Undisputed

# Undisputed with AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D + Intel Arc B390

The pairing of AMD's Ryzen 7 9800X3D with Intel's Arc B390 creates a striking imbalance in Undisputed, a boxing simulation where frame pacing matters more than flashy effects. The data shows a processor capable of 23,230 in Cinebench R23 multi-core paired with a graphics solution scoring just 1,482 in 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, placing this combo at rank 2,491 out of 2,813 tested configurations. This is not a balanced system; it is a CPU-bound powerhouse shackled to an integrated graphics unit that sits in the 9th percentile of all GPUs, with nearest rivals including the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX and GT 710. The measured FPS numbers across resolutions and settings tell a story of a GPU struggling to keep pace with what the 8-core, 16-thread Zen 5 processor can feed it.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS drop from 1080p to 4K is dramatic and reveals where the bottleneck lives. At Low settings, the system delivers 127 FPS at 1920x1080, drops to 92 FPS at 2560x1440, and falls further to 58 FPS at 3840x2160. That is a 54% reduction from 1080p to 4K at Low settings, a scaling pattern that points squarely at the graphics processor. The Arc B390, with its 7.680 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 60.00 GPixel/s pixel rate, simply cannot sustain high frame rates as pixel count multiplies. At Medium settings, the same trend appears: 91 FPS at 1080p, 66 FPS at 1440p, and 42 FPS at 4K. The 1440p to 4K transition at Medium cuts performance by 36%, while the 1080p to 1440p step costs 27%. This is not linear scaling; the GPU's memory bandwidth, listed as "System Dependent" since the card uses shared system memory, becomes a limiting factor at higher resolutions.

High settings amplify the problem. The 1080p result of 76 FPS drops to 55 FPS at 1440p and 35 FPS at 4K, a 54% total loss from the lowest tested resolution to the highest. Ultra settings are nearly unplayable at 4K, with an average of 22 FPS, and even at 1080p Ultra only reaches 49 FPS. The scaling from 1080p Ultra to 4K Ultra represents a 55% performance collapse. What is telling is that the percentage drop between resolutions is relatively consistent across settings—around 27-28% from 1080p to 1440p and another 36-37% from 1440p to 4K at Medium—which indicates a purely pixel-throughput bound situation. The CPU is not the constraint here. A 4.70 GHz base and 5.20 GHz boost clock on the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, combined with 96 MB of shared L3 cache, means the processor can prepare frames far faster than the Arc B390 can render them. The resolution scaling data suggests that this game, at these settings, is exclusively limited by the integrated GPU's ability to fill pixels and shade geometry.

GPU Role

The Intel Arc B390 is an integrated graphics processor based on the Xe3-LPG architecture, built on Intel's 3 nm process. Its role in this system is defined by extreme resource sharing: memory size, memory type, and memory bus width are all listed as "System Shared," with bandwidth described as "System Dependent." This means the GPU borrows from the same DDR5 memory pool the CPU uses, a design choice that creates contention under load. The base clock of 300 MHz and boost clock of 2500 MHz show a wide dynamic range, but the 24 ROPs and 48 TMUs are modest for handling modern sports titles at high resolutions. The 12 ray tracing cores and 1,536 shading units are present, but the 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1,482 places this GPU in the 9th percentile among all GPUs, just 1.3% above the NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX.

In Undisputed, the GPU's limitations manifest as a hard ceiling on achievable frame rates. At 1080p Low, the 127 FPS average is respectable, but the 78 FPS minimum at 1080p Medium (with a 105 FPS maximum) shows inconsistency in frame delivery. The measured data includes min/max only for Medium settings: at 1080p, 78-105 FPS; at 1440p, 56-76 FPS; and at 4K, 36-48 FPS. These ranges indicate the GPU's shared memory architecture causes hitches when the system needs to move data between CPU and GPU workloads. The 7.680 TFLOPS FP32 performance is adequate for lighter loads, but the 80 W TDP and lack of dedicated VRAM mean the chip thermally and bandwidth-limited under sustained gaming. The pixel rate of 60.00 GPixel/s sounds reasonable on paper, but at 4K with 8.3 million pixels per frame, that rate translates to only 44 frames per second theoretical maximum—and the measured 35 FPS at High settings is close to that ceiling, confirming the GPU is the sole limiting component.

FAQ

Q: Why does the FPS drop so significantly from 1080p to 4K?

