Control

The AMD Ryzen 5 5500 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 combination delivers a wide range of frame rates in Control, scaling predictably with resolution and preset. The dataset provides measured average FPS for every combination of three resolutions and four quality settings, with minimum and maximum values recorded only for Medium presets. At 1920x1080, the combo is overwhelmingly fast: Low settings produce an average of 185 FPS, Medium reaches 131 FPS with a minimum of 111 FPS and a maximum of 151 FPS, High averages 117 FPS, and Ultra remains fluid at 101 FPS. At 2560x1440, performance drops but stays comfortably high: Low averages 140 FPS, Medium averages 99 FPS with a range of 84 to 114 FPS, High averages 88 FPS, and Ultra still clears the playable threshold with an average of 77 FPS. At 3840x2160, the picture changes markedly. Low settings average 94 FPS, Medium averages 67 FPS with a minimum of 57 FPS and a maximum of 77 FPS, High averages exactly 60 FPS, and Ultra falls below the playable threshold to an average of 52 FPS. The only recorded frame-time variance comes from the Medium preset at each resolution, showing that the gap between minimum and maximum is roughly 20 FPS at both 1080p and 1440p, and exactly 20 FPS at 4K.

Measured FPS Breakdown

Starting at 1920x1080, the RTX 3080 paired with the Ryzen 5 5500 demonstrates that this game is not a challenge for the combination under any setting. The Low preset produces an average of 185 FPS, which is the highest figure in the entire measured dataset. Moving to Medium, the average drops to 131 FPS, with the measured minimum at 111 FPS and maximum at 151 FPS, indicating that even during demanding scenes the frame rate never approaches the 60 FPS playability floor. The High preset yields 117 FPS on average, while Ultra still delivers 101 FPS. All four presets at 1080p exceed the 60 FPS threshold by a wide margin, with the slowest preset (Ultra) still running 68% faster than the playable minimum.

At 2560x1440, the same pattern holds but with a noticeable step down in raw throughput. The Low preset averages 140 FPS, which is 45 FPS lower than the 1080p Low result. Medium averages 99 FPS, with a minimum of 84 FPS and a maximum of 114 FPS; the minimum is still 40% above the 60 FPS threshold. High averages 88 FPS, and Ultra averages 77 FPS. The transition from 1080p to 1440p costs roughly 24-30 FPS across the presets, which is a moderate penalty given the 78% increase in pixel count. No preset at this resolution dips below the playable threshold, and the gap between Low and Ultra is 63 FPS, showing that the GPU has substantial headroom even at the highest quality settings.

At 3840x2160, the narrative shifts from raw speed to careful tuning. Low settings still average 94 FPS, which is respectable, but the Medium preset drops to an average of 67 FPS with a minimum of 57 FPS and a maximum of 77 FPS. The minimum at 4K Medium falls below the 60 FPS threshold, indicating that while the average is playable, there are moments of stutter. High settings average exactly 60 FPS, placing it on the boundary of playability. Ultra averages 52 FPS, which is below the threshold and not recommended for smooth gameplay. The scaling from 1440p to 4K is steep: Low loses 46 FPS, Medium loses 32 FPS, High loses 28 FPS, and Ultra loses 25 FPS. This suggests that the game becomes increasingly GPU-bound at higher resolutions, with the RTX 3080's 10 GB of GDDR6X memory and 760.3 GB/s bandwidth being the limiting factors rather than the CPU.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen 5 5500 and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 ranks 1071 out of 3720 tested combos for Control. This puts the pair in the top 29% of all configurations tested, which is a strong showing for a CPU that sits at the 73rd percentile among all processors and a GPU that sits at the 68th percentile among all graphics cards. The rank reflects the balance between the two components: the Ryzen 5 5500 provides 6 cores and 12 threads at a boost clock of 4.20 GHz, while the RTX 3080 offers 8704 shading units and 68 ray tracing cores. For a game like Control, which is known for its physics-heavy environments and real-time ray tracing effects, the GPU's 29.77 TFLOPS of FP32 performance is the primary driver of the high frame rates observed.

