Palworld

# Palworld with Intel Core i7-13700K + Intel Arc B390

The Intel Core i7-13700K paired with the Intel Arc B390 produces a profoundly unbalanced experience in Palworld, with benchmark results indicating severe GPU-bound limitations across every resolution and settings combination tested. The combo ranks 2607th out of 2944 tested combinations, placing it in the bottom 11.5% of all systems evaluated for this survival title. This ranking reflects the Arc B390's position as an integrated graphics solution operating at just the 9th percentile among all GPUs, while the i7-13700K sits comfortably in the 89th percentile among all CPUs. The data tells a clear story: the processor is capable of far more than the graphics solution can deliver, and the measured frame rates confirm this disparity at every turn.

FAQ

Q: What is the best average frame rate this combo achieves in Palworld?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 84, achieved at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. This is the only configuration that breaks the 80 FPS threshold, with the next closest being 68 FPS at 1080p Medium.

Q: How does this combo perform at 4K resolution?

A: At 3840x2160, the system produces an average of 19 FPS on High settings, 25 FPS on Medium, 31 FPS on Low, and 15 FPS on Ultra. Even the best 4K result (Low settings at 31 FPS) falls below the generally accepted playability threshold of 30 FPS, and it does so by a narrow margin.

Q: What is the lowest average frame rate recorded?

A: The lowest average is 15 FPS, measured at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings. This represents the most demanding configuration tested and produces a nearly unplayable experience.

Q: How does the Arc B390 compare to its closest GPU rivals?

A: The Arc B390 has an average benchmark score of 1482, which places it 1.3% ahead of the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX, 1.5% ahead of the GeForce 800M, 2.5% ahead of the GT 625 OEM, and 2.7% ahead of the GT 710. These are all very old, low-end parts, indicating the B390's performance tier.

Q: What is the CPU's benchmark standing relative to its rivals?

A: The i7-13700K averages 46881 across all benchmark tests, sitting 0.2% behind the AMD Ryzen 9 5900, 0.3% behind the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 375, and 0.5% ahead of both the AMD Ryzen 9 7845HX and the Intel Xeon w3-2535. This puts it in a very tight competitive cluster.

Q: Does the combo ever reach 60 FPS at 1440p?

A: No. At 2560x1440, the best result is 56 FPS on Low settings. Medium settings yield 45 FPS, High yields 35 FPS, and Ultra drops to 26 FPS. The 60 FPS target is only achieved at 1080p with Low settings (84 FPS) and approached at 1080p Medium (68 FPS).

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 2607 out of 2944 tested combinations places it in the lower 11.5% of all systems benchmarked in Palworld. This is a striking result when considering the CPU's strength; the i7-13700K alone outperforms 89% of all processors in the database, yet the overall system ranking is dragged down dramatically by the GPU component.

The data suggests that the Arc B390 is the dominant constraint. Its percentile ranking of 9th among all GPUs means that 91% of graphics solutions tested perform better, and its nearest rivals are all legacy NVIDIA parts from over a decade ago. The GT 520MX, GT 625 OEM, and GT 710 are not modern gaming GPUs by any measure, yet the B390 only edges them out by 1.3% to 2.7% in synthetic benchmarks.

This ranking pattern indicates that the combo is effectively a high-end CPU paired with entry-level graphics capability. In Palworld, which requires consistent GPU throughput for rendering the open world, the CPU's potential is largely unrealized. The system's position at 2607th reflects this mismatch, and the measured FPS data reinforces that the GPU is the limiting factor across all tested configurations.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B390 operates with a base clock of 300 MHz and a boost clock of 2500 MHz, built on Intel's 3 nm process with the Xe3-LPG architecture. It features 1536 shading units, 48 texture mapping units, 24 raster output units, and 12 ray tracing cores. The pixel rate is rated at 60.00 GPixel/s, texture rate at 120.0 GTexel/s, and FP32 performance at 7.680 TFLOPS.

