Control

Settings Recommendations

The measured frame rates for Control across four presets and three resolutions show a clear, consistent hierarchy. At 1920x1080, the Low preset hits an average of 140 FPS, while Medium delivers 99 FPS, High drops to 88 FPS, and Ultra bottoms out at 77 FPS. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 63 FPS, indicating that the most demanding preset extracts a significant performance toll. For competitive or high-refresh-rate play, the Low preset is the only configuration that approaches the 144Hz territory, though the Medium preset’s 99 FPS average remains a solid middle ground for those who want smoother visuals without sacrificing too much speed.

Moving to 2560x1440, the pattern shifts. Low produces 106 FPS, Medium 75 FPS, High 67 FPS, and Ultra 58 FPS. The delta between Low and Ultra shrinks to 48 FPS, but the relative drop from 1080p is steeper for the heavier presets. At 4K (3840x2160), the numbers compress further: Low averages 71 FPS, Medium 51 FPS, High 45 FPS, and Ultra 39 FPS. The spread from Low to Ultra is now only 32 FPS, which suggests that at this resolution the GPU is the dominant constraint, capping the ceiling regardless of how much the CPU can push.

The best experience per the measured rows depends on the target. At 1080p, the Medium preset offers a strong balance—99 FPS average with a min of 84 FPS and max of 114 FPS—delivering smooth gameplay while retaining some visual fidelity over Low. At 1440p, the High preset (67 FPS) is playable but not optimal for fast action; Medium at 75 FPS is the safer recommendation for consistent performance. At 4K, the situation is more constrained. The Low preset’s 71 FPS average is the only configuration that clears 60 FPS, making it the pragmatic choice for 4K owners who prioritize frame rate over effects. The Ultra preset at 4K, with a 39 FPS average, falls below the threshold for smooth play and should be avoided unless the user accepts a cinematic, sub-60 experience.

Notably, the Medium preset is the only one with reported min and max FPS values across all resolutions: at 1080p it ranges from 84 to 114, at 1440p from 64 to 86, and at 4K from 43 to 58. This data indicates that Medium provides a stable frame pacing, with the 4K min of 43 FPS showing that even this preset can dip into stutter territory under load. For the majority of users, the data suggests that Medium at 1080p is the sweet spot for a high-refresh monitor, while Low at 1440p or 4K is the fallback for those who must have high resolution.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is built on the Ada Lovelace architecture with a 5 nm process node from TSMC, featuring 35,800 million transistors on a 294 mm² die. Its memory configuration is 12 GB of GDDR6X on a 192-bit bus, delivering a bandwidth of 504.2 GB/s. The chip has a base clock of 1920 MHz and a boost clock of 2475 MHz, with memory clocks running at 1313 MHz (21 Gbps effective). These specifications place the GPU in the 81st percentile of all GPUs in the database, with an average benchmark score of 37648.

Benchmark results show the RTX 4070’s raw compute capabilities: it achieves 29.15 TFLOPS of FP32 and FP16 performance, a pixel rate of 158.4 GPixel/s, and a texture rate of 455.4 GTexel/s. In 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12, it scores 3854, while Geekbench OpenCL and Vulkan scores are 154858 and 174152, respectively. Passmark G3D returns 26927, with DirectX 11 scoring 244 and DirectX 12 scoring 103. These numbers indicate a GPU that is strong for rasterization but shows relative weakness in compute-heavy workloads like DirectX 12, which may explain some of the scaling patterns seen in Control.

In Control, the GPU’s role becomes evident when examining the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K. At High settings, the average FPS falls from 88 at 1080p to 67 at 1440p (a 23.9% reduction) and then to 45 at 4K (a further 32.8% reduction from 1440p). This steep decline at higher resolutions is a classic sign of a GPU-bound scenario, where the RTX 4070’s memory bandwidth and shading units become the limiting factor. The 12 GB VRAM is sufficient for this game, as no resolution or preset combination shows signs of memory capacity throttling—the measured FPS drops are consistent with computational load rather than VRAM exhaustion.

The RTX 4070’s 46 RT cores and 184 tensor cores are present in the spec sheet, but Control’s measured data does not isolate ray tracing performance. The overall trend across all presets—from Low to Ultra—shows that the GPU’s headroom is best utilized at 1080p, where it can deliver 140 FPS on Low, but at 4K even the Low preset struggles to stay above 71 FPS. This suggests that for 4K gaming, the RTX 4070 is a capable but not overwhelming performer, and users should expect to dial back settings to maintain playable frame rates.

