Minimum

The pairing of the 20-core Intel Core Ultra 7 265K with the 4 GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti creates an extreme bottleneck scenario in Minimum. The data shows a processor capable of top-tier compute performance (97th percentile among all CPUs) shackled to a graphics card that sits at the 30th percentile among all GPUs. The measured frame rates confirm that the GTX 1050 Ti is the definitive limiting factor across every resolution and settings preset, while the CPU’s headroom remains largely untapped.

FAQ

Q: What is the best playable configuration for this combo?

A: At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo achieves an average of 66.4 FPS. This is the only measured configuration that clears a 60 FPS average. The 1440p Low preset drops to 41.8 FPS, and 4K Low falls to 22.2 FPS.

Q: How does the GTX 1050 Ti compare to its closest rivals?

A: Its average benchmark score of 5316 is essentially identical to the NVIDIA GeForce 930A (deltaPct 0) and roughly 0.4% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce 940M. It edges out the AMD Radeon R7 240 by 0.7%, while the AMD Radeon R7 M445 leads it by 0.8%.

Q: What is the performance gap between Ultra and Low settings at 1080p?

A: The jump from Ultra to Low at 1920x1080 is substantial. The Low preset produces an average of 66.4 FPS, which is 32.4 FPS higher than the Ultra preset’s 34 FPS average. That represents a 95.3% improvement in frame rate by dropping settings.

Q: Is the Intel Core Ultra 7 265K a bottleneck in this game?

A: No. The CPU’s multi-threaded Cinebench R23 score is 50009, and its single-core score is 7060, placing it at the 97th percentile. The GTX 1050 Ti’s 2.138 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is far too low to stress this processor, making the GPU the sole performance limiter.

Q: How severe is the 4K performance deficit?

A: At 3840x2160, the Ultra preset yields a mere 9.5 FPS average. Even the Low preset only reaches 22.2 FPS at 4K. These results are below playable thresholds and indicate that the 4 GB VRAM and 112.1 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for this resolution.

Q: What does the combo’s rank indicate?

A: The combination ranks 1710 out of 1733 tested combos for this game, placing it in the bottom 1.3% of all pairings. This rank reflects the GPU’s low relative standing (30th percentile) dragging down an otherwise elite CPU.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti is built on the 14 nm Pascal architecture with the GP107 chip. It operates with a base clock of 1291 MHz and a boost clock of 1392 MHz. The 4 GB of GDDR5 memory runs at 1752 MHz (7 Gbps effective) across a 128-bit bus, delivering 112.1 GB/s of bandwidth. This memory configuration is the primary constraint in Minimum, as the game’s settings scale directly with the GPU’s ability to feed textures and geometry.

The card’s 768 shading units and 32 ROPs produce a pixel rate of 44.54 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 66.82 GTexel/s. Its FP32 performance is rated at 2.138 TFLOPS. These figures place the card in the 30th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 5316. In the measured FPS data, the GPU’s limitations are clear: even at 1080p Low, the card only manages 66.4 FPS, and every increase in resolution or settings results in a steep drop. The GTX 1050 Ti’s TDP is 75 W, drawing power directly from the PCIe 3.0 x16 slot with no additional power connectors, and it supports DirectX 12 (12_1), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4.

The benchmark data indicates that the GPU is the sole bottleneck. The CPU’s integrated Arc Xe-LPG Graphics 64EU is irrelevant here, as the discrete GPU is far weaker. The GTX 1050 Ti’s performance ceiling is reached quickly: at 1080p High it averages 42.3 FPS, and at 1080p Ultra it drops to 34 FPS. These numbers show a card that struggles to maintain smooth gameplay even at the lowest resolution, with the 4 GB VRAM and 112.1 GB/s bandwidth being the critical weak points for a 2014-era third-person shooter.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a consistent and predictable scaling pattern tied directly to the GPU’s fill rate and memory bandwidth. Moving from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 at Low settings reduces the average frame rate from 66.4 FPS to 41.8 FPS, a 37% drop. At High settings, the same resolution change drops the average from 42.3 FPS to 27.3 FPS, a 35.5% decline. This scaling is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario, where the increase in pixel count directly taxes the ROPs and memory subsystem.

