Road 96

The GeForce RTX 5050 paired with the Intel Core i5-9400 in Road 96 delivers a broad spread of performance across its presets, with the data showing a clear trade-off between visual fidelity and frame rate. Across all three tested resolutions, the Medium preset offers the most balanced experience, providing a substantial improvement over Low settings while maintaining frame rates that are more than double those of Ultra at 1080p and 1440p. The benchmark results indicate that this combination ranks in the 1760th position out of 2903 total tested combinations for this game, placing it in the upper-middle tier of systems.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data for Road 96 shows that the Medium preset is the optimal choice for this hardware configuration, as it delivers the best compromise between visual quality and performance across every resolution tested. At 1920x1080, Medium produces an average of 131 FPS, which is 49 FPS higher than High and 49 FPS lower than Low, but critically, it maintains a minimum of 111 FPS and a maximum of 150 FPS, ensuring smooth gameplay without significant dips. The High preset at 1080p still achieves a respectable 105 FPS average, but the Medium preset's higher minimum frame rate makes it the safer recommendation for consistent performance.

Moving to 2560x1440, the Medium preset again stands out with an average of 83 FPS, with minimum and maximum values of 71 and 96 FPS respectively. This represents a 16 FPS improvement over High at 67 FPS average, while the Low preset jumps to 114 FPS average. The Ultra preset at this resolution drops to just 53 FPS average, which is playable but begins to show the GPU's limits. For 4K resolution, the Medium preset provides 44 FPS average with a minimum of 37 and maximum of 51 FPS, which is the only preset at 3840x2160 that offers a minimum frame rate above 30 FPS. The Low preset at 4K hits exactly 60 FPS average, but the visual compromises are significant.

For players prioritizing frame rate above all else, the Low preset at 1080p delivers a remarkable 178 FPS average, which is more than double the High preset's 105 FPS. However, the data suggests that the Medium preset is the sweet spot, as it offers 131 FPS at 1080p, 83 FPS at 1440p, and 44 FPS at 4K, all of which are playable while providing better visual detail than Low. The Ultra preset is only recommended for players with high-refresh-rate displays at 1080p, where 82 FPS average is still smooth, but at 1440p and 4K, the 53 and 28 FPS averages respectively make it less viable for fast-paced gameplay.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with a 5 nm process node from TSMC, featuring 16,900 million transistors on a 149 mm² die. This GPU operates with a base clock of 2317 MHz and a boost clock of 2572 MHz, paired with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus, providing a memory bandwidth of 320.0 GB/s. The GPU's 2560 shading units, 80 texture mapping units, and 32 render output units work together to deliver a pixel rate of 82.30 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 205.8 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance rated at 13.17 TFLOPS.

In the context of Road 96, the GPU's role is clearly dominant, as evidenced by the frame rate scaling across resolutions. The RTX 5050's 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for this game, even at 4K Ultra settings, where the average FPS drops to 28. The benchmark scores for this GPU show a Passmark G3D score of 17326 and a 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 2502, placing it in the 66th percentile of all GPUs. The nearest rivals in terms of average benchmark score include the AMD Radeon RX Vega M GL, which is 0.6% faster, and the AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT, which is 1.6% slower, indicating that the RTX 5050 sits in a competitive mid-range segment.

The GPU's clock speeds of 2317 MHz base and 2572 MHz boost are relatively high for a mid-range card, and the data shows this translates into strong performance in Road 96 at lower resolutions. At 1080p Low, the GPU achieves 178 FPS, which suggests that the processor is not a limiting factor at this resolution. The GPU's ray tracing capabilities, with 20 RT cores and 80 tensor cores, are present but not heavily utilized in this adventure game, as the measured data does not indicate any ray tracing-specific benchmarks. The GPU's memory bandwidth of 320.0 GB/s is adequate for the textures and assets in Road 96, and the 8 GB VRAM ensures that even at 4K Ultra, memory capacity is not exceeded.

Resolution Scaling

The performance scaling across resolutions in Road 96 reveals a clear GPU-bound scenario for this system, with frame rates dropping substantially as resolution increases. At 1920x1080, the High preset achieves 105 FPS average, while at 2560x1440 it drops to 67 FPS, representing a 36% decrease, and at 3840x2160 it falls to 35 FPS, a 67% decrease from the 1080p figure. This scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU that is fully utilized, as the CPU has sufficient headroom to feed the GPU at lower resolutions but becomes less relevant as pixel count increases.

The Medium preset shows a similar trend, with 131 FPS at 1080p, 83 FPS at 1440p, and 44 FPS at 4K. The percentage drops from 1080p to 1440p are 37%, and from 1080p to 4K are 66%, which is nearly identical to the High preset's scaling. This consistency indicates that the limiting component is the GPU across all settings, as the relative performance degradation is uniform regardless of the preset. The Low preset follows the same pattern, with 178 FPS at 1080p, 114 FPS at 1440p, and 60 FPS at 4K, showing drops of 36% and 66% respectively.

The Ultra preset exhibits the most severe scaling, with 82 FPS at 1080p, 53 FPS at 1440p, and 28 FPS at 4K. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is 35%, and from 1080p to 4K is 66%. This suggests that even at the highest settings, the GPU remains the bottleneck, as the frame rate reduction is proportional to the pixel count increase. The data clearly shows that the Intel Core i5-9400 is not limiting performance in Road 96, as the frame rates scale almost perfectly with the inverse of the resolution pixel count, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound workload. Players targeting 4K should expect to use the Low or Medium presets to maintain playable frame rates, while 1080p and 1440p offer much more headroom for higher settings.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset to use with this CPU and GPU combination for a 60 FPS target at 1440p?