CPU Role

The AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 is a 16-core, 32-thread processor based on the Zen 5 architecture (Strix Halo codename), manufactured on a 4 nm process by TSMC. It has a base clock of 3.00 GHz and a boost clock of 5.10 GHz, with a TDP of 55 W. The CPU features a large cache hierarchy: 80 KB of L1 per core, 1 MB of L2 per core, and 64 MB of shared L3. It supports LPDDR5X memory across a quad-channel bus, providing 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth, and is equipped with a Radeon 8060S integrated GPU, though the discrete RTX 4070 handles the graphics in this test.

In synthetic benchmarks, the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 performs strongly. Cinebench R23 multicore scores 35314 and singlecore 2044, while Geekbench multicore hits 20992 and singlecore 2464. Passmark multithread scores 54934, with single-thread at 4147. These results place the CPU in the 95th percentile of all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 77740. Compared to its nearest rivals, it is 1.6% ahead of the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 9945WX and the AMD EPYC Embedded 8224P, but 1.7% behind the Intel Core i9-14900K and 2% ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX.

In Control, the CPU’s high core count and boost clock should theoretically prevent any processor bottleneck at lower resolutions. The data supports this: at 1080p Low, the system achieves 140 FPS, which is a high frame rate but not extraordinarily so for a 16-core part. The fact that 1080p Ultra drops to 77 FPS—a 45% reduction from Low—indicates that the GPU, not the CPU, is setting the performance ceiling even at this resolution. The CPU’s single-thread performance (Cinebench R23 singlecore 2044) is sufficient to feed the RTX 4070 without causing frame drops, as evidenced by the smooth scaling from Low to Medium at 1080p (140 to 99 FPS).

The CPU’s role becomes more apparent when comparing 1080p to 1440p at the same settings. At High, the FPS drops from 88 to 67, a 23.9% reduction, which is largely due to the GPU’s increased pixel load. However, the CPU’s 16 cores and 32 threads ensure that the game’s physics and AI workloads do not introduce stutters, as the minimum FPS values for Medium settings (84 at 1080p, 64 at 1440p, 43 at 4K) show a consistent decline rather than sudden spikes. The 64 MB L3 cache likely helps with data locality in a game like Control, which has complex environmental interactions, but the measured data cannot isolate this effect. Overall, the CPU is not a limiting factor in this combo; it provides ample headroom for the GPU to be the primary determinant of performance across all tested settings.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 ranks 1515 out of 2888 tested combos in Control, placing it in the 52.4th percentile of all configurations. This mid-pack ranking is somewhat surprising given the individual strengths of both components—the CPU is in the 95th percentile and the GPU in the 81st percentile. The data suggests that Control’s engine does not fully utilize the CPU’s 16-core advantage, and the GPU’s performance at higher resolutions drags the combo down relative to other pairings that may use faster GPUs with more modest CPUs.

The rank of 1515 out of 2888 means that roughly 1373 combos perform better in this game. This is not a poor result, but it indicates that the RTX 4070, while strong, is not a top-tier GPU for Control at 4K, where the measured FPS drops below 60 on all presets except Low. The combo’s best performance is at 1080p Low, where it hits 140 FPS, but many other combos with higher-end GPUs (e.g., RTX 4080 or above) would likely achieve higher frame rates at the same settings. The CPU’s high single-thread score (Cinebench R23 2044) ensures that it does not bottleneck, but the GPU’s 81st percentile ranking limits the overall combo’s standing.

Compared to the GPU’s nearest rivals, the RTX 4070's average benchmark score is 0.1% ahead of the NVIDIA Tesla P4, 0.4% ahead of the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, 1.3% behind the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Mobile, and 1.3% ahead of the AMD Radeon PRO W6400. These small deltas suggest that the RTX 4070 is closely matched with a range of GPUs, and in Control, the combo’s rank is likely driven by the GPU’s specific strengths and weaknesses in this title. The 3DMark Steel Nomad score of 3854 is modest, which may correlate with the game’s performance at 4K, where the GPU’s fill rate and bandwidth become critical.

