Minimum

# Minimum — Intel Core i7-13700K + AMD Radeon RX 9060

The combination of the Intel Core i7-13700K and AMD Radeon RX 9060 delivers a mixed bag of performance in Minimum, a 2014 third-person shooter that remains surprisingly demanding at higher resolutions. The data shows a system that excels at 1080p, holds its own at 1440p, but struggles to maintain smooth frame rates at 4K, particularly at higher quality presets. This pairing ranks 1677th out of 2939 tested combos in this game, placing it in the lower half of all configurations, which suggests that while the hardware is capable, the game's optimization and the GPU's 8 GB memory buffer create notable bottlenecks at extreme settings.

Resolution Scaling

The performance drop from 1080p to 4K is dramatic and reveals a clear GPU-bound scenario at higher resolutions. At Low settings, the average frame rate falls from 187 FPS at 1920x1080 to 121 FPS at 2560x1440, a 35% reduction, and then to 65 FPS at 3840x2160, a 46% further drop. This steep decline indicates that the AMD Radeon RX 9060's rendering pipeline becomes the limiting factor as pixel count increases, with the CPU's headroom being exhausted by the GPU's inability to keep pace.

At Medium settings, the scaling pattern is similar: 143 FPS at 1080p, 92 FPS at 1440p, and 50 FPS at 4K. The 4K result here is particularly telling, as the minimum FPS of 42 at this resolution and preset shows that frame times are inconsistent, suggesting the GPU is hitting memory bandwidth or fill-rate limits. The High preset shows a comparable trend, with 120 FPS at 1080p dropping to 78 FPS at 1440p and 42 FPS at 4K — the latter being below the 50 FPS threshold that many would consider playable for a shooter.

The Ultra preset is where the scaling becomes most punishing. Starting at 92 FPS at 1080p, it falls to 59 FPS at 1440p, and then to just 32 FPS at 4K. This represents a 65% reduction from 1080p to 4K, which is far steeper than the 48% reduction seen at Low settings. This disproportionate drop at Ultra indicates that the higher-quality textures and effects are saturating the GPU's 8 GB memory and 128-bit memory bus, causing severe performance degradation at 4K. The data suggests that 4K gaming is only viable at Low or Medium settings, and even then, the 50 FPS average at Medium with a 42 FPS minimum may not satisfy players seeking fluid gameplay.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i7-13700K and AMD Radeon RX 9060 achieves a rank of 1677 out of 2939 tested combos in Minimum, placing it in the 43rd percentile of all configurations. This is a middling result that reflects the GPU's performance tier more than the CPU's capabilities. The i7-13700K is a high-end processor with an 89th percentile ranking among all CPUs, but the RX 9060 sits at the 59th percentile among all GPUs, meaning the graphics card is the weaker link in this pairing.

Looking at the GPU's nearest rivals, the RX 9060's average benchmark score of 16014 is 0.7% below the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti (average score 16129), which is a negligible difference in synthetic tests. However, the RX 9060 is 1% ahead of both the AMD Radeon R9 370X (average score 15862) and the AMD Radeon RX 7700 (average score 15852), and 2.1% ahead of the AMD Radeon Pro W5500 (average score 15679). These small deltas suggest that the RX 9060 sits in a competitive performance band, but the game's specific requirements may amplify or diminish these differences depending on the settings and resolution.

The CPU's nearest rivals show that the i7-13700K is well-positioned in raw compute, with an average benchmark score of 46881. It trails the AMD Ryzen 9 5900 (46971) by 0.2% and the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 375 (47022) by 0.3%, but it leads the AMD Ryzen 9 7845HX (46654) and Intel Xeon w3-2535 (46653) by 0.5% each. In Minimum, these small CPU differences are unlikely to be the deciding factor, as the game's frame rates at 1440p and 4K are clearly GPU-limited, while even at 1080p, the 187 FPS Low result suggests the CPU has ample headroom.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings for this combo depend heavily on the target resolution and desired frame rate. At 1080p, the High preset is the best balance, delivering 120 FPS average, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold and suitable for fast-paced shooter gameplay. The Ultra preset at 1080p also provides a smooth experience at 92 FPS, but the additional 28 FPS loss compared to High may not justify the visual gains for competitive players. Low at 1080p yields 187 FPS, which is excessive for most displays and suggests the settings are too conservative for the hardware.

At 1440p, the Medium preset offers 92 FPS with a minimum of 79 FPS, which is the recommended choice for maintaining a consistent 60+ FPS experience. The High preset at 78 FPS is also playable, but the 14 FPS drop from Medium may not be worth the quality increase, especially since the minimum FPS is not recorded for High. The Ultra preset at 59 FPS is borderline, as it sits just below the 60 FPS mark and could cause noticeable stuttering in intense scenes. Low at 1440p delivers 121 FPS, which is smooth but sacrifices too much visual fidelity for a 2014 title that can look better.

At 4K, the situation is more constrained. The Low preset is the only option that exceeds 60 FPS, averaging 65 FPS, but it likely looks considerably worse than intended. The Medium preset averages 50 FPS with a minimum of 42 FPS, which may be acceptable for slower moments but risky during combat. High and Ultra at 4K are not recommended, as they drop to 42 FPS and 32 FPS respectively, which are too low for a shooter. For the best experience at 4K, players should use Low settings, or alternatively, consider dropping to 1440p with Medium or High settings for a better quality-to-performance trade-off.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured results show a wide range of performance across presets. Low settings produce an average of 187 FPS, which is the highest recorded for this combo. Medium settings average 143 FPS, with a minimum of 122 FPS and a maximum of 165 FPS, indicating stable frame pacing. High settings average 120 FPS, while Ultra settings average 92 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 95 FPS, demonstrating that the GPU has substantial headroom at this resolution, and even the most demanding preset stays comfortably above 60 FPS.

