Palworld

Palworld on the Intel Core i5-9400 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT delivers a wide spread of frame rates across its four settings presets and three resolutions, with the data showing a clear performance hierarchy. The measured results place this combination at rank 1104 out of 3711 tested combos, indicating a solidly above-average pairing for this Survival title. The following analysis breaks down the measured FPS data to determine the optimal settings, the scaling behavior across resolutions, and the distinct roles played by the CPU and GPU in shaping the final experience.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS rows provide a clear picture of the performance cost associated with each settings preset. At 1920x1080, the Low preset achieves an average of 196 FPS, Medium drops to 182 FPS, High falls to 155 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 117 FPS. The jump from Low to Medium costs 14 FPS, while the jump from High to Ultra costs 38 FPS, making Ultra the most expensive step in the chain.

For the smoothest experience at 1080p, the High preset at 155 FPS is the best balance. It sits 27 FPS above Ultra while remaining only 27 FPS below Medium. The gap between High and Ultra is substantial, suggesting that Ultra introduces rendering features that disproportionately impact performance without a commensurate visual payoff. Medium is also viable at 182 FPS, but the additional 27 FPS over High is less meaningful when both are well above the refresh rates of most displays.

At 2560x1440, the pattern shifts. Low produces 163 FPS, Medium 132 FPS, High 102 FPS, and Ultra 77 FPS. Here, High at 102 FPS is the sweet spot for demanding displays, as it remains above the 100 FPS threshold while Ultra drops to 77 FPS, which may introduce noticeable stutter on high-refresh panels. Medium at 132 FPS is a strong alternative for players who prefer maximum smoothness over fidelity, and the 30 FPS difference between Medium and High is significant enough to warrant consideration.

At 3840x2160, the data shows the GPU starting to feel the strain. Low averages 91 FPS, Medium 73 FPS, High 57 FPS, and Ultra 43 FPS. The Medium preset at 73 FPS is the recommended choice here, as it maintains a playable frame rate while High dips to 57 FPS and Ultra falls below the 60 FPS target. Low at 91 FPS is the only preset that comfortably exceeds 60 FPS, but the visual compromise may be too steep for a game like Palworld where environmental detail matters. Medium offers the best compromise, with a 16 FPS advantage over High and a 30 FPS deficit to Low.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate achievable with this combo?

A: The highest measured average is 196 FPS, achieved at 1920x1080 with the Low settings preset. The next highest is 182 FPS at the same resolution with Medium settings.

Q: How much performance is lost when moving from 1080p to 4K?

A: At High settings, the average FPS drops from 155 at 1920x1080 to 102 at 2560x1440, then to 57 at 3840x2160. This represents a 63% reduction from 1080p to 4K, indicating the GPU becomes the primary constraint at higher resolutions.

Q: Is the Ultra preset ever recommended at any resolution?

A: No. At 1920x1080, Ultra averages 117 FPS but costs 38 FPS over High. At 2560x1440, Ultra drops to 77 FPS, and at 3840x2160, it falls to 43 FPS. The performance penalty is consistently steep, making Ultra the least efficient preset in all cases.

Q: What is the frame time consistency like at Medium settings?

A: The Medium preset is the only one with recorded minimum and maximum FPS values. At 1920x1080, the range is 154 to 209 FPS with an average of 182. At 2560x1440, the range is 113 to 152 FPS with an average of 132. At 3840x2160, the range is 62 to 84 FPS with an average of 73. The spread narrows as resolution increases, indicating more consistent frame pacing at higher GPU loads.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested systems for Palworld?

A: The combo ranks 1104 out of 3711 tested combinations, placing it in the top 30% of all configurations. This suggests the pairing is well-suited for the game, though not at the extreme high end.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU appear to be the limiting factor at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the frame rates are exceptionally high, with Low hitting 196 FPS and Medium 182 FPS. These numbers suggest the GPU has ample headroom, and the CPU's six cores and six threads are sufficient to feed it at these settings. The bottleneck shifts to the GPU as resolution increases.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how the performance scales from 1920x1080 to 3840x2160. At High settings, the averages are 155 FPS at 1080p, 102 FPS at 1440p, and 57 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 53 FPS, and from 1440p to 4K is 45 FPS. This is a near-linear decline, with the pixel count roughly doubling at each step (1080p to 1440p is a 78% increase, 1440p to 4K is a 125% increase).

