The Long Drive

The Intel Core i7-13700K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 delivers exceptional performance in The Long Drive, ranking 11th out of 1,734 tested combinations. This places the combo in the top 1% of all systems, with benchmark data showing that the RTX 5090’s massive 32 GB VRAM and 1.79 TB/s bandwidth are the primary drivers of high-refresh-rate gameplay, while the 16-core i7-13700K provides sufficient headroom to avoid bottlenecking at lower resolutions. The measured results reveal a system capable of 397.4 FPS at 1080p Low settings, yet one that demands careful settings management at 4K Ultra, where framerates drop to 52.1 FPS.

FAQ

Q: What is the highest average framerate recorded for this combo in The Long Drive?

A: The peak measured performance is 397.4 FPS at 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings. This demonstrates the system’s ability to push far beyond typical 144Hz displays when graphical fidelity is minimized.

Q: How does the RTX 5090’s memory configuration impact 4K performance?

A: The 32 GB GDDR7 memory on a 512-bit bus provides 1.79 TB/s of bandwidth. At 3840x2160, this enables 147.6 FPS on Low settings, though Ultra settings reduce this to 52.1 FPS, indicating that raw compute rather than memory bandwidth becomes the limiting factor at maximum quality.

Q: What is the CPU’s multi-threaded capability relative to its direct competitor?

A: The i7-13700K scores 47,282 in the average benchmark, which is statistically identical to the Core i7-13700KF at 47,334, showing a negligible 0.1% difference. This suggests the K and KF variants perform equivalently in gaming workloads.

Q: Which resolution provides the best balance of framerate and visual quality?

A: At 2560x1440 with High settings, the combo achieves 138.1 FPS, which comfortably exceeds 120Hz refresh rates while maintaining higher fidelity than the 267.8 FPS Low preset. This represents the most balanced configuration for competitive play.

Q: How does the GPU’s benchmark score compare to its nearest rival?

A: The RTX 5090 scores 84,306 in average benchmarks, sitting just 0.1% above the RTX 5090 D (84,241) and 0.2% above the RTX 5050 Mobile (84,171). The differences are within measurement noise, indicating near-identical compute performance across these variants.

Q: What is the framerate cost of moving from Medium to Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Medium settings deliver 222.6 FPS, while Ultra drops to 95.5 FPS. This represents a 57% reduction in framerate, showing that Ultra presets impose a severe performance penalty that may not justify the visual gains.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 is the dominant component in this pairing, with its 32 GB of GDDR7 memory and 512-bit bus providing a 1.79 TB/s memory bandwidth that proves critical for The Long Drive’s open-world rendering. The GPU’s boost clock of 2407 MHz and 104.8 TFLOPS of FP32 compute deliver the raw throughput needed for high-resolution textures and physics calculations inherent to a driving simulation. Data confirms the GPU’s influence: at 1080p Low, the system reaches 397.4 FPS, but at 4K Ultra, it falls to 52.1 FPS, a 7.6x reduction that correlates with the 4x pixel increase plus the added shader complexity of Ultra settings.

The GPU’s 94th percentile ranking among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 84,306, places it among the fastest consumer graphics cards available. Its nearest rival, the RTX 5090 D, scores only 0.1% higher (84,241), confirming that the standard 5090 delivers essentially identical performance. The 170 RT cores and 21,760 shading units provide ample geometry and lighting capacity, though the measured data suggests that The Long Drive’s Ultra preset stresses the GPU’s compute units more than its memory subsystem, given the steep 52.1 FPS result at 4K despite the massive bandwidth available.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i7-13700K contributes stable, high-frequency processing with 16 cores and 24 threads, boosting up to 5.40 GHz. Its Raptor Lake architecture, built on a 10 nm process, delivers a 3DMark max-threads score of 12,412 and a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 39,000, indicating robust multi-threaded capability for handling game logic, physics, and AI in The Long Drive. The CPU’s 93rd percentile ranking among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 47,282, shows it performs within 0.5% of the AMD Ryzen 9 PRO 5945 (47,527) and 0.4% ahead of the Intel Core i9-12900F (47,081).

