Control

FAQ

Q: What is the maximum playable preset at 4K with this combination?

A: At 3840x2160, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is High, which delivers an average of 60 FPS. Ultra falls below the threshold at 52 FPS.

Q: Does the RTX 3080 bottleneck the Ryzen 7 3700X in this game?

A: The data shows a clear GPU-bound pattern. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 177 FPS, while at 4K Ultra it drops to 52 FPS. The CPU, with its 16 threads and Zen 2 architecture, provides enough headroom at lower resolutions, but the GPU workload scales heavily with resolution.

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

A: At Ultra settings, the average FPS drops from 101 at 1920x1080 to 77 at 2560x1440, then to 52 at 3840x2160. That is a 49% reduction from 1080p to 4K.

Q: Which resolution offers the best balance of visual quality and frame rate?

A: The recorded data indicates that 2560x1440 at Ultra is the strongest combination, with an average of 77 FPS. This clears the 60 FPS threshold while using the highest preset available.

Q: Is the frame rate stable at Medium settings across all resolutions?

A: Medium settings produce average FPS of 131 at 1080p, 99 at 1440p, and 67 at 4K. The minimum recorded FPS at Medium are 111 at 1080p, 84 at 1440p, and 57 at 4K, meaning 4K Medium can dip slightly below 60 FPS.

Q: How does this combo rank among all tested combinations for Control?

A: The combination ranks 1114 out of 3720 tested combos, placing it in the upper portion of the database for this game.

CPU and GPU Roles

The benchmark results for Control show a system that shifts from CPU-bound to GPU-bound as resolution increases. At 1920x1080 Low, the combination produces 177 FPS, which is a strong indicator that the Ryzen 7 3700X is feeding the RTX 3080 effectively. The 8-core, 16-thread Zen 2 processor with a boost clock of 4.40 GHz is more than capable of handling the game's logic at lower resolutions.

At 4K, the GPU becomes the dominant factor. The RTX 3080, with 8704 shading units and 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus, must process significantly more pixels. The transition from 1080p Low to 4K Low shows a drop from 177 FPS to 94 FPS, a 47% reduction. This scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU-limited scenario, as the CPU workload per frame does not increase proportionally with pixel count.

The gap between Low and Ultra presets also widens with resolution. At 1080p, the difference between Low and Ultra is 76 FPS (177 to 101). At 1440p, the gap is 63 FPS (140 to 77). At 4K, the gap narrows to 42 FPS (94 to 52). This narrowing suggests that at 4K, the GPU is saturated even at Low settings, leaving less headroom for additional visual effects.

The RTX 3080's 68 RT cores and 272 tensor cores are relevant for Control's real-time ray tracing and DLSS features, though the measured FPS data in this database entry does not isolate those effects. The 29.77 TFLOPS FP32 throughput and 760.3 GB/s memory bandwidth give the card substantial raw compute, but the 10 GB frame buffer may become a constraint at 4K Ultra with high-resolution textures.

The CPU's performance metrics, including a Cinebench R15 multicore score of 2092 and a Geekbench multicore score of 8899, indicate solid thread utilization. In Control, which is not heavily multithreaded compared to productivity workloads, the Ryzen 7 3700X's single-thread performance (Cinebench R15 single-core score of 204) is the more relevant metric. At 1080p, where CPU overhead is proportionally higher, the combination still achieves 177 FPS at Low, showing no significant CPU bottleneck.

Best Settings per Resolution

At 3840x2160, the most demanding preset that maintains 60 FPS is High, with an average of 60 FPS. Ultra falls to 52 FPS, which does not clear the playable threshold. Medium runs at 67 FPS, but High offers better visual quality at the same playability level.

At 2560x1440, Ultra is the best choice, delivering 77 FPS on average. This clears the 60 FPS threshold with a comfortable margin. High runs at 88 FPS and Medium at 99 FPS, but the Ultra preset provides the highest visual fidelity while remaining well above the playable line.

At 1920x1080, Ultra achieves 101 FPS, making it the clear recommendation. The GPU has ample headroom at this resolution, and all presets exceed 60 FPS, including Low at 177 FPS and Medium at 131 FPS.

For players with high refresh rate displays at 1080p, the Low preset at 177 FPS or Medium at 131 FPS would be suitable. The data shows that the combination has enough performance to support refresh rates beyond 100 Hz at 1080p on most presets.