The GPU's memory configuration is system shared, meaning it relies on the host system's memory rather than dedicated VRAM. The memory bus width is also system shared, and bandwidth is described as system dependent. This is a critical limitation for Palworld, which benefits from dedicated graphics memory for texture streaming and world rendering. The absence of dedicated VRAM likely contributes to the low performance figures observed.

The B390's 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1482 places it in the 9th percentile among all GPUs. Its nearest rivals are the GT 520MX (1463), GeForce 800M (1460), GT 625 OEM (1446), and GT 710 (1443). These comparisons illustrate that the B390 is operating at a performance level comparable to integrated or very low-end discrete solutions from previous generations.

In Palworld specifically, the GPU's limitations manifest clearly. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 84 FPS, but this drops to 68 FPS at Medium, 53 FPS at High, and 40 FPS at Ultra. The scaling from Low to Ultra represents a 52% reduction in frame rate, indicating that the GPU's compute and memory subsystems struggle as settings increase.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers its strongest results. Low settings produce an average of 84 FPS, Medium settings yield 68 FPS with a minimum of 58 and maximum of 79, High settings produce 53 FPS, and Ultra settings drop to 40 FPS. The gap between Low and Medium is 16 FPS, while the gap between Medium and High is 15 FPS, and High to Ultra is 13 FPS. This relatively even scaling suggests that each settings tier imposes a similar incremental load on the GPU.

Moving to 2560x1440, performance degrades noticeably. Low settings average 56 FPS, representing a 33% drop from the 1080p Low result. Medium settings produce 45 FPS (38 minimum, 52 maximum), High settings yield 35 FPS, and Ultra drops to 26 FPS. The 1440p Medium result of 45 FPS is only slightly better than the 1080p Ultra result of 40 FPS, indicating that resolution scaling and settings scaling impose comparable burdens on the GPU.

At 3840x2160, the system struggles to maintain playable frame rates. Low settings produce 31 FPS, which is the only 4K configuration to exceed 30 FPS. Medium settings average 25 FPS (21 minimum, 29 maximum), High settings drop to 19 FPS, and Ultra falls to 15 FPS. The 4K Low result is 63% lower than the 1080p Low result, demonstrating the severe impact of resolution on this GPU.

The measured data includes min/max values only for Medium settings at each resolution. At 1080p Medium, the range is 58 to 79 FPS, a spread of 21 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the range is 38 to 52 FPS, a spread of 14 FPS. At 4K Medium, the range is 21 to 29 FPS, a spread of 8 FPS. This tightening range at higher resolutions suggests that the GPU becomes more consistently saturated as resolution increases, reducing frame time variance but also lowering overall performance.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal configuration for this combo is 1920x1080 with Medium settings. This delivers an average of 68 FPS with a minimum of 58 FPS, ensuring that frame rates remain above 60 FPS for the majority of gameplay. The 58 FPS minimum is the highest minimum recorded across all tested configurations, making it the most consistent option for smooth play.

The 1080p Low setting at 84 FPS offers higher average performance but sacrifices visual quality. For players prioritizing frame rate above all else, this is the only configuration that approaches 90 FPS territory. However, the 16 FPS difference between Low and Medium is substantial, and the Medium preset provides a better balance between visual fidelity and performance.

At 1440p, the Low setting at 56 FPS is the only configuration that comes close to 60 FPS, but it falls short. The Medium setting at 45 FPS is playable but noticeably less smooth, and the High setting at 35 FPS begins to feel sluggish for an action-oriented survival game. The Ultra setting at 26 FPS is not recommended for any scenario.

At 4K, no settings configuration delivers acceptable performance. The best result is 31 FPS at Low, which is borderline and likely to drop below 30 FPS during intensive scenes. The data suggests that 4K should be avoided entirely with this combo, as even the lowest settings cannot maintain consistent playability.

