Control

Control is an action-adventure title that stresses both CPU and GPU heavily, and the pairing of the AMD Ryzen 7 7700X with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER produces a clear performance profile across resolutions. The data shows a system that delivers playable frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, while 4K Ultra proves to be a step too far for the graphics card. This analysis examines the measured FPS rows, the roles of each component, and how the combination behaves under varying settings.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a predictable and steep drop as resolution increases, but the rate of that drop tells a story about where the bottleneck lies. At 1080p with High settings, the system averages 74 FPS. Moving to 1440p High drops that to 56 FPS, a 24% reduction. At 4K High, the average falls to 38 FPS, which is a 49% reduction from the 1440p figure and a 49% drop from 1080p. This scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU-bound scenario; the RTX 2060 SUPER’s rendering workload increases dramatically with pixel count, while the CPU’s contribution remains relatively constant.

Looking at Low settings, the trend is even more pronounced. At 1080p Low, the system hits 118 FPS, which drops to 89 FPS at 1440p Low (a 25% decrease) and then to 60 FPS at 4K Low (a 33% decrease from 1440p). The fact that Low settings at 1080p exceed 100 FPS suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU at high frame rates, but the RTX 2060 SUPER cannot maintain that throughput as resolution climbs. At 4K Low, the 60 FPS average indicates the GPU is still the limiting factor, as even the reduced graphical load cannot compensate for the sheer number of pixels.

The Medium settings row, which includes min and max FPS data, reinforces this analysis. At 1080p Medium, the average is 84 FPS with a minimum of 71 FPS and maximum of 96 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 63 FPS (min 54, max 73), and at 4K Medium, it falls to 43 FPS (min 36, max 49). The min-to-max spread narrows as resolution increases, from 25 FPS at 1080p to 19 FPS at 1440p and 13 FPS at 4K. This tightening suggests that at lower resolutions, frame time variance is higher—likely due to CPU-driven spikes—while at 4K, the GPU’s consistent workload dominates and compresses the variance.

Ultra settings show the harshest scaling. At 1080p Ultra, the average is 65 FPS. At 1440p Ultra, it drops to 49 FPS (a 25% reduction), and at 4K Ultra, it plummets to 33 FPS (a 33% reduction from 1440p). The 4K Ultra result of 33 FPS is below the 60 FPS target and even misses 30 FPS by only a narrow margin, indicating that this configuration is not viable for 4K at maximum quality. The data suggests that the RTX 2060 SUPER, with its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth, simply runs out of pixel throughput at 4K, regardless of the CPU’s capabilities.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this CPU-GPU combo in Control?

A: The data shows that 1440p High offers a 56 FPS average, which is close to smooth gameplay, while 1080p High reaches 74 FPS. For a consistent 60+ FPS experience, 1080p Medium (84 FPS) or 1080p Low (118 FPS) are the only settings that comfortably exceed 60 FPS across the board. At 4K, even Low settings only average 60 FPS, which is borderline.

Q: How does the RTX 2060 SUPER compare to its closest rivals in overall benchmark scores?

A: The RTX 2060 SUPER has an average benchmark score of 18093, placing it in the 62nd percentile of all GPUs. Its nearest rival, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Mobile, scores 18159, which is a 0.4% difference. The AMD Radeon Pro 5700 scores 18189 (0.5% higher), and the AMD Radeon RX 460 scores 18373 (1.5% higher). These are marginal differences, meaning the RTX 2060 SUPER performs essentially on par with those cards in synthetic benchmarks.

Q: Is the Ryzen 7 7700X a bottleneck for the RTX 2060 SUPER in Control?

A: The data does not indicate a CPU bottleneck at most settings. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 118 FPS, which shows the CPU can drive high frame rates. The Ryzen 7 7700X has 8 cores and 16 threads with a boost clock of 5.40 GHz, and its Cinebench R23 multi-core score is 19088. However, at 4K, the GPU becomes the clear limiting factor, as even Low settings cap at 60 FPS, suggesting the CPU is idle waiting on the GPU.

Q: What is the frame rate difference between Low and Ultra at 1080p?

A: At 1080p, Low settings average 118 FPS, while Ultra averages 65 FPS. That is a 53 FPS difference, or approximately 45% lower performance at Ultra compared to Low. The jump from Medium (84 FPS) to High (74 FPS) is a 10 FPS drop, and from High to Ultra is a 9 FPS drop, showing diminishing returns as settings increase.

Q: Does the 8 GB VRAM of the RTX 2060 SUPER affect performance at 4K?

