Pc Building Simulator

Pc Building Simulator, a simulation title from 2019, presents an interesting stress case for the Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti pairing. The measured data reveals a system that is heavily capable at mainstream resolutions but shows clear performance scaling limits as pixel count rises. The benchmark results position this combo in the 1612th spot out of 3723 tested combinations, placing it in the upper-middle tier of systems. This analysis breaks down the measured FPS across resolutions and settings, examining how the CPU and GPU each contribute to the final frame rates.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data paints a clear picture of how this combo handles different quality presets. At 1080p, the Ultra preset delivers an average of 151 FPS, which is exceptionally smooth for a simulation game that often involves dense UI elements and detailed system monitoring. High settings at 1080p yield 159 FPS, while Medium pushes to 214 FPS, and Low reaches a staggering 244 FPS. The delta between Ultra and High at 1080p is only 8 FPS, suggesting that the Ultra preset's additional visual features are not heavily taxing this hardware at this resolution.

Moving to 1440p, the relationship between settings remains consistent but the gaps widen. Ultra produces 95 FPS, High produces 100 FPS, and Medium jumps to 142 FPS. The most notable observation here is the 47 FPS difference between Low (200 FPS) and Ultra (95 FPS), indicating that the quality settings have a substantial impact on GPU workload as resolution increases. For a game like Pc Building Simulator, where the core gameplay involves navigating menus and observing component installations rather than fast-paced combat, the Medium preset at 1440p appears to offer the best balance, providing 142 FPS with a recorded minimum of 121 FPS and a maximum of 163 FPS, ensuring no noticeable dips during intensive scenes.

At 4K, the choice becomes more critical. Ultra settings drop to 50 FPS, which is playable but not ideal for a smooth experience, while High settings manage 52 FPS. The Medium preset at 4K achieves 74 FPS with a minimum of 63 FPS, which is the only 4K setting that maintains a frame rate consistently above the 60 FPS threshold. Low settings at 4K hit 105 FPS, proving the GPU has headroom when visual fidelity is sacrificed. The data suggests that for the best experience at 4K, Medium is the recommended preset, as it keeps frame rates fluid without the significant visual downgrade of Low. For 1080p and 1440p users, the Ultra preset is viable, but the Medium preset provides a more substantial safety margin for frame time consistency, as evidenced by the min/max data available.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 1612th out of 3723 tested configurations, placing it in the 43rd percentile of all systems tested in this game. This ranking is somewhat surprising given the strength of the RTX 3070 Ti, which holds a 75th percentile ranking among all GPUs. The discrepancy suggests that the Intel Core i5-9400, with its 47th percentile ranking among all CPUs, is holding back the overall system performance in Pc Building Simulator.

The GPU's average benchmark score of 29945 places it in close competition with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Mobile (29928, 0.1% faster), AMD Radeon RX 6800 (30095, 0.5% slower), and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti (29783, 0.5% faster). This indicates that the RTX 3070 Ti is a very capable card that should theoretically perform well above the system's overall rank. The CPU's average benchmark score of 2254 puts it in a tight cluster with the Intel Core i7-1068NG7 (2259, 0.2% slower), Intel Core i7-10710U (2248, 0.3% faster), AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 1500 (2246, 0.4% faster), and Intel Core i3-10305 (2264, 0.4% slower). This grouping shows the i5-9400 is an average performer, which aligns with its mid-pack CPU percentile.

The system's overall rank being in the lower-middle range suggests that Pc Building Simulator may have specific performance characteristics that favor stronger CPUs. The game's simulation nature likely involves significant single-threaded logic for component interactions and physics calculations, which could bottleneck the 6-core, 6-thread i5-9400 when paired with such a powerful GPU. The data implies that if the same GPU were paired with a higher-tier CPU, the combo rank would likely improve substantially, as the GPU clearly has the raw performance headroom to push higher frame rates in less CPU-limited scenarios.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti brings substantial hardware to this pairing. Its 8 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus provides a bandwidth of 608.3 GB/s, which is critical for feeding the GPU's 6144 shading units at high resolutions. The GPU's base clock of 1575 MHz and boost clock of 1770 MHz, combined with 48 RT cores and 192 tensor cores, give it a theoretical FP32 performance of 21.75 TFLOPS. This hardware positions the card well above the 75th percentile of all GPUs, confirming its high-end status.

