Inside

Intel Core Ultra 5 245 pairs with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 to deliver exceptionally high frame rates in Inside, a puzzle platformer that scales cleanly across resolutions and presets. Data from measured benchmarks shows this combo averages 95 FPS at 4K Ultra and 210 FPS at 1080p Ultra, placing it in the 72nd percentile of tested configurations. The following analysis interprets these figures against the hardware’s synthetic scores, nearest rivals, and per-setting performance.

FAQ

Q: What is the average FPS at 1440p Medium?

A: The measured average is 253 FPS, with a minimum of 215 FPS and a maximum of 291 FPS. This is well above the 60 FPS playable threshold and leaves substantial headroom for high refresh-rate displays.

Q: Does the CPU or GPU limit performance at 4K Ultra?

A: At 4K Ultra, the average FPS drops to 95, which is 116 FPS lower than at 1440p Ultra (151 FPS). This 38.4% reduction indicates the GPU becomes the primary constraint at higher resolutions, as the CPU’s single-thread score of 4,648 in Cinebench R23 remains sufficient for this title.

Q: How does the RTX 3080 compare to its nearest rival in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The RTX 3080’s average benchmark score is 23,172, which is 0.3% lower than the NVIDIA P106-100 (23,249) and 0.4% lower than the AMD Radeon RX 6600M (23,273). These deltas are negligible, meaning in most scenarios the RTX 3080 performs nearly identically to those cards.

Q: What is the best playable preset at 1080p?

A: Ultra is the best playable preset at 1080p, delivering an average of 210 FPS. This is only 10 FPS less than High (220 FPS), so the visual quality increase from High to Ultra costs just 4.5% of frame rate.

Q: Is the CPU’s multi-threaded performance competitive?

A: The Core Ultra 5 245 scores 32,924 in Cinebench R23 multi-core, which is 0.8% higher than the Intel Core i5-14600K (48,618 average across all tests) and 0.5% lower than the AMD Ryzen 9 7900 (49,228). In game-specific tests, this translates to no CPU bottleneck at any tested resolution.

Q: Are there any settings where the game drops below 60 FPS?

A: No. Across all four resolutions (4K, 1440p, 1080p) and all four presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra), the minimum average FPS is 95 at 4K Ultra. The lowest recorded minimum FPS is 135 at 4K Medium, still more than double the playable threshold.

CPU and GPU Roles

The data reveals a clear shift in component responsibility as resolution climbs. At 1080p, the combo produces 420 FPS on Low and 220 FPS on High, with the gap between Low and High being 200 FPS (47.6% reduction). This suggests the CPU can feed the GPU rapidly at lower resolutions, but even at 1080p Ultra (210 FPS), the frame rate stays remarkably high. Moving to 1440p, the average FPS across presets drops by roughly 25% compared to 1080p — from 420 to 317 FPS on Low (a 24.5% decrease) and from 220 to 158 FPS on High (28.2% decrease). The 4K results show the steepest scaling penalty: 4K Low (199 FPS) is 52.6% slower than 1080p Low (420 FPS), and 4K Ultra (95 FPS) is 54.8% slower than 1080p Ultra (210 FPS).

These scaling patterns indicate the GPU is the dominant factor at 4K, where the RTX 3080’s 760.3 GB/s memory bandwidth and 29.77 TFLOPS FP32 compute are pushed harder. At 1080p and 1440p, the CPU’s role becomes more visible: the Core Ultra 5 245 with 14 cores and a 5.10 GHz boost clock maintains high minimum frame rates even at Low presets, where the GPU is underutilized. The absence of any sub-60 FPS result across all 12 tested configurations confirms that neither component becomes a bottleneck within the playable envelope. However, the 4K-to-1080p FPS ratio (95/210 = 45.2% at Ultra) shows that resolution scaling is nearly linear for the GPU, meaning CPU overhead is minimal in this puzzle platformer.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo starts at 420 FPS on Low, drops to 352 FPS on Medium (with a 299–405 FPS range), then to 220 FPS on High, and finally 210 FPS on Ultra. The Medium preset’s minimum of 299 FPS is the lowest recorded at 1080p, but still 4.98x the 60 FPS threshold. The step from Low to Medium costs 68 FPS (16.2%), while High to Ultra costs only 10 FPS (4.5%), indicating diminishing returns at the top end.

At 2560x1440, Low delivers 317 FPS, Medium averages 253 FPS (215–291 FPS), High reaches 158 FPS, and Ultra sits at 151 FPS. The Medium to High drop is 95 FPS (37.5%), the largest percentage decrease across any resolution, suggesting that High preset introduces effects that heavily tax the GPU at this resolution. The 1440p Ultra result of 151 FPS is 59 FPS higher than 4K High (99 FPS), showing a 34.5% advantage for the lower resolution.

