Control

# Control with Intel Core Ultra 7 265 + AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT

The pairing of Intel's 20-core Core Ultra 7 265 with AMD's Radeon RX 6600 XT produces a fascinating study in bottleneck dynamics within Control, a 2019 Action Adventure title. Across the measured 1080p, 1440p, and 4K resolutions, the data reveals a system where the GPU consistently dictates performance ceilings, while the CPU's substantial headroom goes largely untapped in this specific title. The combo ranks 2054th out of 2888 tested configurations, placing it in the lower-mid tier of the database, which suggests that while playable, this pairing does not unlock the game's full potential at higher settings.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data shows a steep and predictable decline as resolution increases, but the pattern reveals more than just pixel count pressure. At 1080p with Medium settings, the combo delivers 84 FPS average, dropping to 63 FPS at 1440p (a 25% reduction), and further down to 43 FPS at 4K (a 32% drop from 1440p). This scaling curve is characteristic of a GPU-bound scenario—the RX 6600 XT's rendering throughput, not the CPU's processing power, is the limiting factor.

Looking at Low settings, the story becomes even clearer. At 1080p Low, the system hits 118 FPS average, which is a remarkable figure for a 2019 title. Dropping to 1440p Low yields 89 FPS, and 4K Low still manages 60 FPS. The fact that 4K Low achieves exactly 60 FPS—a common refresh rate target—while 1080p Low nearly doubles that figure, indicates that the GPU is scaling almost linearly with pixel count at lower settings. If the CPU were the bottleneck, we would expect to see diminishing returns as resolution drops, with FPS plateauing around a CPU-imposed ceiling. Instead, the continuous climb from 4K to 1080p suggests the RX 6600 XT is the primary constraint across all measured configurations.

The Medium settings row provides the only complete min/max data in the pack, offering additional insight. At 4K Medium, the combo produces a 36-49 FPS range (43 average), while at 1080p Medium it spans 71-96 FPS (84 average). The frame time consistency, as indicated by the spread between min and max, remains relatively tight at each resolution—roughly 13 FPS at 4K and 25 FPS at 1080p. This stability implies that neither component is experiencing severe frame time spikes, but the overall magnitude of the averages points squarely at GPU limitations.

What does this mean for the limiting component? The Ultra settings data confirms the trend. At 1080p Ultra, the system manages 65 FPS, which drops to 49 FPS at 1440p and 33 FPS at 4K. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1080p is 53 FPS (118 vs 65), a substantial margin that demonstrates how much headroom the GPU has at lower fidelity. At 4K, that same Low-to-Ultra gap narrows to 27 FPS (60 vs 33), showing that at higher resolutions, the GPU's compute resources are saturated regardless of settings. The CPU, with its 20 cores and 20 threads, is never the limiting factor here; even at 1080p Low with 118 FPS, the Core Ultra 7 265 has ample single-core performance to feed the GPU.

FAQ

Q: What is the best resolution for this combo to maintain 60+ FPS?

A: At 1080p, all four settings presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra) average above 60 FPS, ranging from 65 FPS at Ultra to 118 FPS at Low. At 1440p, only Low (89 FPS) and Medium (63 FPS) break the 60 FPS barrier; High (56 FPS) and Ultra (49 FPS) fall short. At 4K, only Low achieves 60 FPS exactly, while Medium (43 FPS), High (38 FPS), and Ultra (33 FPS) all dip below.

Q: How does the RX 6600 XT's VRAM capacity affect Control at 4K?

A: The GPU has 8 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 128-bit bus with 256.0 GB/s bandwidth. The measured data shows playable averages at 4K Low (60 FPS) and 4K Medium (43 FPS), but the drop to 33 FPS at 4K Ultra suggests that the higher-fidelity textures and effects at Ultra settings may be exceeding what the 8 GB frame buffer can efficiently handle, forcing the GPU to manage memory more conservatively.

Q: Is the Core Ultra 7 265's 20-core configuration beneficial for Control?

A: The data indicates that Control does not heavily utilize the CPU's multi-core capabilities. The combo ranks 2054th out of 2888, and the FPS scaling across resolutions mirrors GPU-bound behavior. The CPU's 20 cores and 20 threads provide theoretical headroom, but the game's results are consistently limited by the GPU, meaning the extra cores are not a deciding factor in this title.

Q: What is the performance delta between the RX 6600 XT and its closest GPU rival?

A: The RX 6600 XT has an average benchmark score of 24,442, which places it 0.7% ahead of the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1630 (24,277 score) and 0.8% behind the Intel Arc A350M (24,647 score). Its percentile ranking among all GPUs is 70, indicating it outperforms 70% of tested graphics cards in general benchmarks, though these scores do not directly translate to Control-specific FPS.

