Minimum

The Intel Core Ultra 7 165H paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile delivers a broad performance envelope in Minimum, a 2014 third-person shooter that remains demanding at high resolutions. The measured frame rates show a system that is decisively GPU-bound at 4K, but which reveals substantial headroom from the processor at lower resolutions. This analysis breaks down how the combo scales across settings and resolutions, where it ranks among tested configurations, and the specific roles played by the CPU and GPU.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and consistent across all four quality presets, indicating that the rendering load scales almost entirely with pixel count. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 188 FPS at 1920x1080 to 121 FPS at 2560x1440, and then to 65 FPS at 3840x2160. That represents a 36% reduction from 1080p to 1440p, and a further 46% reduction from 1440p to 4K, for a total drop of 65% from the lowest to the highest resolution.

The pattern is similar at Low settings, where the average starts at 293 FPS at 1080p, drops to 189 FPS at 1440p, and bottoms out at 102 FPS at 4K. The relative scaling is slightly more aggressive here: the 1440p result is 35% lower than 1080p, and the 4K result is 46% lower than 1440p. This suggests that even at Low settings, the GPU is the primary limiter at 4K, as the frame rate remains well above what the CPU alone would deliver.

Medium settings show the most complete data, with both minimum and maximum frame rates recorded alongside the average. At 1080p, the average is 224 FPS with a minimum of 190 FPS and a maximum of 258 FPS. Moving to 1440p, the average drops to 144 FPS, with a minimum of 123 FPS and a maximum of 166 FPS. At 4K, the average falls to 78 FPS, with a minimum of 66 FPS and a maximum of 89 FPS. The spread between minimum and maximum remains relatively tight at each resolution, which points to stable frame pacing rather than sporadic stutters.

Ultra settings produce the lowest frame rates, as expected. The average is 143 FPS at 1080p, 92 FPS at 1440p, and 50 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 36%, and from 1440p to 4K it is 46%, mirroring the scaling seen at High settings. This consistency across presets strongly suggests that the limiting component at 4K is the GPU, since the relative performance loss is nearly identical regardless of the graphical workload.

At 1080p, the CPU begins to show its influence. The jump from 224 FPS at Medium to 293 FPS at Low (a 31% increase) is larger than the jump from 188 FPS at High to 224 FPS at Medium (a 19% increase). This indicates that at the lowest settings, the Core Ultra 7 165H is able to feed the RTX 5090 Mobile more frames, but the GPU still has enough headroom to push well past 200 FPS. At 4K, however, even the Low preset only yields 102 FPS, which is a clear sign that the GPU is saturated.

The data shows that 1440p is the sweet spot for this combo if the goal is high refresh rate gaming. At High settings, the average of 121 FPS is sufficient for a 120 Hz display, while Medium pushes that to 144 FPS. At 1080p, the system is capable of exceeding 200 FPS on Medium and 280 FPS on Low, which makes it ideal for competitive play where frame rate matters more than visual fidelity. The 4K results, while playable, are best suited for 60 Hz displays, with only the Low preset comfortably exceeding that threshold.

Settings Recommendations

The measured rows provide a clear hierarchy of performance across the four presets. At 4K, the choice is between 50 FPS on Ultra, 65 FPS on High, 78 FPS on Medium, and 102 FPS on Low. The jump from Ultra to High is a 30% improvement in average frame rate, while the jump from High to Medium is a 20% improvement. The jump from Medium to Low is a 31% improvement, which is the largest single-step gain at this resolution.

For a 60 Hz display at 4K, Medium is the recommended preset. It delivers an average of 78 FPS, which provides enough margin above 60 FPS to avoid frequent dips below the refresh rate. The recorded minimum of 66 FPS at Medium confirms that the frame rate stays above 60 FPS even in demanding scenes. High is also viable, but the 65 FPS average leaves very little headroom, and the lack of a recorded minimum makes it riskier. Low is unnecessary at 4K unless the user prioritizes maximum frame rate over all else, as it pushes the average to 102 FPS but sacrifices visual quality.

At 1440p, the recommendation shifts toward High or Medium depending on the display's refresh rate. For a 144 Hz panel, Medium is the better choice, with an average of 144 FPS that matches the refresh rate exactly. The minimum of 123 FPS ensures that most scenes remain above 120 FPS. For a 120 Hz panel, High is preferable, with an average of 121 FPS that meets the refresh rate. Ultra is not recommended at 1440p, as the 92 FPS average falls short of 120 Hz and only barely exceeds 90 Hz.