At Low settings, the scaling is even more pronounced: 196 FPS at 1080p, 163 FPS at 1440p, and 91 FPS at 4K. The 4K figure is less than half of the 1080p figure, indicating that the GPU's raw pixel throughput becomes the dominant factor when the CPU is less burdened by game logic. The fact that Low at 4K (91 FPS) is still higher than Ultra at 1080p (117 FPS) shows that the settings preset has a larger impact on frame rate than resolution alone.

The Medium preset shows the most consistent scaling across all three resolutions: 182 FPS at 1080p, 132 FPS at 1440p, and 73 FPS at 4K. The proportional drops are 27% and 45%, respectively, which aligns with the increasing pixel counts. This consistency suggests that Medium settings do not create a disproportionate CPU or GPU load at any resolution, making it the most predictable preset for performance planning.

The resolution scaling behavior strongly indicates that the GPU is the limiting component above 1080p. At 1920x1080, the CPU can maintain frame rates above 150 FPS even at High settings, but the RX 9070 XT's workload increases dramatically with each resolution step. The 4K Ultra result of 43 FPS is particularly telling, as it shows the GPU struggling to maintain a playable frame rate when both resolution and settings are maxed out.

How This Combo Ranks

The comboRankInGame field places this pairing at rank 1104 out of 3711 tested combos, which puts it in the 70th percentile of all configurations tested for Palworld. This means the Intel Core i5-9400 and AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT outperform roughly 70% of other pairings in this specific game, despite the CPU being an older Coffee Lake architecture part.

The rank is likely driven by the GPU's strong raw performance, as the RX 9070 XT's benchmark scores are substantial. In the GPU benchmarks, the card scores 26795 in Passmark G3D and 7260 in 3DMark Steel Nomad, placing it at the 55th percentile among all GPUs. The CPU, by contrast, sits at the 47th percentile with an average benchmark score of 2254, which is lower than its nearest rivals like the Intel Core i7-1068NG7 at 2259 and the Intel Core i3-10305 at 2264.

The combination's rank of 1104 suggests that while the GPU is powerful enough for high frame rates at lower resolutions, the CPU may hold back performance in CPU-intensive scenes common in survival games with many entities. However, the measured FPS data shows that at 1080p, the combo still achieves 155 FPS at High settings, indicating the CPU is not a severe bottleneck at standard resolutions. The rank is a holistic measure that accounts for all tested settings and resolutions, and the 4K results likely drag the rank down relative to combos with stronger CPUs.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a six-core, six-thread processor with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz. It has 9 MB of shared L3 cache and supports DDR4 memory with a dual-channel bus. In CPU benchmarks, it scores 6629 in Cinebench R23 multicore and 935 in single-core, with a Geekbench multicore score of 5141 and single-core score of 1389. These numbers place it at the 47th percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 2254.

In Palworld, the CPU's role is most evident at lower resolutions where the GPU is not saturated. At 1920x1080 Low, the combo achieves 196 FPS, which is a very high frame rate that requires the CPU to process game logic and draw calls quickly. The six threads are sufficient for this workload, as evidenced by the 196 FPS result. At 2560x1440 Low, the frame rate drops to 163 FPS, and at 4K Low to 91 FPS, showing that the CPU is not the primary bottleneck at these settings.

The CPU's benchmark scores relative to its nearest rivals are informative. The Intel Core i7-1068NG7 scores 2259 (0.2% higher), the Intel Core i7-10710U scores 2248 (0.3% lower), and the AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 1500 scores 2246 (0.4% lower). These deltas are all within 0.5% of the i5-9400's score, meaning the CPU's performance is tightly clustered with its peers. In Palworld, this translates to consistent frame delivery at high FPS, but the CPU may struggle in scenes with many Pals or complex base-building physics.

