Control

The Intel Core i5-12400 paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER places 115th out of 1,636 tested combinations in Control. This top 7% placement signals a highly capable pairing, though the data suggests it is not the absolute ceiling for this title. The combination’s strength lies in the GPU’s raw throughput, which dominates the FPS charts across all settings, while the CPU provides enough headroom to avoid bottlenecking the frame rate at standard resolutions. The ranking implies that a large majority of other tested systems—likely those with higher-end CPUs or more specialized GPUs—manage to edge out this combo, but for a mainstream six-core processor paired with a high-end 40-series card, the position is exceptionally strong.

GPU Role

The RTX 4080 SUPER is the undisputed driving force in this configuration. Its 16 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 256-bit bus delivers 736.3 GB/s of bandwidth, which is critical for Control’s texture-heavy environments and physics-driven destruction. The GPU’s boost clock of 2550 MHz, built on the Ada Lovelace architecture with 10,240 shading units, directly translates to the high average FPS observed. For instance, at 1080p Ultra, the combo hits 137.4 FPS, while at 4K Ultra it still manages 70.5 FPS. The data shows a clear pattern: the GPU’s memory bandwidth and compute power are the primary levers for performance, as lowering settings from Ultra to Low at any resolution yields a massive FPS jump—from 137.4 to 233.4 at 1080p, and from 70.5 to 125.8 at 4K. This indicates the GPU is fully utilized, with no signs of memory capacity or bandwidth throttling even at the highest 4K preset.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured rows, the "High" preset offers the most balanced experience across all resolutions. At 1080p High, the system produces 154.8 FPS, which is well above the 144Hz refresh rate common in gaming monitors. At 1440p High, the average drops to 117.9 FPS—still smooth for high-refresh displays. The "Ultra" preset is the most demanding, yielding 137.4 FPS at 1080p and 103.7 FPS at 1440p, which is playable but shows a noticeable performance cost over High. For 4K, High is the recommended ceiling, as it delivers 78 FPS, while Ultra dips to 70.5 FPS—a marginal difference that may not justify the visual gain. "Medium" offers a middle ground, but it does not provide a significant FPS advantage over High at 1440p (129.6 vs 117.9) to warrant the graphical downgrade. The "Low" preset is unnecessary for this hardware, as even 4K Ultra remains above 60 FPS.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the combo scales from 233.4 FPS on Low to 173.8 on Medium, 154.8 on High, and 137.4 on Ultra. The gap between Low and Ultra is substantial—a 96 FPS difference—indicating that the GPU is highly responsive to settings changes at this resolution. Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 185.3 FPS on Low, 129.6 on Medium, 117.9 on High, and 103.7 on Ultra. Here, the drop from Low to Medium is the steepest, losing 55.7 FPS, while the step from High to Ultra is more modest at 14.2 FPS. At 3840x2160, the results are 125.8 FPS on Low, 91.9 on Medium, 78 on High, and 70.5 on Ultra. The 4K Low result is particularly telling—it is higher than the 1080p Ultra result (125.8 vs 137.4), showing that the GPU has ample headroom when pixel count is reduced, but the CPU is not a limiting factor even at 1080p Ultra where the frame rate still exceeds 135 FPS.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS degradation from 1080p to 4K is consistent with a GPU-bound scenario. At High settings, the average FPS falls from 154.8 at 1080p to 117.9 at 1440p—a 23.8% reduction—and then to 78 at 4K, a further 33.8% drop. The scaling from 1440p to 4K is more severe than from 1080p to 1440p, which is typical for pixel-count doubling. At Ultra settings, the pattern holds: 137.4 to 103.7 to 70.5 FPS, with the 4K result being just above half of the 1080p figure. This halving effect from 1080p to 4K suggests that the RTX 4080 SUPER is being pushed to its limits at 4K Ultra, but the fact that it still maintains 70.5 FPS indicates the GPU has enough raw power to handle the workload without CPU interference. The low-settings scaling is the most revealing: 233.4 at 1080p, 185.3 at 1440p, and 125.8 at 4K. The 1080p Low result of 233.4 FPS is the highest recorded in the entire dataset, confirming that the CPU can feed the GPU well beyond typical refresh rates.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12400 is a 6-core, 12-thread processor with a base clock of 2.50 GHz and a boost clock of 4.40 GHz. Its benchmark scores place it in the 77th percentile of all CPUs, with a Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 15,935 and a single-core score of 2,249. In Control, the CPU’s role is to maintain a stable frame pipeline, and the data shows it does so effectively. The highest FPS recorded—233.4 at 1080p Low—suggests the CPU is not a bottleneck even in the least GPU-intensive scenario. The nearest CPU rival, the Intel Core i7-9700, has an average score of 19,831, a mere 0.1% difference from the i5-12400’s 19,850, indicating that this CPU is well-matched to its peers. The i5-12400’s 18 MB of shared L3 cache and support for DDR4 and DDR5 memory provide adequate bandwidth for the GPU, and the fact that FPS scales linearly with resolution (rather than plateauing at lower resolutions) confirms that the CPU is not the limiting component in this combo.

FAQ

*Q: Is the Intel Core i5-12400 a bottleneck for the RTX 4080 SUPER in Control?*

A: No. The data shows no CPU bottleneck, as the combo reaches 233.4 FPS at 1080p Low and 137.4 FPS at 1080p Ultra. The CPU’s benchmark scores (e.g., 15,935 in Cinebench R23 multi-core) are sufficient to feed the GPU, and the FPS scales consistently with resolution.

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

A: The High preset is the best choice for 4K, as it delivers 78 FPS, while Ultra drops to 70.5 FPS. The visual difference between High and Ultra is likely minor compared to the 7.5 FPS loss, making High the more efficient option.

*Q: How does this combo rank against other tested systems in Control?*

A: It ranks 115th out of 1,636 combinations, placing it in the top 7% of all tested systems. This indicates excellent performance, though not the absolute best, with some higher-tier CPUs or GPUs achieving better results.

Q: Can the RTX 4080 SUPER handle 1440p Ultra in this game?

A: Yes, the data shows 103.7 FPS at 1440p Ultra, which is well above the 60 FPS threshold and suitable for high-refresh monitors. Even at 4K Ultra, the combo maintains 70.5 FPS.

Q: What is the FPS difference between Low and Ultra settings at 1080p?

A: The difference is 96 FPS, with Low producing 233.4 FPS and Ultra producing 137.4 FPS. This large gap demonstrates the GPU’s sensitivity to settings changes at lower resolutions.

Q: How does the i5-12400 compare to its nearest rival, the Intel Core i7-9700?

A: The i5-12400 has an average benchmark score of 19,850, which is 0.1% higher than the i7-9700’s 19,831. This negligible difference means the two CPUs perform nearly identically in synthetic tests, though the i5-12400’s newer architecture may offer other advantages not captured in these scores.