A: The measured data shows a significant drop at 4K across all settings. At 4K Medium, the average is 43 FPS with a minimum of 36 FPS, while at 4K High it is 38 FPS. The 8 GB GDDR6 memory with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth is likely insufficient for 4K textures and geometry in Control, as the GPU’s compute capabilities (7.181 TFLOPS FP32) also limit performance. The data does not separate VRAM usage, but the consistent sub-60 FPS results at 4K point to GPU memory and bandwidth constraints.

Q: How does the Ryzen 7 7700X rank against other CPUs?

A: The Ryzen 7 7700X has a percentile rank of 85 among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 35909. Its nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 5845, scores 35802 (0.3% lower). The Intel Core 7 250H scores 35728 (0.5% lower), and the AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 350 scores 35719 (0.5% lower). This places the 7700X slightly ahead of its closest competitors in synthetic tests.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER is the primary determinant of frame rates in Control at higher resolutions. Its specifications include a base clock of 1470 MHz and a boost clock of 1650 MHz, with 2176 shading units, 136 TMUs, and 64 ROPs. The memory subsystem consists of 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, yielding 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. These numbers translate to a pixel rate of 105.6 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 224.4 GTexel/s, with FP32 performance of 7.181 TFLOPS.

In Control, the GPU’s role becomes evident when comparing the 1080p and 4K results. At 1080p High, the average FPS is 74, which is respectable but not exceptional. At 4K High, the average drops to 38 FPS—a 49% decline. This halving of performance aligns with the quadrupling of pixel count from 1080p (2.07 million pixels) to 4K (8.29 million pixels), though the scaling is not linear due to other factors like memory bandwidth. The RTX 2060 SUPER’s bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is sufficient for 1440p but becomes strained at 4K, where texture fetches and frame buffer writes increase exponentially.

The GPU’s benchmark scores provide context for its gaming performance. Its PassMark G3D score is 16462, and its 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score is 2011. The Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan scores are 76957 and 77402, respectively. These place it in the 62nd percentile of all GPUs, which is mid-range. In Control, this translates to playable frame rates at 1080p and 1440p with adjusted settings, but not at 4K Ultra. The 4K Ultra average of 33 FPS is barely above the minimum playable threshold, and the 4K Medium minimum of 36 FPS shows that even mid settings can dip below 40 FPS.

The RTX 2060 SUPER’s 34 RT cores and 272 tensor cores are present but do not appear to provide a measurable advantage in the measured FPS data, as Control’s ray tracing features are not separately benchmarked here. The GPU’s 12 nm process node and 175 W TDP indicate it is a power-hungry card by modern standards, but the data does not include power consumption figures for this game.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data covers four resolutions (1920x1080, 2560x1440, 3840x2160) and four settings levels (Low, Medium, High, Ultra). At 1080p, the Low preset delivers an average of 118 FPS, which is the highest measured result in the entire dataset. Medium averages 84 FPS with a range of 71 to 96 FPS. High averages 74 FPS, and Ultra averages 65 FPS. This progression shows a 31% drop from Low to Medium, a 12% drop from Medium to High, and a 12% drop from High to Ultra. The system easily exceeds 60 FPS at all 1080p settings, making 1080p the most comfortable resolution for this combo.

At 1440p, Low averages 89 FPS, which is a 25% reduction from 1080p Low. Medium averages 63 FPS (min 54, max 73), High averages 56 FPS, and Ultra averages 49 FPS. Only Low and Medium maintain an average above 60 FPS at 1440p, while High and Ultra fall below that threshold. The min FPS of 54 at Medium indicates that even at this setting, there are moments where frame rates dip below 60, which could be noticeable in fast-paced action sequences. The 1440p Ultra result of 49 FPS is 25% lower than 1440p High, showing that the Ultra preset’s additional effects (likely volumetric lighting and shadows) exact a heavy toll.

At 4K, the results are uniformly below 60 FPS. Low averages 60 FPS exactly, which is the only 4K setting that reaches the 60 FPS mark, and even then only marginally. Medium averages 43 FPS (min 36, max 49), High averages 38 FPS, and Ultra averages 33 FPS. The drop from 4K Low to 4K Medium is 17 FPS (28%), and from Medium to High is 5 FPS (12%), with High to Ultra being another 5 FPS (13%). The 4K Ultra result of 33 FPS is the lowest measured average in the dataset, representing a 72% reduction from the 1080p Low maximum.

