Control

The Intel Core i5-12400 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti produces measured frame rates in Control across three resolutions and four quality presets. The data set covers 1920x1080, 2560x1440, and 3840x2160 at Low, Medium, High, and Ultra settings, with average FPS recorded for each configuration. The results show a GPU-bound system with clear scaling patterns that inform settings recommendations for each resolution.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate drop from 1080p to 4K is consistent across all quality presets. At Low settings, the combo delivers 118.8 FPS at 1920x1080, 87.3 FPS at 2560x1440, and 57.6 FPS at 3840x2160. The 4K result is roughly half of the 1080p result, a pattern that repeats at every preset. At High settings, the values are 76.6 FPS at 1080p, 58 FPS at 1440p, and 38.7 FPS at 4K. At Ultra, they are 67.7 FPS, 50 FPS, and 33.7 FPS respectively.

This uniform halving of frame rates from 1080p to 4K indicates that the GPU is the dominant scaling factor. The RTX 3060 Ti, with its 8 GB GDDR6 memory and 256-bit bus providing 448.0 GB/s bandwidth, sets the ceiling at higher resolutions. The CPU — a 6-core, 12-thread Alder Lake part with a 4.40 GHz boost clock — does not appear to constrain performance. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 118.8 FPS, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold and suggests the CPU can feed frames faster than the GPU can render them at higher resolutions.

The scaling from 1440p to 4K is also steep. At Medium settings, 1440p yields 64.5 FPS while 4K yields 44.2 FPS. At Low settings, 1440p yields 87.3 FPS while 4K yields 57.6 FPS. The proportional cost of each resolution step is similar regardless of preset, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound workload. The CPU's role is to keep up with the GPU's demands, and the data shows it does so: the frame rate differences between presets at a given resolution are consistent, with no sudden collapse that would indicate a CPU bottleneck.

Settings Recommendations

At 1920x1080, the measured data shows that High settings deliver 76.6 FPS, comfortably above the 60 FPS target. Ultra settings drop to 67.7 FPS, still playable but with a measurable cost. Medium settings produce 85.4 FPS, and Low produces 118.8 FPS. The step from Low to Medium is the largest single drop among the 1080p presets, while the steps between Medium, High, and Ultra are much smaller. This suggests that the Low preset removes substantial rendering work, while the higher presets add diminishing visual returns for the frame rate cost.

For 2560x1440, Medium settings deliver 64.5 FPS, the only preset besides Low (87.3 FPS) that stays above 60 FPS. High drops to 58 FPS, and Ultra to 50 FPS. For a 1440p display, Medium is the recommended preset for maintaining smooth frame rates, with High as a viable option if the user accepts a frame rate in the high 50s.

For 3840x2160, only Low settings approach playability at 57.6 FPS. Medium drops to 44.2 FPS, High to 38.7 FPS, and Ultra to 33.7 FPS. At 4K, the RTX 3060 Ti is overextended; Low is the only realistic choice for a playable experience. The overall recommendation is Medium at 1080p or 1440p for a balance of quality and frame rate, or High at 1080p if visual fidelity is the priority. At 4K, Low is the only option that stays near 60 FPS.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo ranks 1120 out of 1636 tested combinations in Control. This places it in the lower portion of the field. The CPU's percentile against all CPUs is 77, and the GPU's percentile against all GPUs is 69. The combo rank of 1120 out of 1636 suggests that in Control specifically, this pairing sits below the midpoint of tested systems. The CPU's average benchmark score is 19850, with nearest rivals including the Intel Core i7-9700 at 19831 (delta 0.1%), the Intel Core i7-8700 at 19894 (delta -0.2%), the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5995WX at 19928 (delta -0.4%), and the Intel Core i5-11600K at 19771 (delta 0.4%). The GPU's average benchmark score is 25120, with nearest rivals including the AMD Radeon RX 6700M at 25180 (delta -0.2%), the AMD Radeon RX 6600 at 25235 (delta -0.5%), the AMD Radeon 890M at 25246 (delta -0.5%), and the AMD Radeon RX 580 2048SP at 25287 (delta -0.7%).

