Control

Settings Recommendations

The measured frame rates across the four presets reveal a clear hierarchy in Control. At 1920x1080, the Ultra preset delivers 109 FPS, which is a substantial margin above the 60 FPS threshold for smooth gameplay, while the High preset reaches 123.6 FPS. The Medium preset at 135 FPS and Low at 194.1 FPS offer progressively higher headroom, but the visual fidelity trade-off from Ultra to Low is significant for a game with this game's atmospheric lighting and particle effects. The data indicates that Ultra at 1080p is the optimal choice for a 60 Hz or even 120 Hz display, as the performance cost of the highest settings is only a 14.6 FPS drop compared to High.

Moving to 2560x1440, the Ultra preset maintains a playable 78.5 FPS, while High sits at 93.6 FPS. The gap between Medium (105.6 FPS) and Low (145.3 FPS) shows that this resolution still benefits from the CPU's strong single-thread performance, but the GPU is beginning to carry more of the load. For a high-refresh-rate 1440p monitor, High is the recommended preset, as it provides a 15.1 FPS advantage over Ultra while retaining most of the visual features that define the game's aesthetic. The jump from High to Medium adds 12 FPS but reduces shadow quality and reflection detail, which are prominent in the game's brutalist office environments.

At 3840x2160, the situation changes dramatically. The Ultra preset drops to 56.1 FPS, which is below the 60 FPS target for a smooth experience on many displays. High settings at 62.7 FPS just barely clear that bar, while Medium (72.4 FPS) and Low (98.7 FPS) provide more comfortable margins. The data shows that 4K Ultra is only viable for users who prioritize image quality over frame rate consistency, as the 6.6 FPS deficit versus High is noticeable during fast-paced combat sequences. The recommendation for 4K is High, which balances the game's visual complexity with a frame rate that remains stable enough for the game's telekinetic combat mechanics. Medium is a viable fallback for those seeking 70+ FPS, but the reduction in texture streaming and post-processing effects is evident on large displays.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 is the primary driver of performance at higher resolutions in Control. Its 12 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 192-bit bus provides 504.2 GB/s of bandwidth, which is sufficient for the game's texture-heavy environments at Ultra settings without stuttering or asset pop-in. The GPU's boost clock of 2475 MHz, based on a 1920 MHz base, allows it to sustain high utilization during the game's frequent physics-based destruction sequences. The 29.15 TFLOPS of FP32 compute and 46 RT cores are particularly relevant, as Control was one of the earliest titles to feature hardware-accelerated ray tracing for reflections and indirect lighting.

The benchmark data shows that the GPU's performance scaling is consistent across presets. At 1080p, the difference between Low (194.1 FPS) and Ultra (109 FPS) is 85.1 FPS, indicating that the RTX 4070 is not fully saturated at lower resolutions and that CPU overhead becomes a factor. At 4K, the same preset gap narrows to 42.6 FPS (98.7 FPS Low versus 56.1 FPS Ultra), which reflects the GPU becoming the dominant constraint as pixel count increases. The GPU's 81st percentile ranking among all tested GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 37283, places it as a high-midrange part that can handle Control's demands at 1440p and entry-level 4K. Its nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, has an average score of 37507, a delta of -0.6%, which makes the RTX 4070 slightly slower in synthetic tests but the measured game data shows it is well-suited for this specific title.

Resolution Scaling

The frame rate scaling from 1080p to 4K illustrates a textbook transition from CPU-bound to GPU-bound behavior. At High settings, the average FPS drops from 123.6 at 1920x1080 to 93.6 at 2560x1440, a 30 FPS reduction, and then to 62.7 at 3840x2160, another 30.9 FPS reduction. The percentage drop from 1080p to 1440p is 24.3%, while the drop from 1440p to 4K is 33.0%. This accelerating decline indicates that the GPU's rendering resources are being taxed increasingly harder as resolution scales, while the CPU's contribution remains relatively constant.

The Low preset shows a similar trend but with larger absolute numbers: 194.1 FPS at 1080p, 145.3 FPS at 1440p, and 98.7 FPS at 4K. The 1080p to 1440p drop of 48.8 FPS (25.1%) is close to the High preset's relative decline, but the 1440p to 4K drop of 46.6 FPS (32.1%) is proportionally larger. This suggests that even at Low settings, the RTX 4070's fill rate and memory bandwidth become limiting factors at 4K. The Ultra preset tells a different story: 109 FPS at 1080p, 78.5 FPS at 1440p, and 56.1 FPS at 4K. The 1080p to 1440p reduction is 30.5 FPS (28.0%), and the 1440p to 4K reduction is 22.4 FPS (28.5%), showing a more linear degradation that points to consistent GPU saturation across all resolutions.

