Control

Control is an Action Adventure title from 2019, and the measured data for this combination of an Intel Core i3-12100F and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti provides a clear picture of how a mid-range 12th-gen processor pairs with a 30-series graphics card. The benchmark results reveal a system that is consistently capable of delivering smooth frame rates at 1080p, but which begins to show its limits as resolution and graphical fidelity increase. The data suggests a balance where the GPU becomes the primary workload carrier at higher resolutions, while the CPU's four cores provide a solid foundation that rarely bottlenecks the experience, though the performance deltas between settings highlight where the system's strengths and weaknesses lie.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is substantial and tells a clear story about which component is doing the heavy lifting. At High settings, the system delivers 77 FPS at 1920x1080, which drops to 59.2 FPS at 2560x1440, a decline of roughly 23%, and then falls further to 40.3 FPS at 3840x2160. This scaling pattern indicates that the GPU is the limiting factor as resolution increases, as the demand on the rasterization and shading units of the RTX 3060 Ti grows exponentially with pixel count.

The data implies that at 1080p, the Core i3-12100F is able to feed the GPU adequately, as evidenced by the high 119.7 FPS average at Low settings. However, the gap between Low and High settings at 1080p is 42.7 FPS, which narrows to 32.3 FPS at 1440p and only 19.1 FPS at 4K. This compression of the performance range at higher resolutions is a classic sign of a GPU-bound scenario, where the processor's speed becomes less relevant because the graphics card is saturated with work.

Interestingly, the jump from Medium to High at 4K is relatively small (43.6 FPS to 40.3 FPS), while the jump from High to Ultra is a more significant 9 FPS drop. This suggests that the Ultra preset introduces effects that are particularly taxing on the memory bandwidth or the compute units of the GPU, rather than purely on the CPU. The overall scaling from 1080p Low to 4K Ultra shows a 74% reduction in frame rate, which aligns with the expectation for a card with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory operating on a 256-bit bus, as the higher resolutions demand more from the 448.0 GB/s bandwidth.

Settings Recommendations

For the best experience per the measured rows, the data suggests that High settings at 1920x1080 offer the most balanced performance, delivering 77 FPS without sacrificing the visual quality that the Ultra preset provides. Moving to Ultra at this resolution still yields a playable 63.5 FPS, but the 13.5 FPS cost may not be justified for the marginal visual improvements, especially since the system is not fully utilizing the GPU at this resolution.

At 2560x1440, High settings are the clear recommendation, as the 59.2 FPS average is just shy of the 60 FPS target, while Low settings provide a significant headroom at 91.7 FPS for competitive play or high-refresh-rate monitors. The Medium preset at 66.3 FPS also works well, but the step to High is only a 7.1 FPS reduction, making it the superior choice for visual fidelity. At 3840x2160, the system struggles to maintain smooth gameplay, with only the Low preset achieving a playable 59.4 FPS, while High drops to 40.3 FPS, indicating that users should either lower resolution or accept a compromised experience at 4K.

The data shows that the Ultra preset is not recommended for this combo at any resolution, as it consistently produces the lowest frame rates without a proportional increase in visual quality. For a 60 FPS target, the optimal path is High at 1440p, or Low at 4K, with the 1080p High setting being the sweet spot for most users.

FAQ

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

A: The measured data shows that 1920x1080 provides the most consistent performance, with averages ranging from 63.5 FPS at Ultra to 119.7 FPS at Low, making it the most versatile resolution for this pairing.

Q: How does the Core i3-12100F's single-thread performance affect this game?

A: The CPU's single-thread score in 3dmark is 893, and its Cinebench R23 single-core score is 1681. These scores suggest strong per-core performance, which is sufficient to drive the RTX 3060 Ti at lower resolutions, as evidenced by the high frame rates at 1080p.

Q: Is the RTX 3060 Ti's 8 GB VRAM sufficient for Control at 4K?

A: The benchmark results show 4K performance ranging from 31.3 FPS at Ultra to 59.4 FPS at Low, indicating that the 8 GB memory capacity and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are enough to run the game, but the GPU's compute power becomes the limiting factor at this resolution.

Q: What is the performance difference between Low and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, Low settings yield 91.7 FPS, while Ultra settings drop to 50.6 FPS, a difference of 41.1 FPS. This represents a 45% reduction in frame rate for the highest quality preset.

Q: How does this combo rank compared to other tested configurations?

A: The comboRankInGame is 1099 out of 1636 combos, placing it in the lower-middle range of all tested systems. This suggests that while it is capable, many other CPU and GPU pairings offer higher performance in this game.

Q: Does the CPU bottleneck the GPU at any resolution?

A: The data indicates that the CPU is not a bottleneck at 4K, where the GPU is clearly the limiting factor. At 1080p Low, the 119.7 FPS average suggests the CPU is still capable of pushing the GPU to its limits, but the gap between settings narrows as resolution increases, confirming a shift to GPU-bound performance.