A: The Arc B390's pixel rate of 60.00 GPixel/s and system-shared memory bandwidth create a hard scaling limit. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 127 FPS, but at 4K Low it falls to 58 FPS—a 54% reduction. The GPU's 24 ROPs simply cannot fill 4K pixels as quickly, and the shared memory architecture adds latency.

Q: Is the Ryzen 7 9800X3D holding this system back?

A: No. The CPU's benchmarks—23,230 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2,080 in single-core—are far above what this game needs. The GPU ranks in the 9th percentile of all GPUs, while the CPU sits in the 87th percentile, making it clear the processor is not the bottleneck.

Q: What settings provide the most balanced experience?

A: At 1080p Medium, the system delivers 91 FPS average with a 78 FPS minimum, which is the highest frame rate with a playable minimum. At 1440p Medium, the 66 FPS average with a 56 FPS minimum is acceptable, but 4K Medium's 42 FPS average drops below smooth thresholds.

Q: How does this combo compare to other tested systems?

A: This combo ranks 2,491 out of 2,813 tested configurations, placing it in the bottom 11% of all combos. The GPU's nearest rivals—NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX, GT 625 OEM, and GT 710—are all over a decade old, indicating the graphics performance is the primary weakness.

Q: Is Ultra settings ever viable with this hardware?

A: Only at 1080p, where the average FPS is 49. At 1440p Ultra, it drops to 35 FPS, and at 4K Ultra it reaches just 22 FPS. The GPU's 7.680 TFLOPS FP32 throughput is insufficient for Ultra presets at higher resolutions.

Q: Why does the GPU have no dedicated memory?

A: The Arc B390 is an integrated graphics processor (IGP) with a slot width listed as "IGP" and power connectors listed as "None." It uses system-shared memory, which means bandwidth is "System Dependent" and varies with the CPU's memory load.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data provides a clear hierarchy for playability. At 1080p, Low settings give 127 FPS, Medium gives 91 FPS, High gives 76 FPS, and Ultra gives 49 FPS. The sweet spot is Medium at 1080p, because it maintains a 78 FPS minimum (the only resolution where the minimum stays above 60 FPS at Medium) while offering substantially better visual quality than Low. The 78-105 FPS range at 1080p Medium shows acceptable frame pacing for a sports title, where consistent timing is more important than peak rates. At 1440p, Medium settings yield 66 FPS average with 56 FPS minimum—borderline but playable if the user tolerates occasional dips. High settings at 1440p drop to 55 FPS average, and Ultra at 1440p falls to 35 FPS, which is too choppy for a timing-based boxing game.

The 4K results are uniformly poor across all settings: Low achieves 58 FPS, Medium 42 FPS, High 35 FPS, and Ultra 22 FPS. Given that even Low settings at 4K cannot match the smoothness of Medium at 1080p, the recommendation is to avoid 4K entirely with this GPU. The data indicates the best experience per measured row is 1080p Medium, which balances the 91 FPS average against the 78 FPS floor. If visual fidelity is a priority, 1080p High at 76 FPS is acceptable, but the jump from Medium to High costs 15 FPS while offering diminishing returns on a GPU with only 24 ROPs. For competitive or timing-sensitive play, 1080p Low at 127 FPS provides the highest headroom, but the visual sacrifices are significant given the Arc B390's modest shading capabilities.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo rank of 2,491 out of 2,813 tested combinations places this system in the bottom 11.4% of all configurations tested for Undisputed. This is a surprisingly poor ranking given the CPU's strength, but it makes sense when examining the GPU's percentile. The Arc B390's 9th percentile standing among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of just 1,482, is the dominant factor in this ranking. The CPU, by contrast, achieves an average benchmark score of 39,768 with an 87th percentile rank, meaning the processor is performing in the top 13% of all CPUs while the GPU is in the bottom 9%. This 78-point percentile gap creates a system where the CPU's potential is almost entirely wasted in gaming workloads. The nearest CPU rivals—AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 8840HS (0.4% higher score), AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 (0.7% lower), and AMD Ryzen 7 7700 (0.8% lower)—are all within 1% of the 9800X3D's average score, showing that the CPU is well within normal performance territory for its class.

