Rust

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Rust on this Intel Core i5-9400 + AMD Radeon RX 570 combination reveals a steep performance cliff as resolution increases. At 1080p with Low settings, the combo delivers 68.8 FPS, but dropping to 1440p Low yields 48.7 FPS, a 29% reduction. Moving to 4K Low further collapses performance to 29.5 FPS, which is 57% below the 1080p Low figure. This scaling pattern is characteristic of a system where the GPU becomes the primary bottleneck at higher pixel counts, especially given the RX 570's 4 GB GDDR5 memory and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth.

The gap between settings widens dramatically at 4K. At 3840x2160, the Low preset averages 29.5 FPS, while Medium drops to 19.1 FPS, High to 12.7 FPS, and Ultra to 12.8 FPS. The near-identical High and Ultra results at 4K (12.7 vs 12.8 FPS) suggest that beyond a certain quality threshold, the GPU is completely saturated — additional graphical fidelity makes no measurable difference because the rendering pipeline is already maxed out. This is a clear sign that the RX 570's 5.095 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 159.2 GTexel/s texture rate are insufficient for 4K operation in Rust at any playable quality level.

At 1440p, the situation improves but remains constrained. Low settings achieve 48.7 FPS, which is technically playable, but Medium (34.1 FPS), High (26.6 FPS), and Ultra (20.6 FPS) all fall below the 30 FPS threshold that most users consider a minimum for smooth gameplay. The scaling from 1080p to 1440p at High settings shows a 32% drop (39.2 to 26.6 FPS), indicating that even mid-range resolutions stress this GPU heavily under higher quality presets.

The 1080p results are the most revealing. Here, the combo shows a wide spread: Low hits 68.8 FPS, Medium achieves 47.0 FPS, High manages 39.2 FPS, and Ultra falls to 26.6 FPS. The fact that Ultra at 1080p (26.6 FPS) matches High at 1440p (26.6 FPS) exactly is noteworthy — it suggests the GPU is hitting a hard performance ceiling around that frame rate regardless of resolution, once the quality settings push the shader and texture workloads past a certain point. The CPU, with 6 cores and 6 threads running at a 4.10 GHz boost clock, appears capable of feeding the GPU at 1080p Low (68.8 FPS), but the RX 570's 2048 shading units and 32 ROPs become the limiting factor as resolution and quality rise.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average FPS this combo achieves in Rust?

A: The maximum measured average FPS is 68.8, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. This is the only configuration in the measured data that exceeds 60 FPS, and it represents a 134% improvement over the same resolution at Ultra settings (26.6 FPS).

Q: Is this system capable of 4K gaming in Rust?

A: No. At 3840x2160, the best average FPS is 29.5 with Low settings. Medium drops to 19.1, while High and Ultra both fall below 13 FPS. These results indicate the AMD Radeon RX 570, with its 4 GB GDDR5 memory and 256-bit bus, is not viable for 4K play in Rust at any preset.

Q: How does the CPU's core configuration impact Rust performance?

A: The Intel Core i5-9400 provides 6 cores and 6 threads with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and boost up to 4.10 GHz. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 7969 and single-core score of 1125 suggest sufficient headroom for this game, as evidenced by the 68.8 FPS at 1080p Low, where the GPU is likely the constraint rather than the processor.

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

A: At 2560x1440, High averages 26.6 FPS while Ultra averages 20.6 FPS, a 23% performance penalty for the Ultra preset. Given the relatively small visual difference between these presets in most games, the data suggests High is a more sensible target for this resolution.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations?

A: The combination ranks 1603 out of 1717 tested combos for Rust, placing it in the bottom 7% of all systems. This low ranking is consistent with the measured FPS data, which shows playable performance only at 1080p Low.

Q: Does the GPU show any advantage over its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RX 570 has an average benchmark score of 30158, which is 0.2% higher than the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 (30109) and 0.2% higher than the AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT (30097). However, these deltas are negligible and do not translate into meaningful real-world differences in Rust.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-9400 is a 6-core, 6-thread processor based on the Coffee Lake architecture, manufactured on a 14 nm process. It operates with a base clock of 2.90 GHz and a boost clock of 4.10 GHz, with 9 MB of shared L3 cache and 256 KB L2 per core. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 7969 and single-core score of 1125 place it at the 50th percentile among all CPUs, indicating mid-pack performance relative to the broader market.

In Rust, the CPU's role is most evident at lower resolutions and settings where the GPU is less stressed. At 1080p Low, the combo achieves 68.8 FPS, which is likely near the CPU's practical limit for this title given its 6-thread configuration. The i5-9400's nearest rivals — the Intel Core i3-10305 (avg score 2300, delta 0.2%) and Intel Core i3-1125G4 (avg score 2299, delta 0.2%) — are essentially identical in average benchmark score, suggesting that the CPU is not a differentiator here. The Intel Xeon E-2134 (2295, delta 0.4%) and Intel Core i7-8809G (2319, delta -0.6%) also sit within a narrow band, reinforcing that this processor's performance envelope is tightly clustered with its peers.

