Minimum

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates across the three resolutions reveal a classic GPU-bound scaling pattern. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 4 GB achieves 120 FPS. Moving to 2560x1440 at the same settings drops the average to 78 FPS, a reduction of 42 frames. At 3840x2160 Low, the average falls further to 42 FPS, which is exactly half of the 1080p result.

This scaling curve is steep, and it indicates that the rendering workload is expanding faster than the GPU's throughput as pixel count rises. The 4 GB memory buffer and 192.0 GB/s bandwidth of the RTX 3050 4 GB become increasingly taxed at higher resolutions. The data shows that the transition from 1080p to 1440p costs roughly 35% of the frame rate at Low settings, while the jump from 1440p to 4K costs roughly 46% more. This is not a linear progression; the penalty accelerates at 4K.

Looking at High settings, the pattern repeats. The system delivers 77 FPS at 1080p, 50 FPS at 1440p, and only 27 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 27 frames, and the drop from 1440p to 4K is 23 frames. While the absolute frame count differences are similar, the percentage loss at 4K is more severe relative to the already lower baseline. At Ultra settings, the figures are 59 FPS at 1080p, 38 FPS at 1440p, and 20 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result is below the threshold for smooth gameplay, sitting at just 20 FPS.

The limiting component here is clearly the GPU. The CPU, with 20 cores and 20 threads, is unlikely to be the bottleneck in a 2014-era third-person shooter. The frame rate collapses as pixel count rises, which is the signature of a graphics card struggling to fill pixels. The RTX 3050 4 GB has 2048 shading units and a 128-bit memory bus, and the data suggests that this configuration is only comfortable at 1080p or moderate 1440p settings. At 4K, even Low settings only produce 42 FPS, which is playable but far from smooth.

The medium preset offers the only complete dataset with min and max frames. At 1080p Medium, the average is 92 FPS with a minimum of 78 and a maximum of 106. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 59 FPS with a minimum of 50 and a maximum of 68. At 4K Medium, the average is 32 FPS with a minimum of 27 and a maximum of 37. These ranges show that the frame time consistency degrades at higher resolutions, with the gap between minimum and maximum widening proportionally.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 4 GB is the decisive component in this pairing. Its specifications include a base clock of 1545 MHz and a boost clock of 1740 MHz, with 4 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus. The memory runs at 1500 MHz, translating to 12 Gbps effective, which yields a bandwidth of 192.0 GB/s. These figures are modest by modern standards, and the benchmark results reflect that.

The GPU's memory capacity is the most significant constraint. At 3840x2160, the frame rates suggest that the 4 GB buffer is insufficient for High and Ultra presets, which likely exceed the memory limit and cause swapping or reduced texture residency. The average FPS at 4K High is 27, and at 4K Ultra it is 20. These are not playable numbers for a shooter. Even at 4K Low, the 42 FPS average indicates that the GPU is still the bottleneck, but the reduced memory pressure from lower-quality textures allows for better throughput.

The FP32 performance is rated at 7.127 TFLOPS, with a pixel rate of 55.68 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 111.4 GTexel/s. These raw throughput numbers are consistent with the observed scaling. The GPU's 32 ROPs are responsible for final pixel output, and at 4K the fill rate requirement outstrips what the card can deliver. The 64 TMUs handle texture filtering, but the 4K texture loads likely exceed the 4 GB VRAM, forcing the card to rely on slower system memory over the PCIe 4.0 x8 interface.

The card's 90 W TDP and dual-slot design are typical for this class, and the 1x 6-pin power connector suggests it draws modest power. The data shows that the RTX 3050 4 GB is positioned at the 50th percentile among all GPUs, which is exactly mid-pack. In this game, it performs as a 1080p-oriented card. At 1440p, it can manage 50 FPS on High and 78 FPS on Low, but the 4K results are uniformly poor across all presets. The 16 RT cores and 64 tensor cores are present, but this game from 2014 does not appear to leverage ray tracing or DLSS, so those features do not influence the measured numbers.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this CPU-GPU combo in Minimum?

A: The data shows that 1920x1080 is the only resolution where the system consistently exceeds 60 FPS across all presets. At 1080p, the average FPS ranges from 59 on Ultra to 120 on Low. At 2560x1440, only the Low preset exceeds 60 FPS with an average of 78 FPS. At 3840x2160, no preset reaches 60 FPS, with the best result being 42 FPS on Low.