At 3840x2160, Low yields 199 FPS, Medium averages 159 FPS (135–183 FPS), High drops to 99 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 95 FPS. The Medium preset’s minimum of 135 FPS is notable because it is the only recorded minimum below 200 FPS in the entire dataset, yet it remains 2.25x the playable threshold. The High-to-Ultra gap at 4K is only 4 FPS (4.2%), whereas Low-to-Medium costs 40 FPS (20.1%). This pattern mirrors 1080p but with a compressed absolute range, confirming that the GPU’s compute and memory resources saturate at 4K.

Similar Performance Alternatives

For the CPU, the Core Ultra 5 245 (average benchmark score 48,995) sits within 1% of several alternatives. The AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5755G (49,196) is 0.4% faster, while the AMD Ryzen 9 7900 (49,228) is 0.5% faster. The Intel Xeon Gold 5318H (48,698) is 0.6% slower, and the Intel Core i5-14600K (48,618) is 0.8% slower. In practice, any of these CPUs would produce nearly identical frame rates in Inside, as the game’s CPU demands are modest — the measured FPS differences between presets at 1080p (200 FPS spread) are far larger than what these 1% CPU deltas could cause.

For the GPU, the RTX 3080 (23,172 average) is matched by the NVIDIA P106-100 (23,249, 0.3% faster), AMD Radeon Pro Vega 16 (23,250, 0.3% faster), AMD Radeon RX 6600M (23,273, 0.4% faster), and AMD Radeon R9 M290X (23,276, 0.4% faster). These deltas are within measurement noise, so swapping the RTX 3080 for any of these cards would yield FPS differences of less than 1% — meaning at 4K Ultra, the 95 FPS average would remain essentially unchanged. The RTX 3080’s 68th percentile ranking among all GPUs underscores that it is a mid-to-high-tier card, but its nearest rivals are all older or lower-tier parts with similar synthetic scores.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 722nd out of 3,716 tested combinations, placing it in the top 19.4% of all configurations. This percentile is lower than the CPU’s individual ranking (90th percentile) and higher than the GPU’s (68th percentile), reflecting that the pairing is stronger than the GPU alone but not as dominant as the CPU’s synthetic score suggests. The rank is driven by the game’s low system requirements — Inside is a puzzle platformer, not a AAA 3D title, so even mid-range GPUs achieve high FPS. The 722nd rank means 2,994 other combos score higher, but those likely include more recent flagship GPUs that push frame rates beyond 300 FPS at 4K. Within the context of the measured data, this combo’s 95 FPS at 4K Ultra is sufficient for smooth gameplay, but it does not saturate high-refresh-rate 4K displays (e.g., 144 Hz monitors).

The Verdict

Yes, this PC can run Inside at every resolution and preset tested. The verdict by resolution confirms that all four settings — Low, Medium, High, and Ultra — are playable at 4K, 1440p, and 1080p, with average FPS ranging from 95 (4K Ultra) to 420 (1080p Low). The minimum recorded FPS across all 12 configurations is 135 at 4K Medium, which is 2.25x the 60 FPS playable threshold. At 4K, the best playable setting is Ultra with an average of 95 FPS, meaning the game runs smoothly even at maximum visual quality. At 1440p, Ultra averages 151 FPS, and at 1080p, Ultra averages 210 FPS. There is no scenario in the measured data where the frame rate dips below 60 FPS, so the system comfortably exceeds the playable threshold in every configuration.

Best Settings per Resolution

At 3840x2160, the most demanding preset that stays at or above 60 FPS is Ultra, with an average of 95 FPS. The next step down, High, delivers 99 FPS, but Ultra is only 4 FPS lower and provides the highest visual fidelity. At 2560x1440, Ultra again is the best choice, averaging 151 FPS — this is 46 FPS higher than 4K Ultra and leaves ample headroom for V-Sync or frame limiting. At 1920x1080, Ultra averages 210 FPS, which is 115 FPS higher than 4K Ultra and 59 FPS higher than 1440p Ultra. For players prioritizing maximum smoothness, 1080p Ultra offers the best balance of visual quality and frame rate, while 4K Ultra remains fully playable at 95 FPS. The Medium preset at any resolution does not provide a meaningful FPS advantage over Ultra — at 1080p, Medium is 352 FPS versus 210 FPS for Ultra, but both are far above the threshold, so choosing Ultra is the recommended setting for all resolutions.