Q: How does the CPU's general benchmark performance compare to its rivals?

A: The Core Ultra 7 265 has an average benchmark score of 64,640, which is 0.3% behind the AMD EPYC 4464P (64,823) and 0.3% ahead of the Intel Core Ultra 7 265F (64,438). It sits 0.7% ahead of the AMD EPYC 7343 (64,202) and 0.7% behind the AMD EPYC 9124 (65,104). These close margins indicate the CPU is competitively positioned among its nearest rivals.

Q: What is the combo's overall ranking in this game?

A: The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 + AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT combination ranks 2054th out of 2888 tested combos in Control, placing it in the 29th percentile of all configurations. This ranking reflects that while the system is capable of smooth gameplay at lower resolutions and settings, it falls behind many other pairings in the database for this particular title.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 7 265 represents a modern desktop processor built on Arrow Lake architecture with a 3 nm process node from TSMC. Its specifications include 20 cores and 20 threads, a base clock of 2.40 GHz, and a boost clock of 5.30 GHz. The CPU has a 30 MB shared L3 cache, 192 KB L1 cache per core, and 3 MB L2 cache per core, with a TDP of 65 W. Its memory support is DDR5 over a dual-channel bus, providing 102.4 GB/s of bandwidth.

In Control, the CPU's role appears secondary to the GPU. The measured FPS data shows no signs of a CPU-imposed frame cap. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 118 FPS average, which is a solid indicator that the processor can feed frames well above typical 60 Hz displays. If the CPU were struggling, we would expect to see the FPS plateau at lower resolutions as the GPU's workload decreases, but the data shows FPS continuing to climb from 4K to 1080p at every settings preset. This pattern indicates that the Core Ultra 7 265's single-threaded performance—evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 5,960 and PassMark single-thread score of 4,689—is more than adequate for Control's engine demands.

The CPU's multi-core capabilities, while impressive in synthetic benchmarks like Cinebench R23 multi-core (42,216) and PassMark multi-thread (49,682), do not translate into proportional gains in this game. Control is not a title that leverages 20 threads effectively; the data suggests that the game's rendering pipeline is primarily GPU-bound. The CPU's 93rd percentile ranking among all CPUs confirms it is a high-performing processor overall, but in this specific game, its headroom over what the RX 6600 XT can utilize is substantial. This is not a criticism of the CPU—rather, it highlights that pairing a high-end 20-core processor with a mid-range GPU in a GPU-bound title leaves CPU performance largely on the table.

The fact that the combo ranks 2054th out of 2888 configurations, despite the CPU's strong synthetic scores, underscores that Control's performance is dictated by the graphics card. The Core Ultra 7 265's boost clock of 5.30 GHz provides the per-core speed needed for the game's physics and logic threads, but the RX 6600 XT's 10.60 TFLOPS of FP32 compute is the ceiling for frame rate in most scenarios.

How This Combo Ranks

The combo's rank of 2054 out of 2888 configurations places it in the lower third of the database for Control. This ranking is notable because both components have respectable individual positions: the CPU sits in the 93rd percentile among all processors, while the GPU is in the 70th percentile among all graphics cards. Yet, when combined in this specific title, the pairing underperforms relative to what those individual scores might suggest.

The discrepancy between component-level rankings and the combo's in-game rank indicates that Control's performance profile favors different hardware combinations. The RX 6600 XT, with its 8 GB VRAM and 128-bit memory bus delivering 256.0 GB/s bandwidth, is positioned as a 1080p-class card. At 4K, the measured averages of 33-60 FPS across settings demonstrate that the GPU is stretched beyond its ideal operating envelope. The CPU, meanwhile, has no such limitation in this game, meaning the bottleneck is entirely on the graphics side.

Comparing to other combos in the database, the 2054th rank suggests that many configurations with lower-end CPUs but more powerful GPUs would outperform this pairing in Control. The game's reliance on GPU rendering, combined with the RX 6600 XT's mid-range positioning, means that the combo's overall standing is dragged down by the graphics card's 4K performance, even though 1080p results are solid. The rank also implies that users seeking higher frame rates in Control would benefit more from a GPU upgrade than a CPU upgrade, as the Core Ultra 7 265 is unlikely to be the limiting factor in any scenario.