Q: How does the RTX 3050 4 GB handle 4K gaming in this title?

A: Poorly. The measured average FPS at 3840x2160 are 42 on Low, 32 on Medium, 27 on High, and 20 on Ultra. All four results are below the 60 FPS threshold for smooth play, and the 20 FPS Ultra result is barely interactive. The 4 GB VRAM and 192.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for 4K rendering in this game.

Q: Which settings preset offers the best balance of visual quality and performance at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Medium preset delivers 59 FPS average with a minimum of 50 FPS and a maximum of 68 FPS. This is the highest preset that stays above 50 FPS at 1440p. The High preset drops to 50 FPS average, and Ultra falls to 38 FPS. Medium appears to be the optimal choice for maintaining playable frame rates.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this system?

A: The GPU is the limiting factor. The CPU has 20 cores and 20 threads with a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, which is far more than this 2014 game requires. The frame rates scale dramatically with resolution and settings, which is a clear sign of GPU limitation. The RTX 3050 4 GB sits at the 50th percentile among GPUs, while the Core Ultra 7 265 sits at the 93rd percentile among CPUs.

Q: Are the min FPS values for Medium settings indicative of stuttering?

A: The data includes min FPS only for the Medium preset. At 1080p Medium, the min is 78 FPS against an average of 92 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the min is 50 FPS against an average of 59 FPS. At 4K Medium, the min is 27 FPS against an average of 32 FPS. The gap between min and average widens at higher resolutions, suggesting less consistent frame pacing as the GPU becomes more saturated.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested combinations?

A: This combination ranks 2580 out of 2939 tested combos, placing it in the lower 12% of all results. The rank reflects the GPU's mid-pack performance at the 50th percentile, which is dragged down by the 4 GB memory limitation at higher resolutions.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings depend heavily on the target resolution. At 1920x1080, the High preset provides 77 FPS average, which is well above the 60 FPS target for smooth gameplay. The Ultra preset drops to 59 FPS, which is just below that threshold. For users with a 60 Hz monitor, High is the recommended choice at 1080p, as it maintains a comfortable margin above 60 FPS while offering better visual quality than Medium.

At 2560x1440, the situation is more constrained. The Medium preset delivers 59 FPS average with a minimum of 50 FPS, which is playable but not ideal for fast-paced shooters. The High preset drops to 50 FPS average, and Ultra falls to 38 FPS. For 1440p, Medium is the highest preset that keeps the average near 60 FPS. The Low preset at 1440p achieves 78 FPS, but it sacrifices significant visual quality. The data suggests that Medium at 1440p is the sweet spot for this GPU.

At 3840x2160, none of the presets are truly playable. The Low preset achieves 42 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target but might be tolerable for less demanding gameplay. The Medium preset drops to 32 FPS, and High and Ultra are below 30 FPS. For 4K, the recommendation is to use Low settings if the user insists on this resolution, but the data clearly shows that this GPU is not suited for 4K in this title.

The Medium preset is the only one with complete min/max data, which allows for a more detailed assessment. At 1080p Medium, the 78 FPS minimum ensures that the frame rate never drops below the V-sync threshold for a 60 Hz display. At 1440p Medium, the 50 FPS minimum is workable but may show occasional dips in busy scenes. At 4K Medium, the 27 FPS minimum makes the game feel choppy. For the best overall experience, 1080p High is the recommended configuration, as it provides 77 FPS average without requiring the visual compromises of Medium.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers its best performance. The Low preset achieves 120 FPS average, which is the highest measured result in the entire dataset. Medium reaches 92 FPS with a minimum of 78 FPS and a maximum of 106 FPS. High produces 77 FPS average, and Ultra drops to 59 FPS average. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1080p is 61 FPS, showing that the GPU has headroom at this resolution to handle higher settings.

At 2560x1440, the performance drops noticeably. Low delivers 78 FPS, which is still above 60 FPS. Medium averages 59 FPS with a minimum of 50 FPS and a maximum of 68 FPS. High drops to 50 FPS, and Ultra falls to 38 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 1440p is 40 FPS. Compared to 1080p, the Low preset loses 42 FPS, and the Ultra preset loses 21 FPS. The percentage loss is greater for the higher presets, indicating that the GPU's memory bandwidth is a limiting factor.

