Outriders

# Outriders with Intel Core i5-12400 + AMD Radeon RX 6600

The Intel Core i5-12400 paired with the AMD Radeon RX 6600 delivers a 1080p-focused experience in Outriders, with the data showing a clear GPU-bound profile at higher resolutions and a CPU that comfortably feeds the GPU at lower settings. The combo ranks in the 2844th position out of 3710 tested combinations, placing it in the lower-mid tier of the database, yet the measured frame rates reveal a configurable system that can hit 189 FPS at 1080p Low and still maintain playable 4K performance with settings adjustments. The 6-core, 12-thread Alder Lake CPU with a 4.40 GHz boost clock provides ample headroom, while the Radeon RX 6600's 8 GB GDDR6 memory and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth become the limiting factors as resolution climbs.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is steep and consistent across all settings, indicating that the Radeon RX 6600 is the dominant bottleneck at higher resolutions. At High settings, the average frame rate falls from 103 FPS at 1920x1080 to 65 FPS at 2560x1440 — a 37% reduction — and then to 34 FPS at 3840x2160, which represents a 67% loss from the 1080p baseline. This pattern strongly suggests that the GPU's 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs are saturated by the pixel throughput demands of 4K, while the CPU's 18 MB of shared L3 cache and 12 threads remain underutilized.

The scaling behavior at Low settings is even more revealing. At 1920x1080 Low, the system produces 189 FPS, which drops to 119 FPS at 1440p (a 37% decline) and then to 62 FPS at 4K (a 67% decline from 1080p). The consistency of these percentage drops across settings — roughly 37% for the 1080p-to-1440p step and 67% for the 1080p-to-4K step — points to a purely resolution-driven limitation rather than a settings-driven one. The GPU's 8 GB frame buffer and 128-bit memory interface, delivering 224.0 GB/s, simply cannot sustain the fill rate required at 3840x2160.

Medium settings tell the same story with additional min/max data. At 1440p Medium, the average is 87 FPS with a minimum of 74 and maximum of 100, while at 4K Medium the average drops to 45 FPS with a minimum of 39 and maximum of 52. The narrow min-to-max spread at both resolutions (26 FPS at 1440p, 13 FPS at 4K) indicates that frame pacing is stable and that the bottleneck is consistent rather than spiky. The 4K Medium minimum of 39 FPS is above the 4K High average of 34 FPS, showing that settings reductions provide meaningful headroom even at the highest resolution.

Ultra settings push the system to its limits. At 1080p Ultra, the average is 75 FPS, which is 27% lower than High at the same resolution. At 1440p Ultra, the average falls to 47 FPS, and at 4K Ultra it bottoms out at 25 FPS. The 4K Ultra result is the only measured configuration that drops below the 30 FPS playability threshold, confirming that this combination is not designed for maximum settings at 4K. The scaling from 1080p Ultra to 4K Ultra shows a 67% reduction, identical to the percentage loss seen at High and Low settings, reinforcing that resolution — not settings — is the primary performance driver.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo run Outriders at 4K?

A: Yes, but only with settings reduced. The data shows 62 FPS at 4K Low, 45 FPS at 4K Medium, and 34 FPS at 4K High. The 4K Ultra setting falls to 25 FPS, which is below the 30 FPS threshold for smooth play.

Q: What is the best resolution for a 144 Hz monitor?

A: At 1080p, the combo exceeds 144 FPS on Low (189 FPS) and comes close on Medium (138 FPS). At 1440p, only Low settings (119 FPS) approach 120 FPS, while Medium (87 FPS) and High (65 FPS) will not fully utilize a 144 Hz display.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The Intel Core i5-12400 has an average benchmark score of 18683, placing it within 0.9% of the Intel Core i3-14100F (18519) and within 0.7% of the AMD Ryzen AI 5 330 (18811). It trails the AMD EPYC 7643 by 0.1% and the Intel Core i7-1355U by 0.3% in aggregate benchmarks.

Q: Is the GPU the limiting factor in Outriders?