The Medium preset rows include min and max FPS data, which provides additional insight. At 1080p Medium, the min is 71 FPS and the max is 96 FPS, a spread of 25 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the min is 54 FPS and the max is 73 FPS, a spread of 19 FPS. At 4K Medium, the min is 36 FPS and the max is 49 FPS, a spread of 13 FPS. This narrowing spread at higher resolutions suggests that the GPU’s workload becomes more consistent, reducing frame time spikes that might be caused by CPU variability. Conversely, at 1080p, the wider spread indicates that the CPU can occasionally push frame rates higher, but also that the GPU cannot always keep up, leading to more variance.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen 7 7700X provides the computational foundation for this system, and its role in Control is evident from the high frame rates at low resolutions. The CPU has 8 cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 4.50 GHz and a boost clock of 5.40 GHz. It is built on the Zen 4 architecture (Raphael) using a 5 nm process, with 6,570 million transistors on a 71 mm² die. The cache hierarchy includes 64 KB of L1 per core, 1 MB of L2 per core, and 32 MB of shared L3 cache. Memory support is DDR5 with dual-channel configuration, providing 83.2 GB/s of bandwidth.

In Control, the CPU’s influence is most visible at 1080p Low, where the system achieves 118 FPS. This high frame rate suggests that the 7700X can process game logic, physics, and draw calls without becoming a bottleneck. The CPU’s Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 19088 and single-core score of 1987 indicate strong per-thread performance, which is crucial for games that rely on a few heavily loaded threads. The Geekbench multi-core score of 12451 and single-core score of 2289 further support this.

However, the CPU’s role diminishes as resolution increases. At 4K Low, the FPS drops to 60, which is exactly half of the 1080p Low result. This halving is directly attributable to the GPU’s inability to render 4K at the same rate, not a CPU limitation. The 7700X’s percentile rank of 85 among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 35909, places it well above the RTX 2060 SUPER’s 62nd percentile rank. This mismatch suggests that the CPU is overqualified for the GPU in this pairing, but in Control, that surplus CPU power does not translate to higher frame rates at 4K.

The PassMark multi-thread score of 35686 and single-thread score of 4190 show balanced performance, while the data compression score of 420240 and integer math score of 112601 indicate strong compute throughput. In Control, these capabilities are not fully utilized because the game’s rendering demands outpace the GPU. The 7700X’s 16 threads are unlikely to all be saturated, as Control is not a heavily multithreaded title, but the high single-core performance ensures that the primary game thread runs efficiently.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings for this Ryzen 7 7700X and RTX 2060 SUPER combination depend on the target resolution and frame rate preference. For a 1080p display, the Medium preset at 84 FPS average offers the best balance of visual quality and performance, with a minimum of 71 FPS ensuring that frame rates rarely dip below 60. High at 74 FPS is also viable, but the 10 FPS drop from Medium may not justify the visual improvement for all users. Ultra at 65 FPS is playable, but the minimum FPS is not recorded, so frame time consistency is uncertain. Low at 118 FPS is excessive for most displays and sacrifices too much visual fidelity.

At 1440p, the Medium preset at 63 FPS average with a 54 FPS minimum is the only setting that stays close to 60 FPS, though it does dip below. Low at 89 FPS is the most performant option, but it compromises shadows and textures significantly. High at 56 FPS and Ultra at 49 FPS fall below the 60 FPS threshold and may result in noticeable stutter during intense scenes. For 1440p, Medium is the recommended preset, as it maintains an average above 60 FPS and only occasionally dips below, while High and Ultra are not recommended for smooth gameplay.

For 4K, the data shows that no preset provides a consistently smooth experience. Low at 60 FPS is the only setting that averages exactly 60 FPS, but any variation would drop it below that mark. Medium at 43 FPS, High at 38 FPS, and Ultra at 33 FPS are all below 60 FPS and would require adaptive sync or a lower frame rate target to feel smooth. The 4K Medium minimum of 36 FPS suggests that even mid settings on 4K are not recommended for this GPU. Users with a 4K display should consider lowering the resolution to 1440p or accepting a 30-40 FPS experience on Low or Medium settings.

The overall data suggests that the “best” experience for this combo is 1080p Medium (84 FPS) or 1080p High (74 FPS), depending on whether visual fidelity or frame rate headroom is prioritized. At 1440p, Medium is the only setting that approaches 60 FPS, and at 4K, only Low achieves 60 FPS on average, making it a poor choice for this GPU. The RTX 2060 SUPER’s 8 GB VRAM and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are adequate for 1080p and 1440p, but not for 4K, and the CPU’s performance is sufficient across all measured settings to avoid becoming the limiting factor.