The absence of hyper-threading (6 cores, 6 threads) may be a limiting factor in Rust's multi-threaded rendering and physics workloads. However, the data shows that at higher resolutions (1440p and 4K), the FPS drops are driven primarily by GPU constraints — the RX 570's 4 GB memory and 150 W TDP limit its ability to handle increased pixel counts and texture loads. The i5-9400's 42.7 GB/s memory bandwidth and dual-channel DDR4 support are adequate for feeding the GPU, but the processor's 65 W TDP and 14 nm process node suggest it is not a high-end part.

The benchmark results indicate that the CPU can sustain frame delivery up to approximately 69 FPS in the best case (1080p Low), but the GPU cannot maintain comparable performance as quality settings rise. At 1080p Ultra, the FPS halves to 26.6, and at 4K Ultra it drops to 12.8. This pattern confirms that the RX 570, with its 5.095 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 32 ROPs, is the dominant bottleneck in this pairing. The CPU's 4.10 GHz boost clock and 9 MB L3 cache provide enough single-thread performance for Rust's core game logic, but the overall system is constrained by the GPU's mid-range capabilities.

Settings Recommendations

The measured FPS data provides a clear hierarchy of playable configurations. At 1920x1080, the Low preset delivers 68.8 FPS, which is the only setting that exceeds the 60 FPS target typically desired for smooth gameplay in a survival title like Rust. Medium at 1080p achieves 47.0 FPS, which is acceptable for casual play but may feel less responsive. High at 1080p drops to 39.2 FPS, and Ultra falls to 26.6 FPS — the latter is below the 30 FPS minimum for comfortable play.

For 2560x1440, the only viable option is Low at 48.7 FPS. Medium at 1440p (34.1 FPS) is borderline, while High (26.6 FPS) and Ultra (20.6 FPS) are not recommended for any gameplay scenario. At 3840x2160, no preset achieves a playable frame rate: Low is 29.5 FPS, Medium is 19.1, High is 12.7, and Ultra is 12.8. These 4K results are uniformly poor and indicate that this resolution should be avoided entirely with this hardware.

The data suggests that the best experience is achieved at 1080p with Low settings, which provides 68.8 FPS — a 46% improvement over 1080p Medium (47.0 FPS) and a 75% improvement over 1080p High (39.2 FPS). The trade-off between Low and Medium is substantial: moving from Low to Medium costs 21.8 FPS (a 32% reduction), which is a significant sacrifice for what is typically a modest visual improvement in Rust's low-detail environments. If visual quality is prioritized, Medium at 1080p (47.0 FPS) is the highest preset that maintains a frame rate above 45 FPS.

For users with 1440p displays, the recommendation is to play at Low settings (48.7 FPS) and accept the visual downgrade, as no other preset at this resolution approaches a smooth experience. The 1440p Medium result (34.1 FPS) is only 5.4 FPS above the 1080p Ultra result (26.6 FPS), which suggests that resolution scaling has a more significant impact on performance than quality presets once the GPU is under load. The RX 570's 4 GB memory and 224.0 GB/s bandwidth are insufficient for high-quality textures at 1440p and beyond.

How This Combo Ranks

This Intel Core i5-9400 + AMD Radeon RX 570 combination ranks 1603 out of 1717 tested combos for Rust, placing it in the 7th percentile of all systems. This is a low ranking that reflects the hardware's age and mid-range positioning: the CPU is at the 50th percentile among all processors, and the GPU is at the 74th percentile among all GPUs, but their combined performance in Rust is constrained by the GPU's limitations at higher resolutions and quality settings.

The RX 570's average benchmark score of 30158 places it in a tight cluster with its nearest rivals: the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 (30109, delta 0.2%), AMD Radeon RX 7700 XT (30097, delta 0.2%), NVIDIA Tesla M60 (29969, delta 0.6%), and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Mobile (29928, delta 0.8%). These deltas are all within 0.8% of the RX 570's score, indicating that the GPU's synthetic performance is statistically indistinguishable from these newer parts in aggregate benchmarks. However, Rust's measured FPS data shows that this theoretical parity does not translate to competitive real-world performance, as the combo's rank in-game is far below what the individual component percentiles might suggest.

The i5-9400's nearest CPU rivals (Core i3-10305 at 2300, Core i3-1125G4 at 2299, Xeon E-2134 at 2295, Core i7-8809G at 2319) all have average scores within 0.6% of the i5-9400's 2305. This clustering means the CPU is not a differentiator in this ranking — swapping to any of these near-identical processors would likely produce similar Rust results. The bottleneck is squarely the RX 570, which despite its 74th percentile GPU ranking, cannot deliver playable frame rates at 1440p or 4K with quality presets above Low.

The combo's rank of 1603 out of 1717 means that 93% of tested systems outperform it in Rust. This is consistent with the measured data: the system only achieves 60+ FPS at 1080p Low, and most modern gaming systems would be expected to handle 1080p Medium or High at similar or better frame rates. The RX 570's 5.095 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 4 GB memory are simply below the requirements for Rust's demanding rendering at higher settings. The GPU's 74th percentile ranking among all GPUs is misleading in this context because Rust appears to be particularly sensitive to memory capacity and bandwidth, where the 4 GB GDDR5 and 224.0 GB/s are limiting factors.