Palworld

Palworld, the survival game released on 2024-01-18, presents a demanding workload that stresses both processor and graphics hardware. This analysis examines the measured performance of the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G paired with the Intel Arc B390, using data from the FACT PACK to provide a methodical breakdown of how this combination handles the game across different resolutions and settings. The data indicates this is a low-performing combination overall, ranking 2607 out of 2944 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 12% of systems. The following sections break down the optimal settings, component roles, scaling behavior, and detailed frame rate measurements for this specific hardware pairing.

Settings Recommendations

Benchmark results indicate that the Intel Arc B390 and AMD Ryzen 5 5600G combination produces its most playable experience at 1080p with the Low preset. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the system achieves an average of 84 FPS, which is the highest average frame rate recorded across all tested configurations. This is the only configuration that breaks the 80 FPS threshold, making it the clear choice for users prioritizing smooth gameplay over visual fidelity. The Low preset at 1080p provides a substantial performance buffer, suggesting it can handle the game's dynamic survival elements without significant stutter.

Moving up to Medium settings at 1080p yields a still-respectable average of 68 FPS, with a minimum of 58 FPS and a maximum of 79 FPS. This represents a 19% performance drop from Low but offers noticeably better visual quality. For users with standard 60Hz monitors, the Medium preset at 1080p is the best balance between visual presentation and playability, as the minimum frame rate of 58 FPS stays close to the 60 FPS target. However, the High preset at 1080p drops the average to 53 FPS, which falls below the ideal 60 FPS threshold for many users, while the Ultra preset at 1080p averages only 40 FPS, indicating a significant performance ceiling.

At 1440p resolution, the data shows that even the Low preset struggles to maintain high frame rates, averaging 56 FPS. This is a 33% drop from the 1080p Low result, revealing the GPU's limitations at higher resolutions. The Medium preset at 1440p averages 45 FPS with a minimum of 38 FPS, which may be acceptable for slower-paced exploration but will struggle during combat or when multiple Pals are on screen. The High preset at 1440p drops to 35 FPS, and Ultra falls to 26 FPS, both of which are below comfortable playability thresholds. Therefore, for 1440p users, the Low preset is the only viable option, and even then, the experience will be compromised.

The 4K resolution results are consistently poor across all settings. The best 4K result is the Low preset at 31 FPS, followed by Medium at 25 FPS, High at 19 FPS, and Ultra at 15 FPS. None of these configurations are recommended for active gameplay, as they all fall well below the 30 FPS minimum threshold for acceptable playability in a fast-paced survival game. The data clearly shows that this hardware combination is not suited for 4K gaming in Palworld, and users should stick to 1080p for the best experience. The measured minimum FPS data is only available for Medium settings across all resolutions, showing 21 FPS at 4K, 38 FPS at 1440p, and 58 FPS at 1080p, which further reinforces the recommendation to use 1080p Medium as the highest acceptable preset.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B390 is the primary performance limiter in this configuration, as evidenced by the benchmark data and its overall percentile ranking. The GPU holds a percentile rank of 9 against all GPUs, meaning it performs better than only 9% of the graphics cards in the database. Its average benchmark score is 1482 based on the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 test, and its nearest rivals include the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX (with an average score of 1463, a 1.3% delta), the NVIDIA GeForce 800M (1460, 1.5% delta), the NVIDIA GeForce GT 625 OEM (1446, 2.5% delta), and the NVIDIA GeForce GT 710 (1443, 2.7% delta). This places the Arc B390 in the company of very old and entry-level discrete GPUs, confirming its low-end positioning.

The GPU's memory configuration is "System Shared," meaning it uses the system's main memory rather than dedicated VRAM. The memory type is also "System Shared," with a bus width of "System Shared" and bandwidth described as "System Dependent." This architecture means the GPU's performance is heavily influenced by the system's memory bandwidth and latency. The Ryzen 5 5600G supports DDR4 memory with dual-channel configuration and a maximum bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s, which is modest by modern standards. This shared memory setup likely contributes to the GPU's poor performance, as it must compete with the CPU for memory access.

In terms of clock speeds, the Arc B390 has a base clock of 300 MHz and a boost clock of 2500 MHz. The large gap between base and boost clocks suggests the GPU can scale its performance dynamically, but the measured frame rates indicate it rarely reaches its potential in Palworld. The GPU features 1536 shading units, 48 texture mapping units, and 24 raster output processors, along with 12 ray tracing cores. The pixel rate is 60.00 GPixel/s, and the texture rate is 120.0 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance of 7.680 TFLOPS. These specifications, while not directly comparable to rival specs not in the FACT PACK, are consistent with a low-power integrated graphics solution.

