The Long Drive

The Long Drive, a driving simulation from 2019, presents an interesting case study for the Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 pairing. The benchmark data reveals a system that scales predictably with resolution, but with distinct bottlenecks emerging at different settings. This analysis examines the measured FPS across three resolutions and four quality presets to determine where this combo excels and where it falls short.

Resolution Scaling

The measured frame rates demonstrate a classic scaling curve from 1080p to 4K, though the shape of that curve changes dramatically depending on the quality preset. At Low settings, the system delivers 303.8 FPS at 1920x1080, dropping to 198.4 FPS at 2560x1440, and finally to 110.7 FPS at 3840x2160. This represents a 63.6% performance retention from 1080p to 4K, indicating that even at low graphical loads, the GPU is beginning to feel the pressure of higher pixel counts.

The Medium preset shows a similar pattern but with a steeper decline. Starting at 252 FPS in 1080p, the frame rate falls to 162.7 FPS at 1440p and 89.3 FPS at 4K. The gap between 1080p and 4K here is 64.6% of the original performance, suggesting that the additional shading work at Medium settings is more heavily taxing the GPU's resources. High settings continue this trend, with 157.5 FPS at 1080p, 99.7 FPS at 1440p, and 59.8 FPS at 4K—a retention of just 38% from the lowest to highest resolution tested.

Ultra settings reveal the most pronounced scaling penalty. The system manages 106.7 FPS at 1080p, which is still highly playable, but this falls to 72.8 FPS at 1440p and just 40.6 FPS at 4K. The 4K Ultra result is particularly telling: it sits just below the 60 FPS threshold that most users consider the baseline for smooth gameplay. This steep drop-off suggests that at Ultra settings, the RTX 5070's 12 GB of GDDR7 memory and 192-bit bus are being pushed to their limits, with the GPU becoming the clear limiting component.

The data indicates that at 1080p, the CPU is frequently the bottleneck, especially at lower settings where the GPU has headroom to spare. The jump from Low to Medium at 1080p costs only 51.8 FPS, but the jump from Medium to High costs 94.5 FPS, implying that the GPU starts to take over as the primary constraint even at this resolution. At 4K, the CPU's role diminishes significantly, with the GPU's raw throughput determining the final frame rates across all settings.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070, based on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture, provides the graphical muscle for this combo. Its 6144 shading units and 80 ROPs are supported by a boost clock of 2512 MHz, which helps explain the strong performance at lower resolutions. The card's 12 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 192-bit bus delivers 672.0 GB/s of bandwidth, a figure that proves adequate for The Long Drive's open-world environments at 1440p but shows strain at 4K Ultra.

The GPU's benchmark scores place it in the 83rd percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 41687. Its nearest rivals in the database include the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090, which scores 41441, putting the RTX 5070 just 0.6% ahead. This close margin explains why the 5070 can handle 1440p High at 99.7 FPS with ease, yet struggles to maintain 60 FPS at 4K Ultra. The pixel rate of 201.0 GPixel/s and texture rate of 482.3 GTexel/s are the specs that determine how quickly the GPU can fill the screen with detailed textures.

At 4K Ultra, the 40.6 FPS result is 32.1% below the 4K High figure of 59.8 FPS. This performance cliff suggests that the Ultra preset introduces effects that are particularly demanding on the memory subsystem. The 672.0 GB/s bandwidth, while respectable, becomes a limiting factor when the render target size quadruples from 1080p to 4K. The GPU's 30.87 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is sufficient for the simulation's physics and rendering, but the memory bandwidth is the constraint that prevents higher frame rates at 4K.