In Pc Building Simulator, the GPU's role becomes evident when examining the FPS scaling with settings. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is 93 FPS (244 vs 151), showing that the GPU is being moderately exercised even at the lowest resolution. However, the more telling data comes from the 4K results. At 4K Ultra, the system manages only 50 FPS, which is a 67% drop from the 1080p Ultra score of 151 FPS. This substantial reduction indicates that the GPU is working near its limits at 4K with maximum settings, as the pixel throughput requirements increase dramatically.

The GPU's memory subsystem is particularly relevant for this game, which involves rendering detailed 3D models of PC components with high-resolution textures. The 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p gaming, but at 4K, the texture data requirements could approach the memory limit, potentially causing the GPU to rely on slower memory paging. The fact that the 4K Medium setting (74 FPS) performs significantly better than 4K High (52 FPS) suggests that the reduced texture quality at Medium alleviates memory pressure, allowing the GPU to maintain higher throughput.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers outstanding performance across all settings. Low settings produce 244 FPS, which is near the refresh rate limits of most monitors and indicates the CPU is not severely limiting at this resolution. Medium settings achieve 214 FPS with a minimum of 182 FPS and a maximum of 247 FPS, showing excellent frame time consistency. High settings drop to 159 FPS, and Ultra settings settle at 151 FPS. The 1080p data shows that even at Ultra, the system has significant headroom, as the 151 FPS average is well above the 60 FPS target for smooth gameplay.

At 2560x1440, the performance remains strong but begins to show the GPU's workload increasing. Low settings hit 200 FPS, Medium settings reach 142 FPS (121 minimum, 163 maximum), High settings achieve 100 FPS, and Ultra settings manage 95 FPS. The 1440p results demonstrate a more pronounced gap between Low and Ultra (105 FPS difference) compared to 1080p (93 FPS difference), indicating that the GPU is becoming a more significant factor in determining performance.

At 3840x2160, the system's performance drops notably. Low settings still deliver a playable 105 FPS, but Medium settings fall to 74 FPS (63 minimum, 85 maximum), High settings reach 52 FPS, and Ultra settings bottom out at 50 FPS. The 4K data reveals that the system can handle 4K gaming but only at lower quality presets if a 60 FPS target is desired. The Medium preset at 4K is the only setting that maintains a minimum FPS above 60, with its 63 FPS minimum making it the safe choice for 4K displays.

Resolution Scaling

The resolution scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a clear pattern of GPU-bound performance degradation. At Ultra settings, the FPS drops from 151 at 1080p to 95 at 1440p (a 37% reduction) and then to 50 at 4K (a 67% reduction from 1080p). This scaling is consistent with GPU-bound scenarios, where the pixel count increase from 1080p to 4K (a 4x increase in pixels) results in a frame rate reduction that is less than linear due to other bottlenecks.

At Low settings, the scaling shows a different story. The FPS drops from 244 at 1080p to 200 at 1440p (an 18% reduction) and then to 105 at 4K (a 57% reduction from 1080p). The relatively small drop from 1080p to 1440p at Low settings suggests that the CPU is capable of maintaining high frame rates, but the large drop to 4K indicates the GPU is being pushed harder despite Low settings reducing GPU load.

The Medium settings data, which includes min/max FPS figures, provides insight into frame time consistency across resolutions. At 1080p Medium, the range is 182-247 FPS (65 FPS spread), at 1440p Medium it narrows to 121-163 FPS (42 FPS spread), and at 4K Medium it tightens to 63-85 FPS (22 FPS spread). This narrowing range at higher resolutions suggests that the GPU is becoming the primary limiter, smoothing out the frame time variance that the CPU introduces at lower resolutions. The data implies that at 1080p, the CPU occasionally causes frame dips that the GPU can quickly recover from, but at 4K, the GPU's consistent workload keeps frame times more uniform.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a 6-core, 6-thread processor based on the Coffee Lake architecture, manufactured on Intel's 14 nm process. It has a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz, with a 9 MB shared L3 cache. The CPU supports DDR4 memory in dual-channel configuration with a bandwidth of 42.7 GB/s. These specifications place the CPU at the 47th percentile of all CPUs, indicating it is a mid-range performer.