A: The Medium preset at 2560x1440 achieves an average of 83 FPS, with a minimum of 71 FPS, making it the best choice for a stable 60 FPS experience. The High preset at 67 FPS average is also viable, but its lower minimum frame rate makes Medium the safer recommendation.

Q: How much faster is the Low preset compared to Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers 178 FPS average, which is 96 FPS higher than the Ultra preset's 82 FPS average. This represents a 117% improvement in frame rate when switching from Ultra to Low settings.

Q: Is 8 GB of VRAM sufficient for playing at 4K resolution in this game?

A: Yes, the RTX 5050 with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory can run Road 96 at 3840x2160, with the Ultra preset achieving 28 FPS average and the Medium preset achieving 44 FPS average. The game does not appear to exceed the VRAM capacity, as the frame rates scale consistently with resolution.

Q: How does the RTX 5050 compare to the AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT in synthetic benchmarks?

A: According to the average benchmark scores, the RTX 5050 is 1.6% faster than the AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT. The RTX 5050 also outperforms the AMD Radeon RX Vega M GL by 0.6% and the NVIDIA RTX A4000 Mobile by 1.6%.

Q: What frame rate can I expect at 4K with Medium settings?

A: At 3840x2160 with Medium settings, the system achieves an average of 44 FPS, with a minimum of 37 FPS and a maximum of 51 FPS. This is the highest preset at 4K that maintains a minimum frame rate above 30 FPS.

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU at any resolution in this game?

A: The data indicates that the CPU does not bottleneck the GPU in Road 96. The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K follows the pixel count proportionally, with consistent drops of approximately 36% from 1080p to 1440p and 66% from 1080p to 4K across all presets, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound workload.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a 6-core, 6-thread processor based on the Coffee Lake architecture, with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz. It features a 9 MB shared L3 cache and 64 KB L1 and 256 KB L2 caches per core, with a TDP of 65 W. The processor supports DDR4 memory in a dual-channel configuration, providing a memory bandwidth of 42.7 GB/s, and uses the Intel Socket 1151 interface with PCIe Gen 3 connectivity. In synthetic benchmarks, the i5-9400 scores 6629 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 935 in single-core, with a Geekbench multi-core score of 5141 and single-core score of 1389, placing it in the 47th percentile of all CPUs.

In the context of Road 96, the CPU's role is secondary to the GPU, as the frame rate data demonstrates that the system is GPU-bound across all tested resolutions and settings. The i5-9400's nearest rivals include the Intel Core i7-1068NG7 (0.2% faster), Intel Core i7-10710U (0.3% slower), AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 1500 (0.4% slower), and Intel Core i3-10305 (0.4% faster), all of which have average benchmark scores clustered around 2250. The CPU's 6 cores and 6 threads are sufficient for this adventure game, which does not appear to require extensive multi-threading, as evidenced by the lack of CPU bottleneck at any resolution.

The boost clock of 4.10 GHz provides adequate single-thread performance for game logic and physics, while the 6 cores handle background tasks and any additional processing Road 96 requires. The memory bandwidth of 42.7 GB/s is sufficient to feed the GPU with data, and the dual-channel DDR4 configuration ensures that the CPU can keep up with the GPU's demands. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 178 FPS, which is well above the refresh rate of most displays, and even at 4K Ultra, the 28 FPS average is not limited by the CPU but rather by the GPU's pixel processing capabilities. The data shows that the i5-9400 provides a solid foundation for this GPU, with no evidence of CPU-related stuttering or frame rate caps in the measured results.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data for Road 96 with the Intel Core i5-9400 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5050 provides a comprehensive view of performance across three resolutions and four settings presets. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers the highest average frame rate at 178 FPS, followed by Medium at 131 FPS with a minimum and maximum of 111 and 150 FPS respectively. The High preset achieves 105 FPS average, while the Ultra preset drops to 82 FPS average. This resolution offers the most headroom, with all presets exceeding 60 FPS, making it suitable for high-refresh-rate displays even at Ultra settings.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset maintains a strong 114 FPS average, while Medium achieves 83 FPS with a range of 71 to 96 FPS. The High preset delivers 67 FPS average, which is still playable, but the Ultra preset falls to 53 FPS average. This resolution represents a good balance for the hardware, with Medium and Low providing smooth gameplay and High remaining viable for players who prefer visual quality over raw frame rate. The Ultra preset at 1440p is best suited for slower-paced segments of the game, as the 53 FPS average may cause noticeable dips during action sequences.

At 3840x2160, the Low preset achieves exactly 60 FPS average, which is the only preset at 4K to hit this target. The Medium preset follows with 44 FPS average and a minimum of 37 FPS, providing a playable experience with better visuals. The High preset drops to 35 FPS average, and the Ultra preset falls to 28 FPS average, making these settings less ideal for consistent gameplay. The frame rate breakdown clearly shows that 4K requires the Low or Medium presets for acceptable performance, while 1080p and 1440p offer more flexibility in settings selection.

The minimum and maximum frame rate data is only available for the Medium preset across all resolutions, with values of 111-150 FPS at 1080p, 71-96 FPS at 1440p, and 37-51 FPS at 4K. This data indicates that the Medium preset provides the most consistent frame delivery, with the minimum frame rates remaining relatively close to the averages. The absence of min/max data for other presets suggests that the Medium preset was the focus of detailed frame time analysis, likely due to its status as the recommended setting for this hardware combination. Overall, the measured FPS breakdown confirms that this system is capable of running Road 96 smoothly at 1080p and 1440p with medium-to-high settings, while 4K requires lower settings to maintain playable frame rates.