The RTX 5070's 48 RT cores and 192 tensor cores are present but appear underutilized in this particular title, given that The Long Drive from 2019 does not emphasize ray-traced effects. The card's DirectX 12 Ultimate support and 12_2 feature level ensure compatibility, but the game's engine likely relies on more traditional rasterization paths. This is reflected in the benchmark results, where the GPU's raw fill rate and memory bandwidth are the dominant factors in determining performance.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-13400F brings 10 cores and 16 threads to the pairing, with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.60 GHz. This Raptor Lake-S architecture, built on Intel's 10 nm process, provides the computational foundation for the game's simulation logic. The CPU's 20 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB per-core L2 cache help maintain smooth frame pacing, particularly at lower resolutions where the GPU is not the bottleneck.

The CPU's benchmark results show strong multi-threaded performance, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 21279 and a single-core score of 3004. The PassMark multithread score of 25032 and single-thread score of 3634 confirm that the 13400F is well-balanced for gaming workloads. Its percentile ranking of 82 against all CPUs places it in the upper tier of processors, with nearest rivals like the Intel Core i7-13620H scoring 25201 (0.1% ahead) and the AMD Ryzen 5 5600X3D scoring 25365 (0.5% behind).

At 1080p Low, the 303.8 FPS result indicates that the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU with a massive number of frames. The 3DMark 16-thread score of 7314 and single-thread score of 960 demonstrate that the CPU can handle both the game's main thread and background simulation tasks. However, the 1080p Ultra result of 106.7 FPS suggests that as graphical load increases, the CPU's role diminishes, and the GPU becomes the limiting factor.

The CPU's 65 W TDP and dual-channel memory support (DDR4 and DDR5) make it a flexible partner for the RTX 5070. The 16 PCIe Gen 5 lanes ensure that the GPU has full bandwidth available for data transfers. In this game, the CPU's performance headroom at 1440p is evident: the 198.4 FPS Low result shows that even at this resolution, the CPU is not the primary constraint, allowing the GPU to stretch its legs.

How This Combo Ranks

In the database of tested hardware combinations for The Long Drive, this pairing of the Intel Core i5-13400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 holds a rank of 313 out of 1734 total combos. This places it in the top 18% of all tested systems, indicating a strong overall performance level. The ranking reflects the balanced nature of this setup: the CPU and GPU are well-matched for most gaming scenarios, with neither component dramatically outpacing the other.

The combo's position in the rankings is supported by the measured frame rates across the test matrix. At 1080p, the system is capable of exceeding 300 FPS at Low settings, which puts it in the upper echelon of systems for competitive play. At 1440p, the 162.7 FPS Medium result and 99.7 FPS High result demonstrate that this is a sweet spot for the combo, offering high refresh rate gaming without compromising visual quality.

The 4K results, while playable at High settings with 59.8 FPS, show the combo's limitations. The 40.6 FPS at Ultra is below the 60 FPS target that many users prefer, and this likely contributes to the rank of 313 rather than a higher position. The 1734 total combos include systems with more powerful GPUs or CPUs that can push 4K Ultra past 60 FPS, so this combo's rank reflects its status as a high-end 1080p and 1440p performer, with adequate 4K capability.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average frame rate this combo achieves in The Long Drive?

A: The highest measured average FPS is 303.8 at 1920x1080 with Low settings.

Q: Can this system maintain 60 FPS at 4K resolution?

A: Yes, but only at High settings, where it achieves 59.8 FPS. At Medium settings it reaches 89.3 FPS, but at Ultra settings it drops to 40.6 FPS.

Q: How does the RTX 5070 compare to its nearest rival in benchmark scores?

A: The RTX 5070 has an average benchmark score of 41687, which is 0.6% ahead of the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090's score of 41441.

Q: What is the CPU's single-thread performance in Cinebench R23?

A: The Intel Core i5-13400F scores 3004 in Cinebench R23 single-core, which contributes to its 82nd percentile ranking among all CPUs.

Q: What memory bandwidth does the GPU provide?

A: The RTX 5070's 12 GB GDDR7 memory on a 192-bit bus delivers 672.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

Q: Where does this combo rank among all tested combos in this game?

A: This pairing ranks 313 out of 1734 total tested combos, placing it in the top 18% of all systems.