At lower resolutions, the CPU’s role becomes more pronounced. The jump from 267.8 FPS at 1440p Low to 397.4 FPS at 1080p Low (a 48% increase) suggests that the i7-13700K’s single-thread performance, evidenced by a 3DMark single-thread score of 1,136 and PassMark single-thread score of 4,333, is sufficient to feed the RTX 5090 even at extreme framerates. However, the CPU’s 24 threads and 30 MB of shared L3 cache prevent any measurable bottleneck, as the data shows consistent scaling from 1080p to 1440p across all settings, confirming that the GPU remains the primary constraint in most configurations.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data strongly favors Medium settings as the optimal experience across resolutions. At 1080p, Medium delivers 339.6 FPS compared to 397.4 FPS on Low (a 15% reduction) while providing substantially better visual quality. At 1440p, Medium achieves 222.6 FPS, which is 117% higher than Ultra’s 95.5 FPS and 61% higher than High’s 138.1 FPS, making it the clear choice for high-refresh-rate monitors. Even at 4K, Medium maintains 126.1 FPS, which is 142% faster than Ultra’s 52.1 FPS and only 17% slower than Low’s 147.6 FPS.

High settings offer a middle ground, providing 211.1 FPS at 1080p and 138.1 FPS at 1440p, though the jump from Medium to High costs roughly 35-38% performance at each resolution. Ultra settings are not recommended for competitive play, as the 52.1 FPS at 4K and 95.5 FPS at 1440p fall below the 100 FPS threshold that many driving simulation enthusiasts prefer. The data indicates that Medium provides the best balance of visual fidelity and framerate stability, with no configuration showing a disproportionate performance cliff between Low and Medium.

How This Combo Ranks

This combination ranks 11th out of 1,734 tested systems in The Long Drive, placing it in the top 0.6% of all configurations. This ranking reflects the synergy between the i7-13700K’s high single-thread performance and the RTX 5090’s extreme compute capabilities. The CPU’s average benchmark score of 47,282 is 93% above the average of all CPUs, while the GPU’s 84,306 average score is 94% above the average of all GPUs, indicating that neither component drags the other down.

The rank of 11 out of 1,734 suggests that only a handful of combinations, likely featuring newer or more specialized hardware, outperform this pairing. The GPU’s nearest rivals, including the RTX 5090 D (0.1% faster) and RTX 5050 Mobile (0.2% faster), show that the 5090 is at the pinnacle of consumer GPU performance. The CPU’s position, with the i7-13700KF performing 0.1% faster and the Ryzen 9 PRO 5945 performing 0.5% faster, confirms that the 13700K is not a limiting factor in this ranking.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers 397.4 FPS on Low, 339.6 FPS on Medium, 211.1 FPS on High, and 146.5 FPS on Ultra. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a 63% reduction in framerate, with the largest single drop (38%) occurring between Medium and High. At 2560x1440, performance scales to 267.8 FPS on Low, 222.6 FPS on Medium, 138.1 FPS on High, and 95.5 FPS on Ultra. The Medium-to-High transition again causes the steepest decline at 38%, mirroring the 1080p pattern.

At 3840x2160, the results are 147.6 FPS on Low, 126.1 FPS on Medium, 78.8 FPS on High, and 52.1 FPS on Ultra. The 4K data shows a more gradual decline between Low and Medium (15%) compared to higher resolutions, but the High to Ultra drop of 34% remains significant. Across all resolutions, the Low-to-Medium transition costs only 10-17% performance, while Medium-to-High costs 35-38%, and High-to-Ultra costs 31-34%, indicating that the Medium preset is the most efficient settings tier.

Resolution Scaling

Moving from 1920x1080 to 2560x1440 reduces framerates by 33% on Low (397.4 to 267.8 FPS), 34% on Medium (339.6 to 222.6 FPS), 35% on High (211.1 to 138.1 FPS), and 35% on Ultra (146.5 to 95.5 FPS). This consistent 33-35% reduction across all settings indicates that the GPU is the limiting factor, as the pixel count increases by 78% but performance drops by only a third, suggesting that the RTX 5090’s bandwidth and compute scale efficiently with resolution.

The transition from 2560x1440 to 3840x2160 shows a more pronounced effect: framerates drop by 45% on Low (267.8 to 147.6 FPS), 43% on Medium (222.6 to 126.1 FPS), 43% on High (138.1 to 78.8 FPS), and 45% on Ultra (95.5 to 52.1 FPS). The 4K resolution, with 2.25x the pixels of 1440p, causes a larger relative performance decline, pointing to the GPU’s shading units and RT cores becoming more saturated. The CPU’s influence diminishes at 4K, as evidenced by the similar percentage drops across all settings, confirming that the RTX 5090’s 104.8 TFLOPS compute is the primary constraint at higher resolutions, while the i7-13700K’s 5.40 GHz boost clock provides ample headroom even at 1080p’s extreme framerates.