The GPU's nearest rivals are even more telling. The NVIDIA GeForce GT 520MX scores 1,463 (1.3% lower), the GeForce 800M scores 1,460 (1.5% lower), and the GT 625 OEM scores 1,446 (2.5% lower). These are entry-level discrete GPUs from over a decade ago, yet the Arc B390 only beats them by single-digit percentages. In Undisputed, this translates to the measured FPS numbers: the system cannot break 50 FPS at 4K High, and even at 1080p High it only reaches 76 FPS. The rank of 2,491 makes sense when considering that most of the 2,813 tested combos likely pair similar CPUs with dedicated graphics cards that have dedicated VRAM and higher fill rates. The data implies that the CPU is not the differentiator in this game; the GPU is, and this GPU is positioned near the bottom of the performance spectrum.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete measured FPS dataset for this combo in Undisputed is as follows. At 3840x2160 (4K): Low settings average 58 FPS; Medium settings average 42 FPS with a minimum of 36 and maximum of 48; High settings average 35 FPS; Ultra settings average 22 FPS. At 2560x1440 (1440p): Low settings average 92 FPS; Medium settings average 66 FPS with a minimum of 56 and maximum of 76; High settings average 55 FPS; Ultra settings average 35 FPS. At 1920x1080 (1080p): Low settings average 127 FPS; Medium settings average 91 FPS with a minimum of 78 and maximum of 105; High settings average 76 FPS; Ultra settings average 49 FPS.

The min/max data points, available only for Medium settings, reveal the frame pacing characteristics. At 1080p Medium, the 78 FPS minimum and 105 FPS maximum represent a 27 FPS spread—about 30% variance from the 91 FPS average, indicating noticeable frame rate fluctuations. At 1440p Medium, the spread is 20 FPS (56 to 76), which is a 30% variance from the 66 FPS average, showing similar instability. At 4K Medium, the spread narrows to 12 FPS (36 to 48), a 29% variance from 42 FPS, suggesting the GPU is so heavily bottlenecked that frame delivery becomes more consistent but at a low level. The missing min/max data for Low, High, and Ultra settings means we cannot assess frame pacing for those presets, but the averages alone tell a story of diminishing returns: from 1080p Low to 4K Ultra, the FPS drops from 127 to 22, a 83% reduction. The scaling from Low to Ultra at each resolution shows the GPU's limits: at 1080p, Ultra is 61% slower than Low (49 vs 127 FPS); at 1440p, Ultra is 62% slower (35 vs 92 FPS); and at 4K, Ultra is 62% slower (22 vs 58 FPS). This consistent 61-62% penalty for Ultra over Low across all resolutions confirms the GPU's shading units and ROPs are the limiting factor, not the CPU or memory subsystem.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D brings substantial processing power to this pairing, but the data shows it is largely underutilized in Undisputed. With 8 cores and 16 threads based on the Zen 5 architecture (Granite Ridge), running at 4.70 GHz base and 5.20 GHz boost clocks, the CPU delivers 23,230 in Cinebench R23 multi-core and 2,080 in single-core. The 96 MB of shared L3 cache, a hallmark of the X3D series, provides ample capacity for game data, though this game appears to not stress it. The 3DMark multi-threaded scores—10,081 for 16 threads, 8,252 for 8 threads, and 4,669 for 4 threads—show excellent scaling, but the game's FPS numbers do not reflect this capability. At 1080p Low, where CPU load is typically highest relative to GPU load, the system reaches 127 FPS, but at 1080p Ultra, it drops to 49 FPS. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect the FPS to remain relatively constant as settings increase, with only GPU-heavy effects causing variation. Instead, the FPS drops by 61% from Low to Ultra, proving the GPU is saturated.

The CPU's nearest rivals in benchmark scores—the Ryzen 7 PRO 8840HS (39,603, 0.4% higher), Ryzen AI 9 365 (40,048, 0.7% lower), and Ryzen 7 7700 (40,081, 0.8% lower)—are all within 1% of the 9800X3D's 39,768 average, indicating this processor is typical for its class. Yet in Undisputed, the combo ranks 2,491 out of 2,813, meaning systems with similar CPUs but better GPUs vastly outperform this configuration. The CPU's single-thread performance (2,080 in Cinebench R23 single-core, 1,212 in 3DMark single-thread) is more than sufficient for a sports game's physics and AI calculations. The 89.6 GB/s memory bandwidth and dual-channel DDR5 support are also ample. The data suggests the CPU's role is to feed frames as fast as the GPU can render them, and in this case, the GPU's 7.680 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 60.00 GPixel/s pixel rate are the definitive constraints. The Ryzen 7 9800X3D is essentially idling in this game, waiting for the Arc B390 to catch up—a scenario where the CPU's 120 W TDP and 4 nm process efficiency are wasted on a workload that never exceeds the GPU's modest capabilities.