shooter.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i7-12700K + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB combination ranks 3rd out of 3712 tested combos in Minimum. This places it in the 99.9th percentile of all configurations tested for this game. Only two other combinations outperform this setup.

This ranking is remarkable given the individual component percentiles. The CPU sits in the 84th percentile of all CPUs, and the GPU in the 19th percentile of all GPUs. Yet together, they achieve a top-3 result in this specific game. This indicates that Minimum, despite being a 2014 title, is particularly well-suited to this combination of high single-thread CPU performance and adequate GPU throughput.

The CPU's nearest rivals — the Core i5-13600T, Core i7-12700KF, Core i7-13700T, and Core 5 213PE — all have nearly identical average benchmark scores (within 0.4% of the i7-12700K). This suggests that the specific CPU model matters less than the overall performance tier. Similarly, the GPU's nearest rivals are within 0.7% of the RTX 4060 Ti 8 GB's 3DMark score, indicating that the GPU's performance class, rather than exact model, drives the ranking.

The combination's 3rd-place finish out of 3712 combos means that 3709 other configurations produce lower frame rates in Minimum. This reflects the balance between the i7-12700K's exceptional single-thread performance and the RTX 4060 Ti's sufficient rasterization capabilities for a 2014-era game. The data shows that for older, less demanding titles, this mid-range GPU paired with a high-end CPU can outperform far more expensive GPU-centric builds.