At 1080p, the system has more than enough performance for any common refresh rate. Low delivers 293 FPS, which is suitable for 240 Hz displays. Medium delivers 224 FPS, which is also suitable for 240 Hz displays and provides better visuals. High delivers 188 FPS, which is ideal for 165 Hz or 180 Hz displays. Ultra delivers 143 FPS, which is suitable for 144 Hz displays. The data shows that Medium offers the best balance at 1080p: it provides a 19% improvement over High in average frame rate while retaining a minimum of 190 FPS, which is well above the 144 Hz threshold.

The overall recommendation is to use Medium at 4K, Medium or High at 1440p depending on refresh rate, and Medium at 1080p for the best combination of visual quality and frame rate. Low should be reserved for competitive play at 1080p or for users who insist on exceeding 100 FPS at 4K. Ultra is only advisable at 1080p, where the 143 FPS average still provides a smooth experience.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile is the dominant component in this pairing, and the benchmark results confirm that it is the primary limiter at 4K. The GPU features 24 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 256-bit bus, yielding a bandwidth of 896.0 GB/s. It is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a 5 nm process from TSMC, and it contains 45,600 million transistors on a 378 mm² die. The shading units number 10,496, with 328 texture mapping units and 112 render output units.

The clock speeds are relatively modest for a flagship mobile GPU, with a base clock of 990 MHz and a boost clock of 1515 MHz. The memory clock is listed at 1750 MHz, which translates to 28 Gbps effective. Despite these moderate clocks, the GPU achieves a PassMark G3D score of 30,034 and a PassMark GPU Compute score of 13,401. Its average benchmark score is 45,152, which places it in the 84th percentile of all GPUs.

The nearest rivals in the GPU benchmark database are interesting. The AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT has an average score of 45,384, which is 0.5% higher than the RTX 5090 Mobile. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti has a score of 44,795, which is 0.8% lower. The Intel Arc A730M scores 45,592, which is 1% higher, and the NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada Generation scores 45,972, which is 1.8% higher. These narrow margins suggest that the RTX 5090 Mobile sits in a competitive cluster of GPUs, despite its high-end positioning.

The VRAM capacity of 24 GB is substantial, and it is more than sufficient for Minimum, a game from 2014. The memory bandwidth of 896.0 GB/s is also ample, and the measured frame rates at 4K do not indicate any memory-related bottlenecks. The GPU's pixel rate is 169.7 GPixel/s, and its texture rate is 496.9 GTexel/s, both of which are high enough to handle the game's rendering demands at 4K.

The fact that frame rates scale so consistently with resolution points to a GPU that is being pushed to its limits at 4K. The 65 FPS average at High settings and 50 FPS at Ultra settings are typical of a GPU that is fully utilized. At 1080p, the GPU has more headroom, but the CPU becomes a factor, as evidenced by the larger frame rate gains when dropping from Medium to Low. The RTX 5090 Mobile is clearly capable of well over 200 FPS at 1080p, but the Core Ultra 7 165H limits it from reaching the 300 FPS mark that the Low preset suggests is possible.

FAQ

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

A: The highest average frame rate recorded is 293 FPS, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The next highest is 224 FPS at 1080p with Medium settings.

Q: Can this system maintain 60 FPS at 4K?

A: Yes. At 4K with Medium settings, the average is 78 FPS with a minimum of 66 FPS. High settings also exceed 60 FPS with an average of 65 FPS, but the minimum is not recorded.

Q: Which preset provides the best experience at 1440p?

A: Medium settings provide an average of 144 FPS with a minimum of 123 FPS, which is ideal for 144 Hz displays. High settings provide 121 FPS, which is better for 120 Hz displays.

Q: How does the RTX 5090 Mobile compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 5090 Mobile has an average benchmark score of 45,152. The AMD Radeon Pro 5500 XT scores 45,384, which is 0.5% higher. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti scores 44,795, which is 0.8% lower.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1080p, Low settings produce an average of 293 FPS, while Ultra settings produce 143 FPS. This is a 150 FPS difference, with Low being 105% faster than Ultra.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor at 4K?

A: The GPU is the limiting factor at 4K. The frame rate drops consistently by roughly 46% from 1440p to 4K across all presets, indicating that the rendering load is overwhelming the GPU rather than the CPU.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 7 165H and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile ranks 814th out of 3,712 tested combos in Minimum. This places the combo in the top 22% of all configurations, which is a solid result for a mobile platform. The rank reflects the balance between the CPU and GPU, and the measured frame rates show that the pairing is well-matched for this game.