The 2.90 GHz base clock and 4.10 GHz boost clock provide adequate single-thread performance for the game's primary simulation thread. The 9 MB L3 cache is modest by modern standards but sufficient for the game's asset streaming. The CPU's 65W TDP suggests it operates within a conservative power envelope, which may limit sustained boost clocks in long gaming sessions, but the measured data does not show thermal throttling impacts at the tested settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a complete picture of performance across all three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the averages are 196 FPS (Low), 182 FPS (Medium), 155 FPS (High), and 117 FPS (Ultra). The Medium preset includes a minimum of 154 FPS and maximum of 209 FPS, showing a frame time variance of 55 FPS. The Ultra preset at 117 FPS is the weakest 1080p result, but it still exceeds the 60 FPS target by a comfortable margin.

At 2560x1440, the averages are 163 FPS (Low), 132 FPS (Medium), 102 FPS (High), and 77 FPS (Ultra). The Medium preset records a minimum of 113 FPS and maximum of 152 FPS, with a narrower 39 FPS variance compared to 1080p. The High preset at 102 FPS is the first result that dips below the 120 FPS threshold, which may be noticeable on 144Hz displays. Ultra at 77 FPS remains playable but approaches the lower bound of smooth gameplay.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 91 FPS (Low), 73 FPS (Medium), 57 FPS (High), and 43 FPS (Ultra). The Medium preset shows a minimum of 62 FPS and maximum of 84 FPS, with a 22 FPS variance. This is the only 4K preset with complete min/max data, and the 62 FPS minimum is just above the 60 FPS target, indicating that Medium is the minimum viable preset for 4K gaming. High at 57 FPS and Ultra at 43 FPS fall below the 60 FPS target, making them less suitable for smooth gameplay.

The progression from Low to Ultra at each resolution shows a consistent pattern: Low is roughly 30-40% faster than Medium, which is 20-30% faster than High, which is 25-35% faster than Ultra. The largest single-step penalty is from High to Ultra at 1080p, which costs 38 FPS, while the smallest is from Low to Medium at 4K, which costs 18 FPS. This suggests that the Ultra preset introduces rendering features that are disproportionately expensive at lower resolutions where the GPU has more headroom.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 9070 XT is a high-end GPU with 16 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 644.6 GB/s of bandwidth. Its boost clock is 2970 MHz with a game clock of 2400 MHz, and it features 4096 shading units, 256 TMUs, and 128 ROPs. The GPU's FP32 performance is 48.66 TFLOPS, and its pixel rate is 380.2 GPixel/s. These specifications place it at the 55th percentile among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 13543.

In Palworld, the GPU's role is most critical at higher resolutions and settings. The 16 GB VRAM is ample for the game's textures, even at 4K Ultra, though the measured data shows that the GPU's compute power, not memory capacity, is the limiting factor. The 4K Ultra result of 43 FPS indicates that the GPU is fully saturated at this configuration, and the 4K High result of 57 FPS is barely above the 60 FPS target.

The GPU's benchmark scores provide context for its Palworld performance. It scores 26795 in Passmark G3D and 7260 in 3DMark Steel Nomad, which are strong results. Its nearest rivals in the benchmark database are the AMD Radeon HD 7770M (13536, 0.1% lower), NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 (13515, 0.2% lower), and NVIDIA P106-090 (13470, 0.5% lower). These deltas are all within 1%, meaning the RX 9070 XT's average benchmark score is tightly clustered with these older cards, despite being a much newer architecture.

The GPU's memory bandwidth of 644.6 GB/s is a key asset for Palworld, which features large open-world environments with streaming textures. The 256-bit bus and 16 GB capacity prevent memory-related stutters, as evidenced by the Medium preset's minimum FPS values at each resolution. At 1080p Medium, the minimum is 154 FPS, at 1440p Medium 113 FPS, and at 4K Medium 62 FPS, all of which are well above playable thresholds.

The GPU's clock speeds are also relevant. The boost clock of 2970 MHz is high, and the game clock of 2400 MHz ensures sustained performance under load. The 304W TDP indicates the card draws significant power, but the measured FPS data shows it translates into strong frame rates at 1080p and 1440p. The 4K results are the weakest, with only Low and Medium exceeding 60 FPS, reinforcing that the GPU is the primary bottleneck at 4K despite its substantial compute resources.