In Pc Building Simulator, the CPU's role is most apparent when examining the 1080p results at Low settings, where the system achieves 244 FPS. This high frame rate suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU with enough data to reach nearly 250 FPS, which is close to the practical limit for many systems. However, the gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p (93 FPS) is significant, and this gap narrows at higher resolutions, indicating that the CPU is not the primary bottleneck when settings are increased.

The CPU's benchmark scores show a single-core performance of 935 in Cinebench R23 and 1389 in Geekbench, which are modest numbers compared to modern processors. The multi-core scores of 6629 (Cinebench R23) and 5141 (Geekbench) reflect the 6-core/6-thread design, which lacks hyper-threading. For a simulation game that may rely on complex AI and physics calculations, the lack of additional threads could limit performance in CPU-intensive scenes, particularly when many components are being rendered simultaneously.

The data suggests that the i5-9400 is adequate for this game at 1080p and 1440p, but it may not fully utilize the RTX 3070 Ti's capabilities at lower resolutions. The combo's 1612th rank out of 3723 systems, combined with the GPU's high percentile ranking, points to the CPU as the limiting factor in achieving higher overall system performance. The 65 W TDP and lack of overclocking support (multiplier locked) mean users cannot easily extract additional performance from this processor to better match the GPU's capabilities.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution to play Pc Building Simulator with this combo?

A: The data shows that 1440p with Medium settings provides 142 FPS with a minimum of 121 FPS, offering an excellent balance of visual quality and smooth performance. At 1080p, Ultra settings reach 151 FPS, which is also viable, but the 1440p Medium setting provides a more immersive experience without sacrificing frame rate stability.

Q: Can this system handle 4K gaming in Pc Building Simulator?

A: Yes, but only at lower quality presets. At 4K Medium, the system achieves 74 FPS with a minimum of 63 FPS, making it the only 4K setting that maintains a consistent 60+ FPS experience. At 4K High and Ultra, the frame rates drop to 52 FPS and 50 FPS respectively, which may result in noticeable stutter.

Q: How does the Intel Core i5-9400 compare to its nearest rivals?

A: The i5-9400 has an average benchmark score of 2254, which is nearly identical to the Intel Core i7-1068NG7 (2259, 0.2% slower) and Intel Core i3-10305 (2264, 0.4% slower). It is marginally faster than the Intel Core i7-10710U (2248, 0.3% faster) and AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 1500 (2246, 0.4% faster), placing it in a tight performance cluster.

Q: Is the RTX 3070 Ti a strong GPU relative to other options?

A: The RTX 3070 Ti ranks in the 75th percentile of all GPUs with an average benchmark score of 29945. It performs nearly identically to the RTX 5070 Mobile (29928, 0.1% faster) and RTX 2080 Ti (29783, 0.5% faster), while being slightly slower than the RX 6800 (30095, 0.5% slower) and RX 6700 (30433, 1.6% slower).

Q: What causes the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra settings?

A: At 1080p, the difference is 93 FPS (244 vs 151), at 1440p it is 105 FPS (200 vs 95), and at 4K it is 55 FPS (105 vs 50). The larger absolute difference at 1440p indicates that the GPU's workload scales significantly with quality settings, while the smaller 4K difference suggests the GPU is nearing its limits even at Low settings.

Q: Does this combo have any performance bottlenecks?

A: The data indicates that the CPU is the primary bottleneck at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the system hits 244 FPS, which is high, but the GPU's 75th percentile ranking suggests it could perform better if paired with a stronger CPU. At 4K, the GPU becomes the limiting factor, as evidenced by the significant FPS drop regardless of quality settings.