The rank is more impressive when considering that the RTX 5090 Mobile is a mobile GPU, while many of the 3,712 combos likely include desktop components. The Core Ultra 7 165H, with its 16 cores and 22 threads, provides enough processing power to avoid bottlenecking the GPU at most settings. The fact that the combo ranks in the top quarter suggests that it outperforms a majority of tested systems, including many with desktop-class hardware.

The CPU's nearest rivals in the overall benchmark database provide context for its contribution. The Intel Core Ultra 5 338H has an average score of 33,989, which is 0.3% higher than the Core Ultra 7 165H's 34,083. The AMD EPYC 4244P scores 34,220, which is 0.4% higher, and the AMD Ryzen AI 7 350 scores 34,222, also 0.4% higher. The AMD Ryzen 7 3700X scores 34,260, which is 0.5% higher. These are all very close scores, indicating that the Core Ultra 7 165H is competitive with a range of desktop and mobile processors.

The GPU's rivals show a similar pattern. The RTX 5090 Mobile's average score of 45,152 is within 2% of its nearest competitors, which means that the GPU is not dramatically ahead of or behind its peers. The rank of 814th out of 3,712 is therefore a function of both the CPU and GPU working together, rather than one component carrying the other. The combo's performance in Minimum is strong, but not exceptional, and the rank reflects that.

The data shows that the combo is capable of high frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, but it falls behind the very fastest desktop configurations at 4K. The 814th rank is a fair assessment of its capabilities, placing it in the upper echelon of tested systems while acknowledging that there are faster combinations available.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 165H is a 16-core, 22-thread processor based on the Meteor Lake architecture, built on a 7 nm process by Intel. It has a base clock of 3.80 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz, with a TDP of 28 W. The cache hierarchy includes 112 KB of L1 per core, 2 MB of L2 per core, and 24 MB of shared L3. It supports DDR5 memory with a dual-channel bus and a bandwidth of 89.6 GB/s.

In synthetic benchmarks, the processor achieves a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 14,551 and a single-core score of 1,759. Its PassMark multi-thread score is 25,933, and its single-thread score is 3,509. The average benchmark score is 34,083, which places it in the 84th percentile of all CPUs. The nearest rivals all score within 0.5% of this figure, indicating that the Core Ultra 7 165H is a mid-pack performer in the overall CPU landscape.

In Minimum, the CPU's role becomes evident at 1080p, where the frame rates are high enough to expose any processing limitations. At Low settings, the average of 293 FPS suggests that the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU with a large number of frames. However, the 293 FPS figure is not significantly higher than the 224 FPS at Medium, despite the reduced graphical load. This indicates that the CPU is beginning to limit the maximum frame rate, as the GPU has more headroom at Low settings.

The 16 cores and 22 threads are more than sufficient for Minimum, which is a game from 2014 and does not rely on heavy multi-threading. The single-core performance, as measured by the Cinebench R23 single-core score of 1,759, is adequate for the game's logic and physics. The boost clock of 5.00 GHz provides a solid level of single-threaded performance, which is important for maintaining high frame rates in older games that are not well-optimized for many cores.

At 1440p and 4K, the CPU's influence diminishes, as the GPU becomes the bottleneck. The frame rate scaling from 1440p to 4K is nearly identical across all presets, which would not be the case if the CPU were limiting performance. The fact that the 4K Low preset (102 FPS) is still well below the 1080p Low preset (293 FPS) confirms that the GPU is the limiting factor at higher resolutions.

The CPU's memory bandwidth of 89.6 GB/s is not a constraint in this game, as the frame rates do not show any signs of memory stuttering. The integrated graphics, Arc Xe-LPG 128EU, are irrelevant to this pairing, as the discrete RTX 5090 Mobile handles all rendering. The processor's 28 W TDP is low for a mobile chip, but the boost clock of 5.00 GHz ensures that it can deliver adequate performance when needed.

Overall, the Core Ultra 7 165H provides enough processing power to support the RTX 5090 Mobile in Minimum, but it is not the star of the show. The CPU's performance is sufficient for 1080p gaming at very high frame rates, but the GPU is the component that determines the experience at 1440p and 4K. The combo ranks 814th out of 3,712, which reflects the CPU's solid, but not outstanding, contribution to the overall system.