A: Yes, the resolution scaling data confirms this. The consistent 67% FPS drop from 1080p to 4K across all settings indicates that the AMD Radeon RX 6600's 8 GB VRAM and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth are the bottlenecks, not the CPU's 6 cores and 12 threads.

Q: What is the difference between High and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: High settings produce 65 FPS average, while Ultra drops to 47 FPS — a 28% performance penalty for the visual upgrade. The 1440p Medium setting (87 FPS) offers a 34% improvement over High, suggesting that Medium is the sweet spot for higher refresh rates.

Q: How does this combo rank against all tested configurations?

A: The combo ranks 2844 out of 3710 tested combinations in Outriders, placing it in the 23rd percentile of the database. This position reflects the RX 6600's 63rd percentile ranking among all GPUs and the i5-12400's 72nd percentile among all CPUs.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 is the definitive performance arbiter in this configuration for Outriders. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 224.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p but becomes strained at 4K where the pixel data requirements exceed the memory subsystem's capacity. The GPU's boost clock of 2491 MHz and game clock of 2044 MHz are the clock speeds that matter for sustained gaming loads, and the measured FPS data reflects this: the 4K High average of 34 FPS is exactly where a card with 1792 shading units and 64 ROPs would be expected to land given the 159.4 GPixel/s pixel rate.

The GPU's 7 nm process node and 11,060 million transistors produce a die size of 237 mm², which is larger than the CPU's 163 mm² die on Intel's 10 nm process. This transistor budget is allocated toward the 112 TMUs and 28 RT cores, though Outriders' rasterization workload primarily stresses the ROPs and shading units. The FP32 throughput of 8.928 TFLOPS is the raw compute figure that games like Outriders utilize for shader complexity, and the scaling from 1080p Medium (138 FPS) to 1440p Medium (87 FPS) shows a 37% drop that aligns with the 77% increase in pixel count — the GPU is not compute-limited but bandwidth-limited.

The GPU's nearest rivals in aggregate benchmarks include the NVIDIA Quadro K6000 (0% delta) and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 Mobile (-0.1% delta), indicating that the RX 6600's overall compute capability is comparable to these products. However, in Outriders specifically, the 8 GB VRAM capacity is the differentiator. The 4K Ultra result of 25 FPS suggests that the frame buffer is being fully utilized, with texture streaming and geometry data exceeding what the 224.0 GB/s bandwidth can feed to the GPU cores. The memory clock of 1750 MHz (14 Gbps effective) is the limiting factor at 4K, not the compute units.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 2844 out of 3710 tested combinations places it in the lower 23% of all CPU-GPU pairings tested in Outriders. This ranking is driven by the GPU's 63rd percentile standing among all GPUs, which is the weaker link in this pairing. The CPU's 72nd percentile ranking among all CPUs is comparatively stronger, and the benchmark data supports this: the i5-12400's Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 15989 and single-core score of 2257 demonstrate a processor that can handle modern game logic without bottlenecking the GPU at most settings.

The rank position becomes more meaningful when contextualized against the measured FPS. A rank of 2844 suggests that many other combinations achieve higher frame rates, but the data shows that this combo still delivers 189 FPS at 1080p Low — a result that would place it well above the median for competitive play. The discrepancy between the rank and the raw 1080p performance indicates that the rank is heavily weighted toward 4K and Ultra settings, where this combo struggles. At 4K Ultra (25 FPS), the combo is clearly outclassed by systems with higher-end GPUs, but at 1080p Medium (138 FPS), it outperforms a significant portion of the tested combinations.

The GPU's percentile of 63 vs. the CPU's percentile of 72 creates an imbalance where the CPU has more headroom than the GPU can exploit. This is evident in the resolution scaling: the 1080p Low result of 189 FPS is likely CPU-limited or game-engine-limited, not GPU-limited, because the same CPU can produce 119 FPS at 1440p Low. The 37% drop from 1080p Low to 1440p Low is a GPU limitation, while the 189 FPS ceiling at 1080p Low suggests the CPU could push higher if the GPU allowed it. The nearest CPU rivals — the AMD EPYC 7643 (0.1% faster), Intel Core i7-1355U (0.3% faster), and AMD Ryzen AI 5 330 (0.7% faster) — all have similar aggregate scores, meaning this pairing's rank is not CPU-specific but rather reflects the GPU tier.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data identifies Medium settings as the optimal balance for this combo across all three resolutions, with the only exception being 4K where Low settings are required for smooth play. At 1080p, Medium produces 138 FPS with a minimum of 117 and maximum of 158, which is 34% higher than High (103 FPS) and only 27% lower than Low (189 FPS). The min FPS of 117 at 1080p Medium ensures that even the most demanding scenes remain above 100 FPS, making this the recommended preset for 1080p displays.