The rank of 1071 out of 3720 means that 2649 other combinations tested faster than this one, but it also means that this combo outperforms the vast majority of systems. The nearest rival CPUs show how close the Ryzen 5 5500 is to other mid-range processors: the AMD Ryzen AI 5 430 scores 19617 in average benchmark score, just 0.1% higher; the Intel Core i5-12500 scores 19668, 0.4% higher; the Intel Core i7-10700F scores 19499, 0.5% lower; and the Intel Core i5-11600KF scores 19723, 0.7% higher. All of these deltas are within 1%, meaning that swapping the Ryzen 5 5500 for any of these CPUs would produce nearly identical frame rates in Control. On the GPU side, the nearest rivals are surprisingly different: the NVIDIA P106-100 scores 23249, 0.3% lower; the AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 scores 23250, 0.3% lower; the AMD Radeon RX 6600M scores 23273, 0.4% lower; and the AMD Radeon R9 M290X scores 23276, 0.4% lower. These deltas are also within 1%, suggesting that the RTX 3080's performance is closely matched by a diverse set of cards, though the P106-100 and R9 M290X are older architectures that would not support the same feature set.

FAQ

Q: Can this PC run Control at 4K Ultra settings?

A: No. At 3840x2160 with Ultra settings, the average FPS is 52, which falls below the 60 FPS playable threshold. The verdict data confirms that Ultra is not listed among the playable settings at 4K resolution.

Q: What is the best setting at 1440p for this combination?

A: At 2560x1440, all four presets are playable, and the best setting is Ultra with an average of 77 FPS. This is the most demanding preset that stays above the 60 FPS threshold.

Q: How much performance is lost when going from 1080p to 1440p?

A: The loss varies by preset. Low drops from 185 FPS to 140 FPS (a 45 FPS loss), Medium drops from 131 FPS to 99 FPS (a 32 FPS loss), High drops from 117 FPS to 88 FPS (a 29 FPS loss), and Ultra drops from 101 FPS to 77 FPS (a 24 FPS loss).

Q: Is the CPU or GPU more important for this game at 4K?

A: The data indicates that the GPU becomes the dominant factor at 4K. The average FPS drops from 94 at Low to 52 at Ultra, a 42 FPS swing, while the CPU's single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 score of 2319) remains constant. The steep scaling with settings at 4K points to GPU-bound performance.

Q: What is the minimum FPS recorded for this combination?

A: The only recorded minimum FPS values come from Medium settings: 111 FPS at 1080p, 84 FPS at 1440p, and 57 FPS at 4K. The 4K minimum falls below the 60 FPS threshold, indicating occasional stutter even though the average is 67 FPS.

Q: How does this combo rank against other tested systems?

A: It ranks 1071 out of 3720 tested combos, placing it in the top 29% of all configurations. This is a strong result given that the CPU and GPU individually sit at the 73rd and 68th percentiles respectively.

The Verdict

The verdict data is clear and unambiguous. This PC can run Control at 1920x1080 with every preset, including Ultra, which averages 101 FPS. At 2560x1440, the same holds true: all four presets clear the 60 FPS threshold, with Ultra averaging 77 FPS. At 3840x2160, the situation becomes more nuanced. The playable settings are High, Low, and Medium, with High being the best setting at exactly 60 FPS average. Ultra at 4K is not playable, averaging 52 FPS. The verdictByResolution field confirms this: at 3840x2160, the playable settings are High, Low, and Medium, with the best settings being High at 60 FPS; at 2560x1440, all settings are playable with Ultra at 77 FPS; and at 1920x1080, all settings are playable with Ultra at 101 FPS. For a 60 FPS target, the user can confidently run Ultra at 1080p and 1440p, and High at 4K. If the user prefers maximum quality over resolution, the 4K High setting is the ceiling for this combination.

