Control

Control is a demanding Action Adventure title from 2019, and the benchmark data for the Intel Core i5-14600K paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 reveals a system that is heavily optimized for high-refresh-rate 1440p play, while still delivering a playable 4K experience. The measured FPS across three resolutions and four settings presets provides a clear picture of where this combo excels and where its limits reside. The data indicates a balance leaning on the GPU for most of the heavy lifting, with the CPU providing a robust foundation that rarely bottlenecks the frame rate.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS scaling from 1080p to 4K shows a classic GPU-bound pattern, but with some interesting nuances. At 1080p with Low settings, the system produces an average of 182.9 FPS. Moving to 1440p Low drops that to 142.3 FPS, a reduction of roughly 22%. The jump to 4K Low yields 96.5 FPS, which is a further 32% drop from 1440p. This steep decline as resolution increases is the hallmark of a graphics card working progressively harder, confirming that the RTX 3080 is the primary limiting factor at higher resolutions.

However, the scaling at Ultra settings tells a slightly different story. At 1080p Ultra, the combo hits 100.3 FPS. At 1440p Ultra, it falls to 80 FPS, an exact 20% reduction. At 4K Ultra, the average drops to 54.3 FPS, a 32% decline from 1440p. The consistent percentage drop between 1440p and 4K across Low and Ultra presets suggests that the GPU's memory bandwidth and compute throughput are being taxed uniformly regardless of the quality preset. The difference between 1080p and 1440p is smaller in percentage terms at Ultra than at Low, which implies that at the highest settings, the CPU has more headroom to keep up with the GPU's increased workload, reducing the chance of a CPU bottleneck at 1440p.

The data implies that 4K is the true stress test for this combination. The gap between 4K Low (96.5 FPS) and 4K Ultra (54.3 FPS) is 42.2 FPS, showing that the GPU has significant overhead that can be consumed by visual fidelity. For players targeting a locked 60 FPS experience at 4K, the data suggests that the High preset is the ceiling, as it lands at 61.3 FPS. The scaling pattern firmly places the RTX 3080 as the component determining performance in this title, with the i5-14600K providing a stable platform that does not appear to introduce a significant bottleneck even at lower resolutions where frame rates exceed 180 FPS.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo to achieve a high refresh rate?

A: The data shows that 1440p is the sweet spot. At Medium settings, the combo produces 101.3 FPS, and at High settings it achieves 87.9 FPS. This is a significant step up from 4K, where even the High preset only manages 61.3 FPS, and it allows the system to take advantage of higher refresh rate monitors.

Q: Is the RTX 3080 capable of running Control at 4K?

A: Yes, but with caveats. The benchmark results show 4K High at 61.3 FPS and 4K Ultra at 54.3 FPS. This indicates that 4K is playable, but to stay above a 60 FPS average, players must use the High preset or lower. The 4K Medium preset (67 FPS) also provides a comfortable margin.

Q: How much of a performance difference is there between Low and Ultra settings at 1440p?

A: The difference is substantial. The system delivers 142.3 FPS on Low and 80 FPS on Ultra at 1440p. This represents a 62.3 FPS drop, or a 44% reduction in average frame rate, when moving from the lowest to the highest quality preset.

Q: Does the CPU limit performance at 1080p?

A: The scores suggest not. At 1080p Low, the system achieves 182.9 FPS, and at 1080p Medium it hits 132.6 FPS. These high frame rates indicate that the Intel Core i5-14600K, with its 14 cores and boost clock of 5.30 GHz, provides ample processing power to feed the GPU at this resolution, preventing a CPU-bound scenario.

Q: What is the worst-case performance scenario for this combo?

A: The most demanding scenario is 4K Ultra, where the average FPS drops to 54.3. This is the only measured configuration that falls below the 60 FPS mark, indicating that this is the point where the RTX 3080's capabilities are most stretched.

Q: How does the RTX 3080's performance in Control compare to its overall standing?

A: The GPU's average benchmark score is 35787, and it ranks in the 80th percentile among all GPUs. This indicates it is a high-end part, and its performance in Control, particularly the 87.9 FPS at 1440p High, is consistent with that strong overall position.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 is the undisputed driver of performance in Control for this combo. The GPU's specifications are central to understanding the measured FPS. It features 10 GB of GDDR6X memory on a 320-bit bus, providing a bandwidth of 760.3 GB/s. This memory configuration is likely a key factor in the game's scaling from 1440p to 4K, as the higher resolution demands more data to be fed to the rendering cores. The data shows a consistent ~30% performance hit when moving from 1440p to 4K across various settings, which aligns with the increased memory pressure.

The GPU's clock speeds also play a role. With a base clock of 1440 MHz and a boost clock of 1710 MHz, the RTX 3080 demonstrates a solid frequency uplift under load. This is reflected in its ability to push frame rates from 80 FPS at 1440p Ultra to 100.3 FPS at 1080p Ultra. The 20.3% increase in performance from a 33% reduction in pixel count (from 1440p to 1080p) suggests that while the GPU has headroom, it is not fully scaling with the reduced pixel count, possibly due to other bottlenecks like draw calls or driver overhead at very high frame rates.

The raw compute power is also significant. The RTX 3080 offers 29.77 TFLOPS of FP32 performance. This immense throughput is what allows the card to handle the game's physics and particle effects at high settings. The benchmark results show that the GPU is the primary constraint in this pairing, as evidenced by the significant frame rate drops when increasing resolution. The data suggests that the card's 10 GB VRAM is sufficient for this game, as there are no anomalies in the scaling that would indicate a memory capacity issue, even at 4K Ultra. The GPU's overall benchmark percentile of 80 places it well above average, and its performance in Control seems to be in line with that expectation.

