Control

The AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER is a study in contrast: a top-tier, 96th-percentile CPU from 2025 paired with a 63rd-percentile GPU from 2019. In Control, this combo produces playable frame rates at 1080p and 1440p, but the data clearly shows that the RTX 2060 SUPER is the definitive limiting factor. The CPU’s immense headroom—evident in its 59,712 Cinebench R23 multicore score—is largely untapped in this game, which is heavily reliant on the GPU’s 7.181 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. The result is a system that feels CPU-rich and GPU-poor, with performance scaling that tracks almost exclusively with resolution and graphics settings rather than processor capability.

FAQ

*Q: What is the best resolution to play Control with this hardware?*

A: The data shows 1920x1080 is the only resolution where the combo consistently exceeds 60 FPS across all settings. At 2560x1440, only the Low preset reaches 88 FPS, while High and Medium hover near 60 FPS. At 3840x2160, even the Low preset only manages 59.6 FPS.

*Q: How does this combo rank among all tested configurations in Control?*

A: The combo ranks 1158 out of 1636 tested combinations. This places it in the lower third of all systems, reflecting the GPU’s 63rd percentile standing among all GPUs, which is far below the CPU’s 96th percentile.

Q: Is the Ryzen 9 9950X3D bottlenecking the RTX 2060 SUPER in this game?

A: No. The benchmark results indicate the opposite. The CPU is vastly more powerful than the GPU, as shown by its 96th percentile score versus the GPU’s 63rd percentile. The FPS drops at higher resolutions and settings are characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario.

Q: What is the highest settings preset that maintains an average of 60 FPS at 1440p?

A: The Medium preset at 2560x1440 achieves an average of 60.4 FPS. The High preset is slightly below that threshold at 57 FPS, and Ultra drops to 51.4 FPS.

Q: How much performance is gained by dropping from Ultra to Low at 1080p?

A: The average frame rate increases from 67.4 FPS on Ultra to 119.5 FPS on Low at 1920x1080. This represents a significant 77% improvement in average FPS by reducing the settings to their lowest preset.

Q: Does the RTX 2060 SUPER’s 8 GB VRAM appear to be a limiting factor at 4K?

A: The data suggests that compute performance, not VRAM capacity, is the primary constraint at higher resolutions. The average FPS at 3840x2160 drops from 59.6 on Low to 34 on Ultra, a pattern consistent with the GPU’s raw shading and texture rate being overwhelmed, rather than a simple memory capacity issue.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 SUPER is the workhorse of this pairing, and its specifications dictate the experience in Control. The GPU features 2176 shading units, 136 TMUs, and 64 ROPs, running at a base clock of 1470 MHz and a boost clock of 1650 MHz. Its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus provides 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. These numbers explain the performance tiers seen in the measured FPS data. The GPU’s texture rate of 224.4 GTexel/s and pixel rate of 105.6 GPixel/s are solid for 1080p and 1440p gaming but are insufficient for the pixel workload of 4K.

The Turing architecture also includes 34 RT cores and 272 tensor cores, which are relevant for Control’s real-time ray tracing features, though the measured FPS data in this pack does not specify whether ray tracing was enabled. The FPS results, however, show a clear pattern: the GPU is the bottleneck. When the resolution scales from 1080p to 4K, the frame rate drops dramatically for the same settings preset, which is the hallmark of a GPU-limited scenario. The CPU’s capabilities—16 cores, 32 threads, and a 5.70 GHz boost clock—are far beyond what this game needs at these frame rates, meaning the RTX 2060 SUPER’s compute and memory bandwidth are the sole arbiters of performance.

Settings Recommendations

For a smooth experience at 1920x1080, the High preset offers an excellent balance, delivering an average of 73.5 FPS. This is well above the 60 FPS target and leaves headroom for demanding scenes. Pushing to Ultra yields 67.4 FPS, which is still playable but offers diminishing returns for the performance cost. The Medium preset at 81.5 FPS is a valid option for those prioritizing frame rate over visual fidelity, while the Low preset at 119.5 FPS is ideal for competitive play or high-refresh-rate displays.