Similar Performance Alternatives

Looking at the nearest rivals for the CPU, the AMD Ryzen 5 5500 is nearly identical in performance to several other processors in this game's context. The AMD Ryzen AI 5 430 has an average benchmark score 0.1% higher, the Intel Core i5-12500 is 0.4% higher, the Intel Core i7-10700F is 0.5% lower, and the Intel Core i5-11600KF is 0.7% higher. Any of these CPUs would produce effectively the same frame rates in Control when paired with the RTX 3080. The GPU side presents a more unusual set of alternatives. The NVIDIA P106-100, AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16, AMD Radeon RX 6600M, and AMD Radeon R9 M290X all have average benchmark scores within 0.4% of the RTX 3080. However, these cards are not direct equivalents in terms of features: the P106-100 is a mining-oriented card with no display outputs, the Radeon Pro Vega 16 is a mobile workstation GPU, and the R9 M290X is a much older architecture. In practice, a user looking for similar performance would find that the RX 6600M is the closest mobile alternative, while the desktop equivalents would likely be from the same generation as the RTX 3080. The data does not list a direct desktop rival with the same feature set, so the recommendation is to consider these deltas as indicative of raw performance rather than feature parity.

Best Settings per Resolution

At 1920x1080, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is Ultra, with an average of 101 FPS. This is the highest quality setting available, and the combo has 41 FPS of headroom above the threshold. At 2560x1440, the best setting is also Ultra, averaging 77 FPS, which provides 17 FPS of headroom. At 3840x2160, the best setting is High, averaging exactly 60 FPS. This leaves no headroom, so users who prioritize a consistent frame rate might prefer Medium at 4K, which averages 67 FPS with a minimum of 57 FPS; however, the verdict list includes High as the best playable setting. The data shows a clear pattern: at 1080p and 1440p, the combo can handle the absolute maximum quality; at 4K, the user must step down one tier from Ultra to High to maintain the 60 FPS target. The difference between Medium and High at 4K is 7 FPS on average, which is a modest trade-off for the visual uplift of High settings.

CPU and GPU Roles

The scaling between resolutions and presets reveals which component dominates Control's performance. At 1920x1080, the gap between Low (185 FPS) and Ultra (101 FPS) is 84 FPS, which is a 45% reduction in performance from the lowest to the highest preset. This large spread indicates that the GPU is heavily loaded even at 1080p, but the CPU is still keeping up with the demands of the game's physics and AI. At 2560x1440, the spread between Low (140 FPS) and Ultra (77 FPS) is 63 FPS, a 45% reduction, which is nearly identical to the 1080p scaling. This consistency suggests that the GPU is the primary bottleneck across these two resolutions, as the relative cost of higher settings is unchanged. At 3840x2160, the spread between Low (94 FPS) and Ultra (52 FPS) is 42 FPS, a 45% reduction as well. The percentage drop is remarkably consistent at all three resolutions, which points to a uniform GPU-bound scenario.

However, the absolute numbers tell a different story about CPU involvement. The Ryzen 5 5500's multi-threaded performance, as measured by Cinebench R23 at 16429, is more than sufficient for Control, which typically uses fewer than 8 threads. The CPU's single-core score of 2319 in Cinebench R23 is the more relevant metric for game performance, and the fact that the combo achieves 185 FPS at 1080p Low indicates that the CPU is not a limiting factor at that resolution. As resolution increases, the GPU takes on more work, and the CPU's role diminishes. The 4K results, where the average FPS drops to 52 at Ultra, show that the RTX 3080 is fully saturated, while the CPU has spare capacity. The data does not include CPU-specific frame rate measurements, but the consistent 45% performance penalty from Low to Ultra at every resolution strongly suggests that the GPU is the decisive component for this game, with the CPU providing adequate support without becoming a bottleneck.