At 1440p, Medium settings deliver 87 FPS with a minimum of 74 and maximum of 100. This is 34% higher than High (65 FPS) and 27% lower than Low (119 FPS). The 74 FPS minimum is above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, and the 100 FPS maximum shows that the combo can occasionally reach high refresh rates. For 1440p users, Medium is the clear recommendation — High sacrifices 22 FPS for marginal visual gains, while Low's 119 FPS average does not justify the visual downgrade.

At 4K, the recommendation shifts to Low settings, which produce 62 FPS average. Medium at 4K drops to 45 FPS with a minimum of 39, which is still playable but noticeably less smooth. High at 4K falls to 34 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 25 FPS. For 4K users, Low settings provide the only configuration that consistently exceeds 60 FPS, and the jump from Low to Medium costs 17 FPS (a 27% reduction). The 4K Medium minimum of 39 FPS is acceptable for slower-paced gameplay, but the 62 FPS average at Low makes it the default choice for 4K displays.

Ultra settings are not recommended at any resolution. At 1080p Ultra (75 FPS), the performance is 46% lower than Medium and 27% lower than High, with no min/max data to suggest frame stability. At 1440p Ultra (47 FPS) and 4K Ultra (25 FPS), the results are below the 60 FPS and 30 FPS thresholds respectively. The visual upgrade from High to Ultra does not justify the substantial FPS cost, particularly when Medium provides a smoother experience with only a modest visual compromise.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its strongest results. Low settings produce 189 FPS average, making this the only setting that exceeds 144 Hz refresh rates. Medium settings produce 138 FPS with a minimum of 117 and maximum of 158, placing the average just below the 144 Hz threshold. High settings deliver 103 FPS, which is smooth on 60 Hz and 100 Hz displays but will not fully utilize 144 Hz monitors. Ultra settings produce 75 FPS, a 27% drop from High, and represent the least efficient setting at this resolution. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a 60% reduction in performance, from 189 FPS to 75 FPS, with each settings tier costing roughly 25-35% of the previous tier's performance.

At 2560x1440, the performance scales down proportionally. Low settings produce 119 FPS, which is 37% lower than the 1080p Low result. Medium settings deliver 87 FPS with a minimum of 74 and maximum of 100, representing a 37% drop from the 1080p Medium result. High settings produce 65 FPS, which is 37% lower than the 1080p High result. Ultra settings fall to 47 FPS, a 37% reduction from 1080p Ultra. The consistent 37% reduction across all settings at 1440p confirms that resolution scaling is linear and GPU-bound, with no settings-dependent anomalies. The 1440p Medium minimum of 74 FPS is particularly notable because it exceeds the 1440p High average of 65 FPS, demonstrating that Medium settings provide better frame stability than High.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops become more severe. Low settings produce 62 FPS, which is 48% lower than the 1440p Low result and 67% lower than the 1080p Low result. Medium settings deliver 45 FPS with a minimum of 39 and maximum of 52, representing a 48% drop from 1440p Medium. High settings produce 34 FPS, a 48% reduction from 1440p High. Ultra settings fall to 25 FPS, which is 47% lower than 1440p Ultra. The 4K results show that the GPU is operating at its bandwidth limit, with the 8 GB VRAM and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth unable to sustain higher frame rates. The 4K Medium minimum of 39 FPS is the lowest recorded minimum across all tested configurations, indicating that even at Medium settings, the combo can experience frame drops below 40 FPS in demanding scenes. The 4K Low result of 62 FPS is the only 4K configuration that provides a comfortable margin above the 60 FPS threshold, making it the only viable option for 4K displays.