To The Core

# To The Core with Intel Core i5-11400F + NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070

This combination of an Intel Core i5-11400F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 produces extremely high frame rates in To The Core, an idle genre title released on 2024-02-14. The measured data shows this pairing ranks 426th out of 1,756 tested combinations, placing it in the top quarter of all configurations. Across all three tested resolutions, every settings preset delivers well above 100 FPS on average, indicating that this hardware is far more than sufficient for the game's demands. The data reveals a system that never struggles to maintain smooth gameplay, even at 4K with Ultra settings, which is the most demanding configuration tested.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K follows a predictable pattern across all settings presets, but the magnitude of the drop reveals important information about where the bottleneck lies. At High settings, the average FPS falls from 316.9 at 1920x1080 to 215.4 at 2560x1440, a decline of 101.5 FPS, and then further to 119.9 at 3840x2160. This represents a 62% reduction from 1080p to 4K, which is a substantial scaling penalty. However, the absolute numbers remain so high that even the 4K result is nearly double the 60 FPS threshold.

Looking at the Low preset, the scaling is even more dramatic in absolute terms. The average FPS at 1080p is 430.8, dropping to 290.5 at 1440p and 165.7 at 4K. The 265.1 FPS difference between 1080p and 4K Low is the largest gap in the entire dataset. This large absolute drop, combined with the fact that the 1080p Low result is extraordinarily high, suggests that at lower resolutions the CPU is becoming the limiting factor. The i5-11400F, with its 6 cores and 12 threads, can only push so many frames per second, and at 1080p Low the GPU has plenty of headroom but the CPU ceiling is being approached.

The Medium preset shows a similar pattern: 366.1 FPS at 1080p, 247.3 at 1440p, and 140.7 at 4K. The Ultra preset produces 255.1 FPS at 1080p, 170 at 1440p, and 100.2 at 4K. The Ultra scaling from 1080p to 4K is a 60.8% reduction, which is slightly less severe than the Low preset's 61.5% reduction. This consistency across presets indicates that resolution scaling is primarily driven by pixel count rather than by specific settings changes. The data shows that as resolution increases, the GPU becomes more heavily utilized, and the frame rate drop becomes more pronounced relative to the CPU-bound lower resolutions.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-11400F is a 6-core, 12-thread processor from the Rocket Lake architecture, built on a 14 nm process. It has a base clock of 2.60 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz, with 12 MB of shared L3 cache. In synthetic benchmarks, this CPU achieves a single-thread score of 868 in 3DMark, a multi-thread score of 5,619 in the 16-thread test, and a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 14,372. Its average benchmark score of 17,181 places it at the 75th percentile of all CPUs, with nearest rivals including the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U at 17,189 (0% delta), the Intel Core i7-1260P at 17,212 (-0.2% delta), and the Intel Core Ultra 7 164U at 17,215 (-0.2% delta).

In To The Core, the CPU's role appears most significant at lower resolutions. The gap between 1080p Low (430.8 FPS) and 1440p Low (290.5 FPS) is 140.3 FPS, while the gap between 1440p Low and 4K Low is 124.8 FPS. These are relatively similar drops, which is unusual because typically the 1080p to 1440p transition should be smaller if the GPU is the primary constraint. The fact that the drop is nearly as large from 1080p to 1440p as from 1440p to 4K suggests that the CPU is contributing to the frame rate ceiling at 1080p.

The single-thread performance of 868 in 3DMark and 2,029 in Cinebench R23 is relevant because To The Core, as an idle genre game, likely relies heavily on a few threads for game logic and simulation updates. The boost clock of 4.40 GHz provides solid single-thread performance, but the data indicates that even this is a limiting factor at very high frame rates. The 430.8 FPS at 1080p Low is likely near the practical ceiling for this CPU in this game, as the GPU would be capable of rendering even more frames if the CPU could feed it faster.

FAQ

*Q: What is the highest average FPS recorded for this combo in To The Core?*

A: The highest average FPS is 430.8, achieved at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The next highest is 366.1 at 1080p Medium, followed by 316.9 at 1080p High.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in overall performance?

A: The i5-11400F has an average benchmark score of 17,181, which is essentially tied with the AMD Ryzen 7 5700U at 17,189 (0% delta). It is 0.2% behind the Intel Core i7-1260P and Intel Core Ultra 7 164U, and 0.2% ahead of the Intel Core i5-1240U.

Q: What is the lowest average FPS recorded for this combo?

A: The lowest average FPS is 100.2, recorded at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings. This is still well above 60 FPS, indicating that even the most demanding configuration tested remains highly playable.

Q: How much performance is lost when going from 1080p to 4K at High settings?

A: At High settings, the average FPS drops from 316.9 at 1080p to 119.9 at 4K, a reduction of 197 FPS, which is a 62.2% decrease. The 1440p result of 215.4 sits in between.