At 2560x1440, the Medium preset is the sweet spot, achieving 60.4 FPS average. This is the only settings tier at this resolution that consistently hits the 60 FPS mark. The High preset at 57 FPS is close but may dip below 60 in intensive moments, making Medium the safer choice for a locked experience. The Ultra preset at 51.4 FPS is best reserved for players who prioritize visual quality over smoothness.

At 3840x2160, the data shows that none of the presets provide a consistently smooth experience. The Low preset achieves 59.6 FPS, which is technically near 60 but leaves no margin. The Medium preset at 44.8 FPS and High at 41 FPS are playable but not ideal, while Ultra at 34 FPS is a slideshow. For 4K, the Low preset is the only viable option, and users should expect occasional frame drops below 60 FPS.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo’s rank of 1158 out of 1636 in Control is a direct reflection of the GPU’s standing. The RTX 2060 SUPER’s average benchmark score of 19,774 places it in the 63rd percentile of all GPUs, with its nearest rivals being the NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN (0.3% ahead), the RTX 2070 (0.5% ahead), and the Quadro K5200 (0.8% ahead). This clustering shows that the 2060 SUPER is essentially at the performance level of a high-end GTX 10-series card or an entry-level RTX 20-series card.

In contrast, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D is a performance outlier. Its average benchmark score of 71,660 puts it in the 96th percentile, and it is 2.2% ahead of the Intel Core i7-14700KF and 1.8% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X. This massive CPU advantage does not translate into Control performance because the game is GPU-bound. The rank of 1158/1636 indicates that most other tested combos likely feature more balanced or stronger GPUs, even if their CPUs are significantly weaker. The data suggests that swapping the RTX 2060 SUPER for a more powerful GPU would yield a dramatic improvement in Control, while upgrading the CPU would provide almost no measurable benefit.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS progression from 1080p to 4K is a textbook demonstration of GPU-bound scaling. At the High preset, the average FPS drops from 73.5 at 1920x1080 to 57 at 2560x1440 and then to 41 at 3840x2160. This represents a 44% reduction in performance from 1080p to 4K. The Low preset shows a similar trend: 119.5 FPS at 1080p, 88 FPS at 1440p, and 59.6 FPS at 4K, a 50% drop.

This scaling pattern indicates that the RTX 2060 SUPER’s compute units are being saturated as the pixel count increases. If the CPU were the bottleneck, the FPS would remain relatively flat across resolutions because the processor’s workload would be similar. Instead, the frame rate declines almost linearly with the number of pixels, confirming that the GPU’s shading units, TMUs, and ROPs are the limiting resource. The 448.0 GB/s memory bandwidth also becomes a constraint at higher resolutions, as the GPU needs to fetch more texture data and geometry. The data clearly shows that this combo is optimized for 1080p and 1440p gaming, with 4K being achievable only at the lowest settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

1920x1080: The Low preset delivers the highest average at 119.5 FPS. Medium follows at 81.5 FPS, High at 73.5 FPS, and Ultra at 67.4 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra is 52.1 FPS, showing a significant performance cost for maximum visual quality.

2560x1440: The Low preset averages 88 FPS, a substantial drop from 1080p. Medium averages 60.4 FPS, which is just above the 60 FPS target. High averages 57 FPS, and Ultra drops to 51.4 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is 36.6 FPS.

3840x2160: The Low preset averages 59.6 FPS, barely missing the 60 FPS target. Medium averages 44.8 FPS, High averages 41 FPS, and Ultra averages 34 FPS. The range from Low to Ultra is 25.6 FPS, demonstrating that even the fastest settings cannot overcome the GPU’s limitations at 4K.

Across all resolutions, the data shows that the RTX 2060 SUPER provides a playable experience (60+ FPS) only at 1080p for all presets and at 1440p for Low and Medium. The Ryzen 9 9950X3D’s performance headroom is never fully utilized, as the FPS is dictated almost entirely by the GPU’s capabilities. This pairing is best suited for 1080p gaming with high refresh rates or 1440p gaming with moderate settings.