How This Combo Ranks

The combination of the Intel Core i3-12100F and the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti ranks 1099 out of 1636 tested combos in Control, placing it in the 67th percentile of all configurations. This ranking is somewhat surprising given the GPU's solid Passmark G3D score of 20349, which places it in the 69th percentile of all GPUs. The lower combo ranking suggests that the CPU's 4-core, 8-thread configuration, while adequate, does not fully unlock the potential of the graphics card in this specific game.

The CPU itself has a percentileVsAllCpus of 72, with an average benchmark score of 13516, which is nearly identical to rivals like the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 3975WX (13534, delta -0.1%) and the Intel Core i7-1250U (13462, delta 0.4%). This indicates that the i3-12100F is a strong performer for its class, but the game's engine may not scale well with only 4 physical cores, even with hyperthreading. The GPU's nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon RX 6700M (delta -0.2%) and the RX 6600 (delta -0.5%), showing that the RTX 3060 Ti is closely matched with those cards, yet the combo ranking implies that the overall system performance is held back by the CPU in certain scenarios.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i3-12100F is a 4-core, 8-thread processor based on the Alder Lake architecture, with a base clock of 3.30 GHz and a boost clock of 4.30 GHz. Its Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 11912 and single-core score of 1681 indicate strong per-thread performance, which is crucial for game logic and physics calculations. In Control, the measured FPS at 1080p Low (119.7 FPS) shows that the CPU can handle the game's demands without being overly stressed, but the performance scaling from Low to Ultra at this resolution (a drop of 56.2 FPS) suggests that the GPU is still the primary driver of frame rate changes.

The processor's 12 MB of shared L3 cache and 1.25 MB per-core L2 cache provide adequate data locality for gaming workloads. The 3dmark multi-thread scores show a scaling pattern from 2859 at 4 threads to 4026 at 8 threads, indicating that the hyperthreading provides a significant boost. However, the game's performance at 1440p and 4K shows that the CPU's role diminishes as the GPU becomes the bottleneck, as evidenced by the smaller frame rate gaps between settings at higher resolutions. The CPU's Passmark single-thread score of 3444 further confirms its capability, but the 4-core limitation may cause minor hitches in scenes with heavy particle effects or complex AI, even if the average FPS remains high.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers 77 FPS on High, 84.6 FPS on Medium, 119.7 FPS on Low, and 63.5 FPS on Ultra. The 56.2 FPS spread between Low and Ultra highlights the GPU's capability at this resolution, with the CPU providing enough headroom to keep frame rates high even in the most demanding scenarios. The step from Medium to High is only 7.6 FPS, while the step from High to Ultra is 13.5 FPS, suggesting that Ultra settings introduce effects that disproportionately impact performance.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 59.2 FPS on High, 66.3 FPS on Medium, 91.7 FPS on Low, and 50.6 FPS on Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p is consistent across settings, averaging around 22% reduction, which is expected given the increased pixel count. The 41.1 FPS difference between Low and Ultra at this resolution shows that the GPU is still the primary factor, but the CPU's 4 cores begin to show their limits in maintaining high frame rates at the Low preset.

At 3840x2160, the performance drops significantly: 40.3 FPS on High, 43.6 FPS on Medium, 59.4 FPS on Low, and 31.3 FPS on Ultra. The gap between Low and Ultra is 28.1 FPS, which is narrower than at 1080p, confirming the GPU-bound nature of 4K gaming. The Medium preset at 43.6 FPS is only slightly better than High, indicating that the game's rendering pipeline at this resolution is heavily reliant on the GPU's fill rate and memory bandwidth.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is built on the Ampere architecture with a GA104 chip, featuring 4864 shading units, 152 TMUs, and 80 ROPs. Its base clock of 1410 MHz and boost clock of 1665 MHz, combined with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, provide a bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s. The GPU's Passmark G3D score of 20349 places it in the 69th percentile of all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 25120, which is nearly identical to the AMD Radeon RX 6700M (25180, delta -0.2%) and the RX 6600 (25235, delta -0.5%).

In Control, the GPU's role is evident in the resolution scaling. At 1080p, the system achieves 119.7 FPS on Low, which is close to the 144 Hz refresh rate of many monitors, but the Ultra preset drops to 63.5 FPS, showing the card's limits with maxed-out settings. The 16.20 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and 38 RT cores provide ample compute power for the game's physics and visual effects, but the 4K Ultra result of 31.3 FPS indicates that the GPU is overwhelmed at the highest resolution and quality settings.

The VRAM capacity of 8 GB is sufficient for Control, as the game does not appear to exceed this limit based on the measured FPS, but the 448.0 GB/s bandwidth becomes a constraint at 4K, where the texture data requirements grow. The GPU's 133.2 GPixel/s pixel rate and 253.1 GTexel/s texture rate are adequate for 1440p gaming, but the performance data shows that for a smooth 60 FPS experience, High settings at 1440p are the practical ceiling for this card in this title.