Q: Does the GPU's benchmark percentile indicate strong relative performance?

A: Yes, the RTX 4070 sits at the 81st percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 37,283. Its nearest rival is the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 at 37,507 (-0.6% delta), and it trails the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile by 2.2%.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Low settings produce 290.5 FPS while Ultra produces 170 FPS, a difference of 120.5 FPS. Ultra represents a 41.5% reduction in average FPS compared to Low at this resolution.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are 430.8 for Low, 366.1 for Medium, 316.9 for High, and 255.1 for Ultra. The progression from Low to Ultra shows a steady decline, with each settings tier costing approximately 50-60 FPS on average. The difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 175.7 FPS, which is the largest absolute gap between any two presets at the same resolution.

At 2560x1440, the results are 290.5 FPS for Low, 247.3 for Medium, 215.4 for High, and 170 for Ultra. The gap between Low and Ultra narrows to 120.5 FPS. The Medium preset at 1440p (247.3 FPS) is actually very close to the Ultra preset at 1080p (255.1 FPS), differing by only 7.8 FPS. This suggests that moving from 1080p Ultra to 1440p Medium costs only a small amount of performance while providing a significant resolution upgrade.

At 3840x2160, the results are 165.7 FPS for Low, 140.7 for Medium, 119.9 for High, and 100.2 for Ultra. The gap between Low and Ultra at 4K is 65.5 FPS. Notably, the 4K Low result (165.7 FPS) is nearly identical to the 1440p Ultra result (170 FPS), differing by only 4.3 FPS. This indicates that the GPU can handle 4K at Low settings as easily as 1440p at Ultra settings in terms of frame rate output.

Across all resolutions, the Ultra preset consistently delivers the lowest frame rates, while Low delivers the highest. The scaling from Low to Medium, Medium to High, and High to Ultra is fairly consistent, with each step costing roughly 15-20% of the previous frame rate. The data shows that at 1080p, even the lowest-performing preset (Ultra at 255.1 FPS) is more than four times the 60 FPS standard.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is built on the Ada Lovelace architecture using a 5 nm process at TSMC, with a die size of 294 mm² and 35,800 million transistors. It has a base clock of 1920 MHz and a boost clock of 2475 MHz, with 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus providing 504.2 GB/s of bandwidth. The GPU features 5,888 shading units, 184 texture mapping units, 64 ROPs, 46 ray tracing cores, and 184 tensor cores. Its FP32 performance is rated at 29.15 TFLOPS, with a pixel rate of 158.4 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 455.4 GTexel/s.

In synthetic benchmarks, the RTX 4070 achieves a Passmark G3D score of 26,927, a Geekbench OpenCL score of 168,006, and a Geekbench Vulkan score of 157,352. Its average benchmark score of 37,283 places it at the 81st percentile of all GPUs. The nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56 at 37,507 (-0.6% delta), the NVIDIA GeForce MX570 A at 38,008 (-1.9% delta), and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile at 38,135 (-2.2% delta).

In To The Core, the GPU's role becomes more prominent as resolution increases. At 4K, the frame rates range from 100.2 FPS at Ultra to 165.7 FPS at Low, showing that the GPU is still the dominant factor in determining performance. The 65.5 FPS difference between Low and Ultra at 4K is proportionally smaller than the 175.7 FPS difference at 1080p, indicating that at higher resolutions the GPU is more consistently utilized across all settings. The 12 GB of VRAM is more than sufficient for this game, as the data shows no signs of memory capacity limiting performance at any resolution or settings combination.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the Ultra preset at 2560x1440 delivers 170 FPS on average, which is an excellent balance of visual quality and performance. This configuration provides a substantial resolution improvement over 1080p while maintaining a frame rate that is nearly three times the 60 FPS standard. For users with 1440p displays, Ultra is the recommended preset, as the 170 FPS average leaves ample headroom for any frame rate fluctuations.

At 3840x2160, the High preset delivers 119.9 FPS, which is the best combination of visual fidelity and smoothness at 4K. The Ultra preset at 4K produces 100.2 FPS, which is still highly playable, but the 19.7 FPS gain from dropping from Ultra to High is relatively small compared to the visual difference. The Medium preset at 4K (140.7 FPS) is also a strong option for users who prioritize higher frame rates over maximum visual quality, offering a 40.5 FPS improvement over Ultra.

For 1080p users, the data shows that even the Ultra preset delivers 255.1 FPS, so there is no practical reason to lower settings for performance reasons. The choice between presets at 1080p should be based entirely on visual preference, as even the most demanding setting combination provides more than four times the refresh rate of a standard 60 Hz monitor. The Medium preset at 1080p (366.1 FPS) offers a middle ground, but the Ultra preset's 255.1 FPS is already so far beyond display capabilities that users should select the highest quality settings their display can support.