Control

Control, Remedy’s paranormal action-adventure from 2019, presents a demanding workload that stresses both the GPU and CPU depending on the resolution and preset. This analysis examines the measured performance of the Intel Core i5-14600K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, interpreting the data to explain where the bottleneck lies and how to optimize the experience. The benchmark results provide a clear picture of a system that is well-balanced at 1440p but begins to show its GPU's age at 4K Ultra settings.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a classic GPU-bound scaling pattern as resolution increases. At 1080p with High settings, the combo achieves 82.4 FPS. Moving to 1440p, this drops to 60 FPS, a reduction of approximately 27%. Scaling further to 4K, the average FPS falls to 41.6, another 31% decrease from the 1440p figure. This consistent, significant drop with each resolution step indicates that the rendering workload is expanding faster than the GPU's fill rate and shading capacity can handle.

The pattern becomes even more telling when examining the Low preset. At 1080p Low, the system produces 130.8 FPS, but this plummets to 100 FPS at 1440p and then to 69 FPS at 4K. The fact that even at the lowest settings, the frame rate still drops by nearly half from 1080p to 4K, suggests that while the GPU is the primary limiter, the game's engine has a substantial fixed cost per frame that scales with resolution. The CPU, with its 14 cores and 20 threads, is not the bottleneck here; the data implies that the RTX 2070 SUPER’s 8 GB of GDDR6 memory and 448.0 GB/s bandwidth are being saturated by the higher pixel counts.

The gap between Low and Ultra settings also widens at higher resolutions. At 1080p, the difference between Low (130.8 FPS) and Ultra (70.4 FPS) is 60.4 FPS. At 4K, this gap narrows to 33.2 FPS (69 vs 35.8). This compression of the settings range at 4K is a strong indicator that the GPU is completely maxed out; it can no longer leverage the performance headroom that lower settings provide because the sheer pixel throughput is the limiting factor. The system is unequivocally GPU-limited at 4K, while at 1080p, the high frame rates suggest the CPU is still feeding the GPU efficiently, but the GPU's limits are still the final arbiter.

FAQ

Q: What is the average frame rate at 1440p with High settings?

A: The measured average is exactly 60 FPS, which is the target for standard 60Hz monitors and indicates a smooth experience for this setting.

Q: How much faster is the Low preset compared to Ultra at 1080p?

A: The Low preset achieves 130.8 FPS, while Ultra achieves 70.4 FPS. This represents a performance increase of 60.4 FPS, or about 86% more performance, when dropping from Ultra to Low.

Q: Is the 4K Ultra preset playable with this combo?

A: The data shows an average of 35.8 FPS at 3840x2160 with Ultra settings. This is below the 60 FPS threshold and may be considered borderline for a smooth action game, though it is technically playable.

Q: Which resolution provides the highest frame rate for competitive play?

A: The 1920x1080 resolution with Low settings provides the highest measured average at 130.8 FPS, making it the best choice for maximizing responsiveness.

Q: What is the performance difference between Medium and High settings at 1440p?

A: At 2560x1440, the Medium preset achieves 67.6 FPS, which is 7.6 FPS higher than the High preset's 60 FPS. This suggests Medium offers a better balance for higher refresh rates at this resolution.

Q: How does the combo's overall rank in this game compare?

A: The combo ranks 1010 out of 1636 tested combinations for Control, placing it in the lower half of the database for this specific title.

Settings Recommendations

For a 60 FPS target, the optimal choice is the 2560x1440 resolution with High settings, which hits exactly 60 FPS. If a higher refresh rate is desired, dropping to 1080p with Medium settings yields 93.8 FPS, a significant jump that provides a much smoother experience. The data suggests that 1440p Medium, at 67.6 FPS, is a strong alternative that offers better image quality than 1080p while still maintaining a frame rate above 60.

Pushing to 4K is only viable with the Low preset, which produces 69 FPS. However, this sacrifices most visual fidelity. The 4K High (41.6 FPS) and 4K Ultra (35.8 FPS) presets are below the 60 FPS target and would require a variable refresh rate monitor to be acceptable. The most balanced experience for image quality and performance is 1440p on the Medium preset; it provides a 12.7% improvement over High (67.6 vs 60 FPS) without a substantial drop in visual quality. For users prioritizing frame rate above all else, 1080p Low at 130.8 FPS is the clear winner.

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core i5-14600K and RTX 2070 SUPER combination ranks 1010th out of 1636 tested combos for Control. This places it in the 38th percentile of all tested systems, meaning it outperforms roughly 38% of the combinations in the database. This is a modest ranking, reflecting that while the CPU is a high-end part, the GPU is a previous-generation mid-range card that struggles with the game's demands at higher resolutions. The ranking is likely held back by the 4K performance, where the GPU's limitations are most apparent.