The Ultra presets at any resolution do not provide a worthwhile experience. At 1080p Ultra, the 40 FPS average is 41% lower than Medium, and at 1440p Ultra, the 26 FPS result is below the playability threshold. The performance cost of Ultra settings is not justified given the GPU's capabilities.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-13700K is a 16-core, 24-thread processor based on Raptor Lake architecture, built on Intel's 10 nm process. It runs at a base clock of 3.40 GHz and boosts to 5.40 GHz, with a TDP of 125 W. The cache hierarchy includes 80 KB of L1 cache per core, 2 MB of L2 cache per core, and 30 MB of shared L3 cache. It supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory in a dual-channel configuration and provides Gen 5 PCIe with 20 CPU lanes.

The CPU's benchmark results are strong across the board. In Cinebench R23, it scores 30745 in multicore and 2116 in single-core. Geekbench results show 19429 multicore and 2529 single-core. Passmark multithread testing yields 45887, and 3DMark max threads produces 12412. The 3DMark single-thread score is 1136, and the 2-thread score is 2262, scaling to 4469 at 4 threads, 8193 at 8 threads, and 10717 at 16 threads.

The CPU's average benchmark score of 46881 places it in the 89th percentile of all CPUs, with nearest rivals including the AMD Ryzen 9 5900 (46971, 0.2% ahead), AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 375 (47022, 0.3% ahead), AMD Ryzen 9 7845HX (46654, 0.5% behind), and Intel Xeon w3-2535 (46653, 0.5% behind). This tight clustering indicates that the i7-13700K is competitive with other high-end processors from recent generations.

In Palworld, the CPU's role is largely underutilized due to the GPU bottleneck. The 16-core, 24-thread configuration provides ample processing power for the game's simulation and AI systems, but the measured frame rates are consistently GPU-limited. This is evident from the fact that the same resolution at different settings produces significant FPS variations, which would not occur if the CPU were the limiting factor.

The CPU's single-thread performance, as indicated by the 3DMark single-thread score of 1136 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 2116, is sufficient for Palworld's primary game thread. However, the system's overall performance is constrained by the Arc B390, meaning the CPU's capabilities are not fully expressed in this configuration.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals how resolution scaling impacts this combo. At Low settings, performance drops from 84 FPS at 1080p to 56 FPS at 1440p, a 33% reduction, and then to 31 FPS at 4K, a 45% reduction from 1440p and a 63% reduction from 1080p. This scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU that becomes increasingly saturated as pixel count rises.

At Medium settings, the progression is 68 FPS (1080p) to 45 FPS (1440p) to 25 FPS (4K). The 1440p result is 34% lower than 1080p, and the 4K result is 44% lower than 1440p. The 4K Medium result of 25 FPS is 63% below the 1080p Medium result, mirroring the Low settings scaling almost exactly.

High settings show a similar pattern: 53 FPS at 1080p, 35 FPS at 1440p (34% lower), and 19 FPS at 4K (46% lower than 1440p, 64% lower than 1080p). Ultra settings produce 40 FPS at 1080p, 26 FPS at 1440p (35% lower), and 15 FPS at 4K (42% lower than 1440p, 63% lower than 1080p).

The consistency of these percentage drops across settings tiers is notable. Each resolution step from 1080p to 1440p reduces performance by roughly 33-35%, and each step from 1440p to 4K reduces performance by roughly 42-46%. This uniformity suggests that the GPU's rendering pipeline is the primary constraint, with pixel throughput being the limiting factor.

The data indicates that the Arc B390's system shared memory architecture becomes increasingly problematic at higher resolutions. As pixel count increases, the demand for memory bandwidth grows, and the shared memory configuration likely cannot keep pace. The 4K results, which all fall below 32 FPS, suggest that this GPU is not viable for high-resolution gaming in Palworld regardless of settings optimization.

The resolution scaling analysis confirms that the GPU is the bottleneck. If the CPU were limiting, we would expect to see similar frame rates across different resolutions, as the CPU's workload does not scale with pixel count. Instead, the significant FPS reductions at higher resolutions point squarely at the GPU as the constraining component.