Similar Performance Alternatives

The CPU's nearest rivals provide context for how other processors would behave in this system. The AMD Ryzen AI 7 350 has an average benchmark score of 34222, which is 0.1% lower than the Ryzen 7 3700X's 34260. The AMD EPYC 4244P scores 34220, also 0.1% lower. The Intel Core i5-13450HX scores 34333, which is 0.2% higher, and the Intel Core Ultra 7 165H scores 34083, 0.5% lower. These four processors are essentially performance peers, meaning any of them would produce nearly identical frame rates in Control when paired with the same RTX 3080.

The GPU's nearest rivals are more varied. The NVIDIA P106-100 has an average score of 23249, which is 0.3% lower than the RTX 3080's 23172, a difference of less than one percent. The AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 scores 23250, also 0.3% higher. The AMD Radeon RX 6600M scores 23273, 0.4% higher, and the AMD Radeon R9 M290X scores 23276, 0.4% higher. These deltas are all within measurement noise, so any of these GPUs would deliver nearly identical performance in Control. However, the RTX 3080 has unique features like dedicated RT cores and DLSS support that these rivals may not offer, even if their average benchmark scores are similar.

The practical takeaway is that swapping the CPU to any of its nearest rivals would change frame rates by less than 1%, and swapping the GPU to any of its nearest rivals would also change frame rates by less than 1%. The recorded performance of this combination is therefore representative of a cluster of similar hardware.

The Verdict

Yes, this PC can run Control at all three tested resolutions, but the playable settings vary. At 1920x1080, all four presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra) clear the 60 FPS threshold, with Ultra at 101 FPS. At 2560x1440, all four presets also clear 60 FPS, with Ultra at 77 FPS. At 3840x2160, three presets (Low, Medium, High) are playable, but Ultra at 52 FPS does not meet the 60 FPS requirement.

The best playable settings by resolution are: 1080p Ultra at 101 FPS, 1440p Ultra at 77 FPS, and 4K High at 60 FPS. The data indicates that this combination is best suited for 1440p gaming, where it can run the highest preset with a solid margin above the playability threshold. At 4K, players would need to choose between High quality at exactly 60 FPS or Medium at 67 FPS for a small frame rate buffer.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of AMD Ryzen 7 3700X and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 ranks 1114 out of 3720 tested combinations for Control. This places it in the 70th percentile of all tested combos, meaning it outperforms roughly 70% of the systems in the database for this specific game. The rank reflects the balanced nature of this pairing: the CPU sits at the 84th percentile among all CPUs, while the GPU sits at the 68th percentile among all GPUs. The combination performs better than the GPU's individual percentile suggests, indicating that Control benefits from the CPU's strong multi-threaded performance.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1920x1080:

• Low: 177 FPS average
• Medium: 131 FPS average, minimum 111 FPS, maximum 151 FPS
• High: 117 FPS average
• Ultra: 101 FPS average

2560x1440:

• Low: 140 FPS average
• Medium: 99 FPS average, minimum 84 FPS, maximum 114 FPS
• High: 88 FPS average
• Ultra: 77 FPS average

3840x2160:

• Low: 94 FPS average
• Medium: 67 FPS average, minimum 57 FPS, maximum 77 FPS
• High: 60 FPS average
• Ultra: 52 FPS average

The minimum and maximum FPS data are only recorded for Medium settings in this database. At 1080p Medium, the minimum of 111 FPS shows that frame times remain stable even during demanding scenes. At 1440p Medium, the minimum of 84 FPS still clears the playability threshold. At 4K Medium, the minimum of 57 FPS dips below 60, indicating occasional stutter during heavy sequences.

The scaling from Medium to High to Ultra shows diminishing returns in frame rate cost. At 1080p, moving from Medium to High costs 14 FPS, and from High to Ultra costs 16 FPS. At 1440p, the same transitions cost 11 FPS each. At 4K, Medium to High costs 7 FPS, and High to Ultra costs 8 FPS. The cost of each preset step decreases as resolution increases, which aligns with the GPU becoming the bottleneck at higher pixel counts.

The jump from Low to Medium is the largest performance hit at every resolution. At 1080p, it costs 46 FPS. At 1440p, it costs 41 FPS. At 4K, it costs 27 FPS. This suggests that Medium enables significant visual features that have a substantial GPU cost, while the difference between Medium and Ultra is relatively smaller.