At 3840x2160, the performance is marginal. Low achieves 42 FPS, Medium averages 32 FPS with a minimum of 27 FPS and a maximum of 37 FPS, High produces 27 FPS, and Ultra delivers 20 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra at 4K is 22 FPS. The 4K Low result is 65% lower than the 1080p Low result, and the 4K Ultra result is 66% lower than the 1080p Ultra result. This consistency in percentage loss across presets suggests a uniform GPU bottleneck that scales with pixel count.

The Medium preset provides the only complete frame time data. At 1080p, the range from minimum to maximum is 28 FPS (78 to 106). At 1440p, the range is 18 FPS (50 to 68). At 4K, the range is 10 FPS (27 to 37). While the absolute range narrows at higher resolutions, the relative variation compared to the average increases. At 4K, the minimum is 84% of the average, while at 1080p, the minimum is 85% of the average. This indicates a similar frame pacing profile, but the lower absolute values at 4K make any variation more noticeable.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 is a 20-core, 20-thread processor based on the Arrow Lake architecture, manufactured on a 3 nm process by TSMC. It has a base clock of 2.40 GHz and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, with 30 MB of shared L3 cache. The CPU's benchmark scores are strong: a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 42216 and a single-core score of 5960. It sits at the 93rd percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 64640.

In the context of Minimum, a game released in 2014, this CPU is massively over-provisioned. The game's engine is unlikely to utilize more than a few cores, and the 5.30 GHz boost clock provides ample single-thread performance. The nearest rivals in CPU benchmarks are the AMD EPYC 4464P with a deltaPct of -0.3%, the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F at +0.3%, the AMD EPYC 7343 at +0.7%, and the AMD EPYC 9124 at -0.7%. These deltas are all within 1%, meaning the CPU is essentially tied with its closest competitors in synthetic benchmarks.

The data shows no evidence of CPU limitation in the measured FPS. If the CPU were the bottleneck, the frame rates would not scale so dramatically with resolution. The fact that 1080p Low achieves 120 FPS while 4K Low achieves only 42 FPS is a clear indication that the GPU is the constraint. The CPU's 20 threads and high boost clock are more than sufficient for this workload.

The CPU's memory support includes DDR5 with dual-channel configuration and 102.4 GB/s bandwidth. This memory bandwidth is unlikely to be a limiting factor for a game of this era. The CPU also integrates Arc Xe-LPG Graphics with 32 EUs, but the discrete RTX 3050 4 GB handles all rendering duties. The CPU's 65 W TDP and 17,800 million transistors on a 243 mm² die suggest a power-efficient design that does not introduce thermal throttling concerns that could affect frame rates.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific combination of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 4 GB ranks 2580 out of 2939 tested combos in Minimum. This places it in the bottom 12% of all system configurations tested for this game. The rank is primarily driven by the GPU's performance ceiling, which is at the 50th percentile among all GPUs.

The CPU's 93rd percentile ranking does little to boost the overall combo rank because the game is not CPU-bound. The data shows that the frame rates are consistently limited by the GPU's ability to render at higher resolutions and settings. A more powerful GPU paired with this CPU would likely achieve a much higher rank, but the RTX 3050 4 GB's 4 GB memory buffer and 192.0 GB/s bandwidth cap the system's potential.

The rank of 2580 out of 2939 means that 359 other combinations performed worse. This places the combo in the lower quartile but not at the very bottom. The system can handle 1080p gaming well, with all presets producing at least 59 FPS average. It can also manage 1440p at Low and Medium settings, but it struggles at 4K. The combination is best suited for 1080p gaming with medium-to-high settings, which aligns with the GPU's mid-pack positioning.

Given the CPU's performance headroom, the limiting factor is unquestionably the GPU. The 20-core processor is capable of driving much higher frame rates if paired with a stronger graphics card. The 4 GB VRAM of the RTX 3050 4 GB is the single most restrictive element, as it forces the system to use lower quality textures at 1440p and 4K, which is reflected in the steep FPS drops at those resolutions. The combo rank reflects this imbalance, placing the system well below what the CPU alone would suggest.