Settings Recommendations

The measured data points to a clear hierarchy for an optimal experience. For players with a 1440p monitor, the High preset at 87.9 FPS is the recommended balance of visual quality and performance. This frame rate is well above the 60 FPS threshold and provides a smooth experience. The Ultra preset at 1440p yields 80 FPS, which is still highly playable, but the 7.9 FPS gain from High to Ultra is not as substantial as the jump from Medium (101.3 FPS) to High. The data suggests that Medium to High is the most efficient scaling tier at 1440p.

At 4K, the recommendation is more constrained. The High preset is the only one that averages above 60 FPS, hitting 61.3 FPS. The Medium preset at 67 FPS offers a more comfortable margin above 60 FPS, but with a visual downgrade. Given that the Ultra preset dips to 54.3 FPS, which is below the standard 60 FPS target, the data implies that High is the 'best' setting for a 4K experience, as it provides the highest quality without sacrificing a stable frame rate. The 1080p data shows that even the Ultra preset (100.3 FPS) is more than sufficient for high-refresh-rate monitors, so players with lower resolution displays can maximize settings without concern.

Ultimately, the "best" experience depends on the display. For 60 Hz 4K displays, High is the clear choice. For 144 Hz 1440p displays, High is again the optimal choice, as it gets closer to the refresh rate limit, though it won't fully saturate it. The data does not support a recommendation for Low settings, as the visual cost is significant while the frame rate gains are primarily beneficial only for extreme refresh rates (182.9 FPS at 1080p Low). The analysis points to High as the universal recommended preset for this hardware combination.

How This Combo Ranks

In the grand database of tested combinations for Control, this pairing of the Intel Core i5-14600K and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 holds a rank of 485 out of 1636 combos. This places it in the top 30% of all tested systems. While this is a strong showing, it is not in the top tier, indicating that there are numerous more powerful combinations, likely featuring higher-end GPUs, that can push this game to higher frame rates at 4K.

This rank is a holistic measure that considers performance across all settings and resolutions. The data shows that the system is a consistent performer, but its 4K Ultra score of 54.3 FPS likely pulls its rank down compared to combos that can comfortably exceed 60 FPS at that extreme. The combo's position in the 485th spot suggests that it is a very capable high-end system, but one that is not at the absolute high-end for this specific title. It is a system that excels at 1440p, but is merely 'passable' at 4K, which is a key differentiator in the rankings. The 1636 total combos in the database show that this is a competitive field, and this particular pairing is a solid mid-to-high tier contender, but it leaves performance on the table at the highest resolution compared to top-tier systems.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The comprehensive data set provides exact figures for every configuration. At 1920x1080, the system achieves an average of 182.9 FPS on Low, 132.6 FPS on Medium, 114.3 FPS on High, and 100.3 FPS on Ultra. These numbers show a clear and steady decline as quality increases, with a total drop of 82.6 FPS from Low to Ultra.

Moving to 2560x1440, the performance scales down as expected. The averages are 142.3 FPS on Low, 101.3 FPS on Medium, 87.9 FPS on High, and 80 FPS on Ultra. The spread here is 62.3 FPS, which is narrower than at 1080p, indicating that the GPU is becoming more of a limiting factor and the relative cost of each setting tier is slightly different. The step from Medium to High at 1440p is a 13.4 FPS drop, while the step from High to Ultra is only a 7.9 FPS drop.

At 3840x2160, the 4K results are the most demanding. The system produces 96.5 FPS on Low, 67 FPS on Medium, 61.3 FPS on High, and 54.3 FPS on Ultra. This is the only resolution where the Ultra setting falls below the 60 FPS mark. The data shows that the gap between Low and Medium at 4K is 29.5 FPS, which is the largest single-tier drop in the entire data set, highlighting the significant cost of certain graphical features at this resolution. The progression from Medium to High (5.7 FPS drop) and High to Ultra (7 FPS drop) is much smaller, suggesting diminishing returns at the top end of the quality spectrum.

CPU Role

The Intel Core i5-14600K plays a supporting role in this game, but it is a critical one. With 14 cores and 20 threads, and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz, the CPU has the raw horsepower to ensure the GPU is fed with data. The benchmark data shows that even at 1080p Low, where the system is pushing 182.9 FPS, the CPU does not appear to be a bottleneck. If it were, the frame rate would plateau or exhibit erratic behavior, which is not present in the measured averages.

The CPU's strong single-core performance, evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 4642, is likely crucial for Control. This game, like many action titles, relies heavily on a primary game thread for physics and game logic. The i5-14600K's high boost clock ensures that this thread is processed as quickly as possible, minimizing frame time spikes. The 14-core configuration also provides ample multi-threaded headroom for background tasks and the game's various sub-systems, preventing them from interfering with the main render thread.

The i5-14600K's overall standing is high, ranking in the 93rd percentile among all CPUs, with an average benchmark score of 49166. This places it in the same performance tier as the AMD Ryzen 9 5950X, which has a deltaPct of only 0.2%. This high-end positioning means that the CPU is not the weak link in this pairing for Control. The data implies that the CPU is more than capable of supporting the RTX 3080, and that the performance ceiling in this game is defined by the graphics card, not the processor. The CPU's 24 MB of shared L3 cache and support for DDR5 memory further ensure that it can keep up with the GPU's demands without introducing latency.