Compared to its individual component benchmarks, the combo's in-game rank is lower than the CPU's standalone percentile of 93. This discrepancy highlights that the GPU, which sits at the 65th percentile, is the limiting factor. The data suggests that the i5-14600K has significant headroom in this game, and a more powerful GPU would substantially improve this combo's rank. The 1010th position is a direct result of the RTX 2070 SUPER’s inability to maintain high frame rates at 4K, dragging down the overall system score despite the CPU's strength.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER, with its 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 256-bit bus, is the primary driver of the performance scaling seen in the data. The memory bandwidth of 448.0 GB/s is a critical factor; as resolution increases, the demand for texture data and frame buffer access grows, and this bandwidth becomes a bottleneck. The 4K results, where even Low settings (69 FPS) cannot approach the 1080p Low figure (130.8 FPS), show that the GPU's raw throughput is exhausted.

The GPU's core specifications, including 2560 shading units and a boost clock of 1770 MHz, deliver 9.062 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. This raw compute power is sufficient for 1080p and 1440p gaming, as evidenced by the 82.4 and 60 FPS results on High settings. However, the 4K Ultra result of 35.8 FPS indicates that the chip's pixel fill rate and texture rate are insufficient for the massive workload. The card's 40 RT cores and 320 tensor cores are present, but the data suggests that the traditional rasterization pipeline is the limiting factor here, not ray tracing features.

The transition from High to Ultra at 1440p (60 to 51.5 FPS) shows a 14% performance cost for the highest preset. This is a relatively small penalty, suggesting that the Ultra preset adds effects that are not disproportionately heavy. However, the 8 GB VRAM capacity may also be a factor at 4K Ultra, potentially causing the GPU to spill over into system memory, which would explain the significant drop to 35.8 FPS. The benchmark results indicate a GPU that is well-suited for 1080p and capable at 1440p, but out of its depth at 4K, especially with high-fidelity settings.

Measured FPS Breakdown

At 1920x1080, the system delivers 130.8 FPS on Low, 93.8 FPS on Medium, 82.4 FPS on High, and 70.4 FPS on Ultra. This represents a smooth scaling curve, with each preset step costing between 11 and 37 FPS. The 1080p results are all playable, with even the most demanding Ultra preset maintaining a solid 70.4 FPS.

Moving to 2560x1440, the averages are 100 FPS on Low, 67.6 FPS on Medium, 60 FPS on High, and 51.5 FPS on Ultra. The High and Medium presets remain comfortably in the playable range, while Ultra dips below 60 FPS. The performance gap between Low and Medium at this resolution is 32.4 FPS, which is the largest single-step drop, indicating a heavy reliance on medium-quality textures and effects.

At 3840x2160, the frame rates become more constrained: 69 FPS on Low, 44.9 FPS on Medium, 41.6 FPS on High, and 35.8 FPS on Ultra. Only the Low preset achieves a frame rate above 60. The differences between Medium, High, and Ultra are relatively small (3.3 and 5.8 FPS), which shows that the GPU is hitting a hard limit. The data suggests that at 4K, the primary constraint is the GPU's memory bandwidth and pixel processing capability, rather than the specific settings chosen.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600K is a 14-core, 20-thread processor with a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. Its Cinebench R23 multicore score of 32881 and single-core score of 4642 place it in the 93rd percentile of all CPUs. This immense processing power is more than sufficient for Control, which is a GPU-intensive title. The benchmark data does not show any signs of CPU bottlenecking; the frame rates are consistently high at 1080p, and the scaling with resolution is smooth and predictable.

The CPU's high single-thread performance is crucial for game logic and draw calls. The 5.30 GHz boost clock ensures that the main game thread is rarely waiting on the CPU. The data shows that at 1080p Low, the system achieves 130.8 FPS, which is a high enough frame rate that a weaker CPU would likely start to become a limiting factor. The fact that the frame rate still scales down as resolution increases indicates that the GPU is the clear bottleneck, leaving the i5-14600K with ample reserve capacity.

The processor's 24 MB of shared L3 cache and support for DDR4 and DDR5 memory also contribute to stable performance. The nearest rival, the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, has a nearly identical average benchmark score (49062 vs 49166), showing that the i5-14600K is a top-tier performer. In this specific game, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with data quickly and efficiently, and the measured FPS numbers confirm that it does so without introducing a performance ceiling. The system's 1010th rank is not a reflection of the CPU's capability but rather the GPU's inability to keep pace at higher resolutions.