Palworld

Palworld, a survival title released on 2024-01-18, presents a demanding workload that scales heavily with both resolution and graphics settings. For the combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 8400F and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080, the measured data shows a system capable of delivering high refresh rates at 1080p and 1440p, while 4K remains a challenge at higher presets. This analysis examines the measured FPS across three resolutions and four settings presets to determine optimal configurations and bottleneck characteristics.

FAQ

Q: What is the average FPS at 1080p with Ultra settings for this CPU/GPU combo?

A: At 1920x1080 with Ultra settings, the system achieves an average of 111.8 FPS. This is notably lower than the 146.9 FPS seen at High settings, indicating a significant performance cost for the highest preset.

Q: How does the frame rate at 1440p High compare to the 1080p High preset?

A: At 2560x1440 with High settings, the average FPS is 100, compared to 146.9 FPS at 1920x1080. This represents a drop of about 46.9 FPS, or roughly 32%, when increasing the resolution by one step.

Q: Is the RTX 3080 capable of hitting 60 FPS at 4K in Palworld?

A: Yes, but not at the highest settings. At 3840x2160 with Medium settings, the average FPS is 70.4, and with Low settings, it reaches 86.4. However, at High settings, it drops to 51.4 FPS, and at Ultra, it falls to 42.6 FPS.

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

A: At 2560x1440, the jump from Low (155.4 FPS) to Ultra (76.4 FPS) results in a performance reduction of 79 FPS. This shows that the Ultra preset roughly halves the frame rate compared to the Low preset at this resolution.

Q: How does the Ryzen 5 8400F's multi-threaded performance compare to its nearest rival?

A: The Ryzen 5 8400F has an average benchmark score of 25064, which puts it 0.3% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 5 7500F (24993). It is effectively tied with the AMD Ryzen 7 2700X, which has a deltaPct of 0.

Q: What is the GPU's performance percentile relative to all other GPUs?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 sits in the 80th percentile among all GPUs, based on its average benchmark score of 35787. This places it slightly behind the AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE, which is 0.9% faster.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data suggests that the "High" preset provides the most balanced experience across all tested resolutions. At 1920x1080, High yields 146.9 FPS, which is substantially higher than the 111.8 FPS at Ultra, while still offering a significant visual upgrade over the 193.6 FPS at Medium. The difference between High and Ultra is a 35.1 FPS drop, a cost that may not justify the visual gains for most users.

Moving to 2560x1440, the High preset again appears optimal, delivering exactly 100 FPS. This hits the sweet spot for high-refresh-rate monitors. While the Low preset achieves 155.4 FPS, the Medium preset at 130.1 FPS and High at 100 FPS offer better visual fidelity with still-playable frame rates. The Ultra preset at 76.4 FPS is playable but begins to sacrifice the smoothness that the lower presets provide.

At 3840x2160, the situation changes. The High preset's 51.4 FPS is below the 60 FPS threshold many consider the minimum for a smooth experience. For a consistent 60+ FPS experience at 4K, the Medium preset (70.4 FPS) is the highest settings level that achieves this goal. The Low preset provides 86.4 FPS, but the visual compromise is substantial. Therefore, for 4K, Medium is the recommended maximum, with High being viable for users who prioritize image quality over frame rate smoothness.

Resolution Scaling

The data reveals a clear trend: performance scales predictably as resolution increases, with the most significant constraint appearing at 4K. The transition from 1080p to 1440p on the High preset shows a drop from 146.9 FPS to 100 FPS, a 46.9 FPS reduction. This 32% performance hit is typical of a GPU-bound scenario where pixel count increases by roughly 78%, but the frame rate does not drop proportionally, indicating some headroom in the GPU.

The jump from 1440p to 4K on the High preset is more severe, falling from 100 FPS to 51.4 FPS, a 48.6 FPS reduction. This is a 48.6% drop in performance. This steep decline suggests that at 4K, the RTX 3080 is becoming fully saturated, and the workload is almost entirely limited by the GPU's rendering capabilities. The Ryzen 5 8400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, appears to be providing enough data to keep the GPU fed at 1080p and 1440p, but at 4K, the GPU's fill rate and compute power are the limiting factors.

This pattern is consistent across all settings. For example, at Low settings, the FPS goes from 239.5 at 1080p to 155.4 at 1440p, then to 86.4 at 4K. The percentage drop from 1440p to 4K (44.4%) is larger than from 1080p to 1440p (35.2%), reinforcing that the GPU is the primary bottleneck at higher resolutions. The system is well-balanced for 1080p and 1440p gaming, but 4K gaming will require lower settings to maintain high frame rates.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1920x1080: The lowest resolution tested shows the highest frame rates. The Low preset achieves an average of 239.5 FPS, which is exceptionally high and indicates the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at this level. Medium settings produce 193.6 FPS, while High settings yield 146.9 FPS. The Ultra preset, at 111.8 FPS, is the only setting at 1080p that drops below the 144 FPS mark, but it still provides a very smooth experience for most displays.

2560x1440: At this resolution, the frame rates are still excellent. The Low preset delivers 155.4 FPS, which is above the threshold for high-refresh-rate gaming. Medium settings provide 130.1 FPS, and High settings hit exactly 100 FPS. The Ultra preset drops to 76.4 FPS, which is still playable but shows a more significant performance cost. The scaling from Low to Ultra here shows a 79 FPS difference, highlighting the impact of the highest settings.

3840x2160: This resolution pushes the GPU to its limits. The Low preset manages 86.4 FPS, making it the only 4K setting to break the 60 FPS barrier comfortably. Medium settings achieve 70.4 FPS, which is also above 60 FPS. The High preset drops to 51.4 FPS, and the Ultra preset falls to 42.6 FPS. This data clearly shows that for a 60 FPS target at 4K, users should stick to Medium settings or lower.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 plays a central role in Palworld's performance, particularly at higher resolutions and settings. Its 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus provides a memory bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s. This high bandwidth is likely a key factor in maintaining playable frame rates at 4K, where large texture sets and high-resolution rendering demand rapid data access. The GPU's boost clock of 1710 MHz, derived from a base clock of 1440 MHz, helps sustain performance under load.

The RTX 3080's architecture, Ampere, includes 8704 shading units and 68 RT cores. While the game's use of ray tracing is not specified in the data, the raw compute power of 29.77 TFLOPS FP32 is substantial. The performance data suggests that at 1080p and 1440p, the GPU is not the primary bottleneck in most presets, as frame rates scale well with resolution. However, at 4K, the GPU becomes the clear limiting factor, as evidenced by the significant FPS drops across all settings.

The GPU's benchmark scores support its strong gaming performance. Its Passmark G3D score of 25086 and average benchmark score of 35787 place it in the 80th percentile. It trades blows with the AMD Radeon RX 7900 GRE (0.9% faster) and the AMD Radeon Pro Duo (0.2% slower). This indicates that while not the absolute top-tier, the RTX 3080 is a high-end card that is well-suited for demanding titles like Palworld, especially when paired with a capable CPU like the Ryzen 5 8400F. The VRAM capacity of 10 GB, while sufficient for the tested settings, could become a limitation in future titles or with higher-resolution texture packs, but the current data shows no such constraint in Palworld.