The data indicates that the limiting component shifts with resolution. At 1080p, the CPU's 10 cores and 16 threads can feed the GPU fast enough to reach 194 FPS on Low, but the GPU's capabilities cap the Ultra preset at 109 FPS. At 4K, the GPU is clearly the bottleneck, as even the Low preset cannot reach 100 FPS, and the CPU's headroom is irrelevant. The 1440p results sit in a balanced zone where both components contribute, making it the optimal resolution for this combination of CPU and GPU.

How This Combo Ranks

This specific configuration of the Intel Core i5-12600KF paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 ranks 382nd out of 1636 tested combinations in Control. This places the combo in the top 23.4% of all systems tested, which is a strong showing for a midrange desktop build. The rank reflects the balance between the CPU's 84th percentile ranking among all processors and the GPU's 81st percentile among all graphics cards, indicating that neither component is significantly holding back the other in this game.

The combo's position in the rankings is influenced by the fact that Control benefits from both strong single-thread performance and substantial GPU compute. The i5-12600KF's Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3309 and multi-core score of 23444 demonstrate that it can handle the game's physics and AI calculations without becoming a bottleneck, while the RTX 4070's Passmark G3D score of 26927 provides the rasterization power needed for the game's demanding visual effects. Compared to the CPU's nearest rivals, the i5-12600KF is effectively tied with the Intel Core i9-10900K (deltaPct 0) and the Intel Core i5-12600K (deltaPct -0.1), meaning that swapping to a higher-tier processor would yield negligible gains in this game. Similarly, the GPU's nearest rival, the AMD Radeon RX Vega 56, has a deltaPct of -0.6%, which is within the margin of error for synthetic benchmarks.

The rank of 382 out of 1636 suggests that there are many higher-end configurations with newer GPUs or more powerful CPUs that achieve higher frame rates, particularly at 4K where the RTX 4070's 12 GB memory capacity and 504.2 GB/s bandwidth become limiting. However, for the majority of gamers playing at 1080p or 1440p, this combo sits well above the median, delivering frame rates that exceed the refresh rate of most mainstream monitors.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-12600KF plays a crucial role in Control's performance, particularly at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 120 FPS. The processor's 10 cores and 16 threads, based on the Alder Lake-S architecture, provide ample parallel processing for the game's background tasks, while its boost clock of 4.90 GHz ensures that the main game thread can execute quickly. The 20 MB of shared L3 cache helps reduce memory latency, which is important for the game's streaming of large environment chunks. The CPU's Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 23444 and single-core score of 3309 are both strong indicators of its ability to handle the game's dual demands of physics simulation and draw call submission.

At 1080p with Low settings, the CPU is the primary limiter, as the frame rate of 194.1 FPS approaches the maximum that the processor can feed to the GPU. The difference between the Low and Ultra presets at 1080p is 85.1 FPS, which is a much larger gap than at 4K, where the same preset difference is only 42.6 FPS. This demonstrates that the CPU has more headroom at higher resolutions, where the GPU's rendering time dominates the frame time. The 3dmark single-thread score of 1016 and 2-thread score of 1995 show that the CPU's single-core performance is in the top tier, which is essential for a game like Control that relies heavily on one main thread for gameplay logic.

The CPU's 84th percentile ranking among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 27827, places it just above the Intel Core i9-10900K (27829, deltaPct 0) and the Intel Core i5-12600K (27851, deltaPct -0.1). This means that within the same generation and price tier, there is no meaningful performance difference for gaming workloads. The CPU's memory support for both DDR4 and DDR5 allows for flexibility in system configuration, though the measured data does not show a significant impact from memory type in Control. At 1440p and 4K, the CPU's role diminishes as the GPU becomes the bottleneck, but the i5-12600KF ensures that frame times remain consistent without stutters during combat scenarios with multiple enemies and destructible objects. The processor's 125 W TDP and unlocked multiplier make it a suitable choice for users who want to overclock, though the stock boost clock of 4.90 GHz already provides sufficient performance for this game.