The jump from 1440p to 4K is even more punishing. At Low settings, the average falls from 41.8 FPS at 2560x1440 to 22.2 FPS at 3840x2160, a 46.9% reduction. At High settings, the drop is from 27.3 FPS to 14.9 FPS, a 45.4% decrease. These proportions indicate that the GTX 1050 Ti’s 112.1 GB/s bandwidth and 44.54 GPixel/s pixel rate are insufficient to handle the 4K pixel count, resulting in sub-20 FPS averages for all settings except Low.

The scaling behavior confirms that the CPU is not a factor. The Core Ultra 7 265K’s 20 cores and 5.50 GHz boost clock provide ample headroom, but the GPU’s FP32 throughput of 2.138 TFLOPS is the limiting factor. The 4K Ultra preset’s 9.5 FPS average is the clearest evidence of this, as even the most demanding settings cannot leverage the CPU’s 30 MB of L3 cache or 102.4 GB/s dual-channel DDR5 memory bandwidth. The resolution scaling is purely a function of the GPU’s pixel and texture processing capabilities.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the GTX 1050 Ti delivers its only playable results. The Low preset averages 66.4 FPS, which is the highest measured frame rate for this combo. Medium settings drop the average to 48.5 FPS, while High averages 42.3 FPS. The Ultra preset bottoms out at 34 FPS, a 48.8% reduction from Low. These numbers show that the card can handle 1080p only at the lowest settings, and even then, the 66.4 FPS average is marginal for a third-person shooter.

At 2560x1440, performance becomes marginal across the board. Low settings average 41.8 FPS, which is the only 1440p preset above 40 FPS. Medium drops to 35.1 FPS, High falls to 27.3 FPS, and Ultra averages 20.5 FPS. The drop from 1080p Low to 1440p Low is 24.6 FPS, a 37% loss, highlighting the GPU’s inability to sustain frame rates at higher resolutions. None of the 1440p presets achieve a consistent 60 FPS, and even the Low preset is borderline for competitive play.

At 3840x2160, the results are largely unusable. Low settings average 22.2 FPS, Medium averages 17.1 FPS, and High averages 14.9 FPS. The Ultra preset produces a 9.5 FPS average, which is below 10 FPS and effectively a slideshow. The scaling from 1440p Low to 4K Low represents a 46.9% drop, and the 4K Ultra result is 72.2% lower than the 1080p Ultra average. These figures underscore the GTX 1050 Ti’s severe limitations at 4K, regardless of the Core Ultra 7 265K’s compute prowess.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265K 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 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 5.50 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W. The CPU’s cache hierarchy includes 192 KB of L1 per core, 3 MB of L2 per core, and 30 MB of shared L3. Its memory support is dual-channel DDR5 with a bandwidth of 102.4 GB/s, and it supports PCIe Gen 5 with 20 CPU lanes. The processor’s average benchmark score is 79102, placing it at the 97th percentile of all CPUs.

In Minimum, the CPU’s role is minimal. The measured FPS data shows no CPU bottleneck, as the GTX 1050 Ti’s 2.138 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is the clear limiting factor. The Core Ultra 7 265K’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 50009 and single-core score of 7060 indicate that it can handle any game logic or physics calculations with ease. The nearest rivals include the Intel Core Ultra 7 265KF (deltaPct -0.2), Intel Core i9-14900KF (deltaPct -0.2), Intel Core i9-14900K (deltaPct -0.9), and AMD EPYC 7413 (deltaPct -1.2), all of which are within 1.2% of the 265K’s average score.

The CPU’s 20 threads and 5.50 GHz boost clock are vastly overprovisioned for this workload. At 1080p Low, the GPU is pegged at 66.4 FPS, while the CPU sits idle. Even at 4K Ultra, where the GPU averages 9.5 FPS, the CPU’s performance is not a factor. The data suggests that the Core Ultra 7 265K could support a significantly more powerful GPU in this game, as its 97th percentile standing leaves zero CPU-related frame rate constraints. The combo’s rank of 1710 out of 1733 is entirely attributable to the GPU’s 30th percentile standing, not the processor.