At 2560x1440, the performance drops are more pronounced. Low settings average 121 FPS, which is still excellent for 1440p. Medium settings average 92 FPS, with a minimum of 79 FPS and a maximum of 106 FPS — the tighter range suggests the GPU is working harder but maintaining consistency. High settings average 78 FPS, while Ultra settings fall to 59 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 62 FPS, showing that the resolution increase has reduced the headroom available for higher-quality settings.

At 3840x2160, the data reveals the GPU's limitations. Low settings average 65 FPS, which is the only preset above the 60 FPS threshold. Medium settings average 50 FPS, with a minimum of 42 FPS and a maximum of 57 FPS, indicating that frame times are becoming inconsistent under load. High settings average 42 FPS, and Ultra settings drop to 32 FPS. The difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is just 33 FPS, which is less than half the spread seen at 1080p, confirming that the GPU is saturated and further quality increases yield diminishing returns.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9060, built on the RDNA 4.0 architecture with the Navi 44 chip, plays the dominant role in determining Minimum's performance at higher resolutions. The GPU's 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 288.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which appears to be a bottleneck at 4K with higher presets. The measured FPS drop from 65 FPS at Low to 32 FPS at Ultra at 4K strongly suggests that the memory subsystem is overwhelmed by the increased texture and buffer demands, even though the GPU's core has sufficient compute power.

The GPU's clock speeds are notable: a base clock of 1700 MHz, a game clock of 2400 MHz, and a boost clock of 2990 MHz. The high boost clock helps deliver strong performance at lower resolutions, where the GPU is not memory-limited. The 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs produce a pixel rate of 191.4 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 334.9 GTexel/s, which are sufficient for 1080p and 1440p gameplay. However, the 21.43 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is not fully utilized at 4K due to the memory constraints.

The GPU's benchmark scores provide context for its performance class. Its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 3322 and Passmark G3D score of 17631 place it in the 59th percentile among all GPUs. The nearest rival, the RTX 3060 Ti, scores 16129 on average, which is nearly identical to the RX 9060's 16014. This parity suggests that the RX 9060 should perform similarly to a mid-range card from the previous generation, but the 8 GB memory capacity may prove limiting in modern titles like Minimum when pushed to 4K Ultra.

FAQ

*Q: Is this combo capable of 60 FPS at 4K in Minimum?*

A: At 4K with Low settings, the combo averages 65 FPS, which exceeds 60 FPS. However, at Medium settings, it drops to 50 FPS average with a 42 FPS minimum, so 60 FPS at 4K is only achievable at the lowest quality preset.

Q: What is the best resolution for this setup?

A: The data shows that 1920x1080 with High or Ultra settings provides the smoothest experience, with 120 FPS and 92 FPS respectively. At 1440p, Medium settings at 92 FPS are recommended, while 4K is only viable at Low settings.

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

A: The RX 9060 has an average benchmark score of 16014, which is 0.7% lower than the RTX 3060 Ti's 16129. This difference is within the margin of error, indicating near-identical synthetic performance.

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU at 1080p?

A: At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 187 FPS, which is likely near the game's engine limit. The CPU's high single-thread performance, with a 3DMark single-thread score of 1136, suggests it is not the limiting factor at this resolution.

Q: Why does 4K Ultra performance drop so significantly?

A: The 4K Ultra result of 32 FPS, compared to 65 FPS at 4K Low, indicates that the GPU's 8 GB memory and 288.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for the high-resolution textures and effects, causing a severe bottleneck.

Q: What is the rank of this combo among all tested configurations?

A: This combo ranks 1677th out of 2939 tested combos in Minimum, placing it in the lower half of all configurations tested.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-13700K, with its 16 cores and 24 threads, provides ample processing power for Minimum, but its role is largely secondary to the GPU in this game. The CPU's base clock of 3.40 GHz and boost clock of 5.40 GHz, combined with 30 MB of shared L3 cache, ensure that it does not bottleneck the RX 9060 at any resolution or setting. The benchmark results support this: the CPU's Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 30745 and single-core score of 2116 indicate strong performance that far exceeds the demands of a 2014 title.

At 1080p, where the CPU is most likely to be a factor, the combo achieves 187 FPS at Low settings, which is a high frame rate that could potentially stress the CPU's single-thread performance. However, the i7-13700K's 3DMark single-thread score of 1136 and Passmark single-thread score of 4333 suggest it can handle this workload without issue. The CPU's 89th percentile ranking among all CPUs further confirms that it is a high-end part that should not limit gameplay.

The CPU's nearest rivals, including the AMD Ryzen 9 5900 and AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 375, show that the i7-13700K is competitive in raw compute, with a deltaPct of -0.2% and -0.3% respectively. In Minimum, these differences are unlikely to manifest as measurable FPS variations, as the game is not CPU-intensive. The CPU's 125 W TDP and support for DDR4 and DDR5 memory provide flexibility, but the measured FPS data shows that the GPU is the primary determinant of performance, especially at higher resolutions where the CPU's role diminishes further.