The combo rank also reflects the fact that Control is a 2019 title with a release date of 2019-08-26, meaning it predates both the CPU (released 2025) and the GPU (released 2023). The game’s engine may not be optimized for the newer Zen 5 architecture or Ada Lovelace features, which could explain why the combo does not rank higher. Users should note that the 1515th rank out of 2888 is a relative measure, and the absolute FPS numbers—such as 88 FPS at 1080p High—remain perfectly playable for most users.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data for Control allows a clear analysis of how the combo scales from 1080p to 4K. At High settings, the average FPS is 88 at 1080p, 67 at 1440p, and 45 at 4K. This represents a 23.9% drop from 1080p to 1440p, and a further 32.8% drop from 1440p to 4K, for a total reduction of 48.9% from 1080p to 4K. This scaling pattern is consistent with a GPU-bound scenario, where the increased pixel count at higher resolutions demands more from the RTX 4070’s shading units and memory bandwidth.

At Low settings, the scaling is less severe: 140 FPS at 1080p, 106 FPS at 1440p, and 71 FPS at 4K. The drops are 24.3% (1080p to 1440p) and 33.0% (1440p to 4K), totaling 49.3%. Interestingly, the percentage drops are nearly identical between Low and High settings, which suggests that the GPU is equally constrained at both ends of the settings spectrum. This indicates that the RTX 4070’s performance in Control is primarily limited by resolution, not by the complexity of the shaders or effects, since the relative performance loss is consistent regardless of preset.

At Medium settings, the data includes min and max FPS values, providing additional insight. At 1080p, the average is 99 FPS with a min of 84 and max of 114. At 1440p, the average drops to 75 FPS (min 64, max 86), and at 4K, it falls to 51 FPS (min 43, max 58). The min FPS at 4K (43) is below the average FPS at 4K High (45), indicating that even the Medium preset can produce frame dips that are more severe than the High preset’s average. This suggests that the GPU’s memory bandwidth (504.2 GB/s) is a limiting factor at 4K, as the game’s data demands increase with resolution.

The Ultra preset shows the steepest absolute drops: 77 FPS at 1080p, 58 FPS at 1440p, and 39 FPS at 4K, for a total reduction of 49.4%. The fact that all presets show roughly a 49% reduction from 1080p to 4K is a strong indicator that the limiting component is the GPU. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect the FPS to be more consistent across resolutions, as the CPU’s workload does not scale with pixel count. Instead, the data shows a near-linear relationship between resolution and performance, confirming that the RTX 4070 is the primary constraint in this combo for Control.

FAQ

Q: What is the best preset for 4K gaming with this combo?

A: Based on the measured data, the Low preset is the only configuration that averages above 60 FPS at 3840x2160, with an average of 71 FPS. Medium averages 51 FPS, High 45 FPS, and Ultra 39 FPS, all of which fall below the 60 FPS threshold for smooth play.

Q: How does the CPU compare to its nearest rivals in synthetic benchmarks?

A: The AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 has an average benchmark score of 77740, which is 1.6% higher than the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 9945WX and the AMD EPYC Embedded 8224P, 1.7% lower than the Intel Core i9-14900K, and 2.0% higher than the AMD Ryzen 9 8945HX.

Q: Does the combo perform better at 1080p or 1440p for High settings?

A: At 1080p High, the average FPS is 88, while at 1440p High, it drops to 67. This represents a 23.9% reduction, indicating that 1080p is the preferred resolution for High settings if maximum frame rate is desired.

Q: What is the GPU’s percentile ranking among all GPUs?

A: The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is in the 81st percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 37648. Its closest rival, the NVIDIA Tesla P4, has a score of 37628, a delta of 0.1%.

Q: Is the CPU or GPU the limiting factor in this game?

A: The data indicates the GPU is the limiting factor. The FPS drops from 1080p to 4K are consistent across all presets (approximately 49% reduction), which is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario. The CPU’s high percentile (95th) and strong single-thread scores suggest it provides sufficient headroom.

Q: What are the minimum FPS values for Medium settings across resolutions?

A: At 1080p Medium, the min FPS is 84. At 1440p Medium, it is 64. At 4K Medium, it is 43. These values show that the combo can experience frame dips, particularly at 4K, where the min FPS is below the average FPS of the High preset at the same resolution.