The rank of 1120 out of 1636 places this combo in the lower portion of the tested field. The component percentiles — 77 for the CPU and 69 for the GPU — are higher than the combo rank would suggest, indicating that Control's specific workload does not favor this pairing as much as other games might. The GPU's tight clustering with its nearest rivals, all within 0.7% of its average benchmark score, shows that the RTX 3060 Ti sits in a competitive performance band where small differences in game optimization can shift rankings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the measured average FPS values are: Low 118.8, Medium 85.4, High 76.6, Ultra 67.7. The gap between Low and Medium is the largest, while the gaps between Medium, High, and Ultra are relatively small. This pattern holds at 2560x1440, where the values are Low 87.3, Medium 64.5, High 58, and Ultra 50. At 3840x2160, the values are Low 57.6, Medium 44.2, High 38.7, and Ultra 33.7, with the steps between presets more evenly distributed.

The data shows that at every resolution, the difference between Low and Medium is larger than the difference between any other adjacent preset pair. This suggests that the Low preset removes a significant amount of rendering work, while the Ultra preset adds diminishing visual returns for the frame rate cost. The 1080p Low result of 118.8 FPS is the only value that approaches high-refresh-rate territory, while 1440p Low at 87.3 FPS is the only 1440p value above 60 FPS besides Medium at 64.5 FPS. At 4K, no preset reaches 60 FPS, with Low at 57.6 FPS being the closest.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti is built on the Ampere architecture with the GA104 chip, fabricated on an 8 nm process at Samsung. It has 4864 shading units, 152 texture mapping units, and 80 ROPs. The GPU includes 38 RT cores and 152 tensor cores, with FP32 performance of 16.20 TFLOPS. The memory subsystem consists of 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 256-bit bus, providing 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth. The boost clock is 1665 MHz, with a base clock of 1410 MHz. The GPU's launch MSRP is 399 USD.

In Control, the GPU's role is decisive. The measured frame rates at 4K — 57.6 FPS at Low, 44.2 at Medium, 38.7 at High, and 33.7 at Ultra — show that the GPU is the limiting component at this resolution. The 8 GB VRAM and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are sufficient for 1080p and 1440p, where the combo delivers 67.7 to 118.8 FPS at 1080p and 50 to 87.3 FPS at 1440p. At 4K, the rendering load exceeds what the GPU can sustain at higher presets. The GPU's average benchmark score is 25120, with a percentile of 69 against all GPUs. Its nearest rivals are all within 0.7% of its score, indicating that the RTX 3060 Ti sits in a tightly contested performance band. The PassMark G3D score of 20349 and Geekbench OpenCL score of 109075 reflect its compute capabilities, but in Control, the practical result is that 4K gaming requires Low settings to stay near 60 FPS.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor from the Alder Lake-S family, with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. It has 18 MB of shared L3 cache and a TDP of 65 W. The CPU supports DDR4 and DDR5 memory and connects via PCIe Gen 5 with 16 lanes. Its launch MSRP is $199.

The CPU's benchmark results show strong single-thread and multi-thread performance. Cinebench R23 scores are 2249 single-core and 15935 multi-core. 3DMark scores include 910 single-thread and 5890 max-threads. PassMark single-thread is 3456 and multithread is 18747. The CPU's percentile against all CPUs is 77, with an average benchmark score of 19850. Its nearest rivals are the Intel Core i7-9700 (delta 0.1%), Intel Core i7-8700 (delta -0.2%), AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5995WX (delta -0.4%), and Intel Core i5-11600K (delta 0.4%). The i5-12400 is effectively tied with these processors in average score.

In Control, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU. At 1080p Low, the combo reaches 118.8 FPS, which indicates the CPU can drive frame rates well above 60 FPS. The 6 cores and 12 threads, combined with the 4.40 GHz boost clock, are sufficient for this game's demands. The fact that frame rates scale consistently with resolution — rather than collapsing at lower resolutions due to CPU limits — confirms that the CPU is not the bottleneck in this pairing. The CPU's higher percentile (77) compared to the GPU's (69) also suggests that the processor has more headroom than the graphics card in this configuration.