The GPU's TDP is 80 W, and it is classified as an IGP (Integrated Graphics Processor) with no power connectors, indicating it draws power from the motherboard. The process node is 3 nm, manufactured by Intel, using the Xe3-LPG architecture with the Panther Lake chip. The GPU supports DirectX 12 Ultimate (12_2), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.4, which means it is feature-complete for modern games but lacks the raw horsepower to utilize these features effectively at higher resolutions. The benchmark results show that the GPU's performance scales predictably with settings changes, but the overall ceiling is low, making it the clear bottleneck in this system.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600G provides the processing power for this system, and while it is a capable mid-range processor, it is not the limiting factor in Palworld. The CPU features 6 cores and 12 threads, based on the Zen 3 architecture with the Cezanne codename, manufactured on a 7 nm process by TSMC. It has a base clock of 3.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, with a TDP of 65 W. The cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 cache per core, 512 KB of L2 cache per core, and 16 MB of L3 cache. The CPU supports DDR4 memory with a dual-channel bus and 51.2 GB/s bandwidth.

Benchmark data shows the Ryzen 5 5600G performs well for its class. It achieves a Cinebench R23 multicore score of 10551 and a single-core score of 1409. In Geekbench, it scores 8428 multicore and 1801 single-core. Its average benchmark score is 21088, placing it in the 74th percentile against all CPUs. Its nearest rivals include the Intel Core i3-1220P (average score 21066, deltaPct 0.1%), the Intel Core Ultra 7 256V (21112, -0.1%), the AMD Ryzen 5 7530U (21133, -0.2%), and the Intel Core Ultra 7 155U (21174, -0.4%). These rivals are all within 0.5% of the 5600G's performance, indicating that it is a solid, mid-pack performer.

In the context of Palworld, the CPU's 12 threads are sufficient for the game's logic, world simulation, and physics calculations. The measured FPS data shows that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 84 FPS, which is likely near the CPU's practical limit for this game. However, as the resolution increases, the FPS drops significantly, which indicates the GPU becomes the bottleneck. At 4K Low, the FPS drops to 31, a 63% reduction from 1080p Low, which cannot be attributed to CPU limitations since the resolution increase puts more strain on the GPU, not the CPU.

The CPU's memory bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s is shared with the integrated GPU, which may create contention in memory-intensive scenarios. However, the data suggests that the CPU is not the primary constraint in Palworld, as the frame rate scales more with resolution and graphics settings than with CPU-bound factors. The CPU's 16 MB of L3 cache is adequate for gaming workloads, and its single-thread performance is strong enough to handle the game's main thread without becoming a bottleneck at the tested settings. The CPU's percentile rank of 74 indicates it is a better-than-average processor, but the overall combo rank of 2607 out of 2944 is dragged down significantly by the GPU.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G and Intel Arc B390 ranks 2607 out of 2944 tested combos in Palworld, placing it in the bottom 11.4% of all systems tested. This poor ranking is overwhelmingly attributable to the GPU, as the CPU is a mid-range performer while the GPU sits in the 9th percentile of all GPUs. The combo rank of 2607 indicates that this system will struggle to provide a smooth experience in Palworld at anything above 1080p Low, and even at 1080p Medium, the minimum frame rate of 58 FPS suggests occasional dips that could affect gameplay.

Relative to its component peers, the CPU is well-matched with processors like the Intel Core i3-1220P and Intel Core Ultra 7 256V, all within 0.4% of each other in average benchmark scores. However, the GPU is in a completely different class, competing with the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX and GT 710, which are over a decade old. This mismatch creates a significant performance imbalance, where the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU more data than it can process, but the GPU's limitations cap the overall frame rate.

The data shows that the combo's performance is heavily dependent on resolution. At 1080p, the combo achieves playable frame rates at Low and Medium settings, with the CPU able to push the GPU to its limits. At 1440p, the combo falls below 60 FPS even at Low settings, and at 4K, it is unplayable across all settings. This scaling behavior confirms that the GPU is the limiting factor, as the CPU's performance does not degrade with resolution increases. The rank of 2607 out of 2944 is a clear indicator that this is not a recommended configuration for Palworld, and users would need to lower expectations significantly or upgrade the GPU to achieve a better experience.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a clear pattern of performance degradation as resolution increases, which is typical for a GPU-bound system. At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 84 at 1080p to 56 at 1440p (a 33% reduction) and further to 31 at 4K (a 63% reduction from 1080p). This steep decline indicates that the GPU's rendering throughput is the primary constraint, as the number of pixels increases by 1.78x from 1080p to 1440p and by 4x from 1080p to 4K, but the frame rate does not scale linearly, suggesting additional overhead.

At Medium settings, the FPS drops from 68 at 1080p to 45 at 1440p (a 34% reduction) and to 25 at 4K (a 63% reduction). The consistency of these percentage drops across settings (approximately 33-34% from 1080p to 1440p and 63% from 1080p to 4K) indicates that the GPU is consistently the bottleneck, regardless of the graphics preset. This is further supported by the High settings data, which shows a drop from 53 FPS at 1080p to 35 FPS at 1440p (34% reduction) and 19 FPS at 4K (64% reduction).

The Ultra settings show a slightly different pattern, with FPS dropping from 40 at 1080p to 26 at 1440p (35% reduction) and 15 at 4K (62.5% reduction). This consistency across all settings suggests that the resolution scaling is purely GPU-bound, with the CPU playing a minimal role in the frame rate differences. The data indicates that the system can achieve roughly 2.7x higher FPS at 1080p compared to 4K at the same settings, which aligns with the 4x pixel count difference but shows sub-linear scaling, likely due to other bottlenecks like memory bandwidth.

The limiting component is clearly the GPU, as evidenced by the fact that the CPU's performance metrics (like Cinebench scores) do not change with resolution. The system shared memory architecture of the GPU may also contribute to the scaling behavior, as higher resolutions require more memory bandwidth, which is already constrained. The data suggests that users should stay at 1080p to get the best experience, as the FPS drops are steep and consistent when moving to higher resolutions.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The following table summarizes the measured average FPS for each resolution and settings combination:

• 1920x1080 (1080p):
• Low: 84 FPS (average)
• Medium: 68 FPS (average, min 58, max 79)
• High: 53 FPS (average)
• Ultra: 40 FPS (average)

• 2560x1440 (1440p):
• Low: 56 FPS (average)
• Medium: 45 FPS (average, min 38, max 52)
• High: 35 FPS (average)
• Ultra: 26 FPS (average)

• 3840x2160 (4K):
• Low: 31 FPS (average)
• Medium: 25 FPS (average, min 21, max 29)
• High: 19 FPS (average)
• Ultra: 15 FPS (average)

At 1080p, the system shows a linear progression from Low to Ultra, with each step down in settings providing a significant FPS boost. The jump from Ultra (40 FPS) to High (53 FPS) is a 32.5% improvement, High to Medium (68 FPS) is a 28.3% improvement, and Medium to Low (84 FPS) is a 23.5% improvement. This suggests that the GPU's shading units and texture units are heavily taxed at higher settings, and reducing them yields substantial gains.

At 1440p, the same pattern holds but with lower absolute numbers. The jump from Ultra (26 FPS) to High (35 FPS) is a 34.6% improvement, High to Medium (45 FPS) is a 28.6% improvement, and Medium to Low (56 FPS) is a 24.4% improvement. The relative improvements are similar to 1080p, indicating that the settings scaling is consistent across resolutions.

At 4K, the absolute numbers are low across the board. The jump from Ultra (15 FPS) to High (19 FPS) is a 26.7% improvement, High to Medium (25 FPS) is a 31.6% improvement, and Medium to Low (31 FPS) is a 24% improvement. The minimum FPS data only available for Medium settings shows 58 FPS at 1080p, 38 FPS at 1440p, and 21 FPS at 4K, indicating that even the minimum frame rates are above the average for the next lower resolution settings, which is a positive sign for consistency.

FAQ

Q: What is the best settings preset for this system in Palworld?

A: The best experience is at 1920x1080 with the Low preset, which achieves an average of 84 FPS. For users preferring higher visual quality, the Medium preset at 1080p averages 68 FPS with a minimum of 58 FPS, which is still playable on 60Hz displays.

Q: Is the GPU or CPU the main bottleneck in this configuration?

A: The Intel Arc B390 GPU is the clear bottleneck. It ranks in the 9th percentile of all GPUs, while the Ryzen 5 5600G ranks in the 74th percentile of all CPUs. The FPS drops significantly with resolution increases, which is characteristic of a GPU-limited system.

Q: How does this combo rank compared to other tested systems in Palworld?

A: The combo ranks 2607 out of 2944 tested combos, placing it in the bottom 11.4% of all systems. This poor ranking is primarily due to the GPU's low performance relative to other graphics cards.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Palworld?

A: No. At 3840x2160, the best average FPS is 31 on Low settings, with Medium at 25 FPS, High at 19 FPS, and Ultra at 15 FPS. All of these are below acceptable playability thresholds.

Q: What is the expected frame rate difference between 1080p and 1440p?

A: At Low settings, the average FPS drops from 84 at 1080p to 56 at 1440p, a 33% reduction. At Medium settings, it drops from 68 to 45, also a 34% reduction, indicating consistent scaling.

Q: Are there any settings where the minimum FPS is close to the average?

A: At Medium settings, the minimum FPS is 58 at 1080p (average 68), 38 at 1440p (average 45), and 21 at 4K (average 25). The minimums are within 15% of the averages, suggesting relatively stable frame pacing at this setting.