The data shows that at 1080p, the combo delivers between 65 and 118 FPS depending on settings, which is competitive for most gaming scenarios. However, the database includes configs that achieve much higher averages at this resolution, pushing the combo down in the rankings. The takeaway is that this pairing is balanced for 1080p gaming but falls behind at higher resolutions, making it a reasonable choice for budget-conscious 1080p gamers rather than a high-end enthusiast setup.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 6600 XT is built on the RDNA 2.0 architecture with a Navi 23 chip, manufactured on a 7 nm process by TSMC. Its specifications include 2,048 shading units, 128 texture mapping units, 64 raster operation units, and 32 ray tracing cores. The GPU's clocks are notable: a base clock of 1968 MHz, a game clock of 2359 MHz, and a boost clock of 2589 MHz. Memory is 8 GB of GDDR6 on a 128-bit bus, yielding 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth.

In Control, the RX 6600 XT's performance profile is consistent with its mid-range positioning. The GPU's 70th percentile ranking among all graphics cards, with an average benchmark score of 24,442, places it above the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1630 (24,277 score, 0.7% behind) but below the Intel Arc A350M (24,647 score, 0.8% ahead). Its PassMark G3D score of 16,461 and 3DMark Steel Nomad DX12 score of 1,804 provide synthetic reference points, but the in-game data tells the more relevant story.

The measured FPS reveals that the GPU handles 1080p comfortably across all settings. At 1080p Ultra, the card produces 65 FPS average, which is playable but not high-refresh territory. Dropping to High yields 74 FPS, Medium hits 84 FPS, and Low reaches 118 FPS. These figures suggest that the GPU's 10.60 TFLOPS of FP32 compute and 165.7 GPixel/s pixel rate are sufficient for 1080p at moderate to high settings.

At 1440p, the GPU's limitations become apparent. High settings produce 56 FPS, Medium 63 FPS, and Ultra 49 FPS—all below the 60 FPS target except Low at 89 FPS. The 4K results are more challenging: Ultra averages 33 FPS, High 38 FPS, Medium 43 FPS, and Low 60 FPS. The sharp drop from 1440p to 4K, particularly at Ultra settings (49 to 33 FPS, a 33% reduction), indicates that the 8 GB VRAM buffer and 256.0 GB/s bandwidth are stretched thin at 4K. The card's 64 ROPs and 331.4 GTexel/s texture rate are not enough to maintain high frame rates at 4K with demanding settings.

The GPU's memory configuration—8 GB GDDR6 at 2000 MHz (16 Gbps effective)—is adequate for 1080p and 1440p gaming in Control, but the 4K Ultra results suggest that the frame buffer capacity and bandwidth become limiting factors. The measured 33 FPS at 4K Ultra is a 45% reduction from 1080p Ultra (65 FPS), a steep penalty that underscores the GPU's target resolution is firmly at 1080p.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured FPS data provides a comprehensive picture of the combo's performance across twelve configurations—three resolutions (1920x1080, 2560x1440, 3840x2160) and four settings presets (Low, Medium, High, Ultra). At 1080p, the system delivers 118 FPS at Low, 84 FPS at Medium (with a min of 71 and max of 96), 74 FPS at High, and 65 FPS at Ultra. The 53 FPS spread between Low and Ultra at 1080p demonstrates the GPU's sensitivity to graphical fidelity changes.

At 1440p, the averages are 89 FPS at Low, 63 FPS at Medium (min 54, max 73), 56 FPS at High, and 49 FPS at Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p at each settings tier is consistent: Low falls by 29 FPS, Medium by 21 FPS, High by 18 FPS, and Ultra by 16 FPS. This decreasing delta as settings increase suggests that at higher quality presets, the GPU is already near its limit at 1080p, so the resolution increase has less absolute impact.

At 4K, the averages are 60 FPS at Low, 43 FPS at Medium (min 36, max 49), 38 FPS at High, and 33 FPS at Ultra. The 4K Low result of exactly 60 FPS is a notable achievement—it shows the RX 6600 XT can drive 4K in Control if the player is willing to accept minimal graphical settings. However, the 4K Ultra average of 33 FPS is barely playable, and even the Medium preset at 43 FPS sits below the 60 FPS target that most gamers prefer.

The Medium settings row is the only one with complete min/max data, providing frame time consistency insights. At 1080p Medium, the spread is 71-96 FPS (25 FPS range), at 1440p Medium it's 54-73 FPS (19 FPS range), and at 4K Medium it's 36-49 FPS (13 FPS range). The narrowing range at higher resolutions suggests that as the GPU becomes more fully utilized, frame times become more consistent—there's less variance when the GPU is saturated. This is a typical pattern for GPU-bound scenarios.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS data, the optimal settings preset depends heavily on the target resolution and desired frame rate. For 1080p, the sweet spot is Medium at 84 FPS average, which provides a smooth experience well above 60 FPS while maintaining a 71 FPS minimum. High at 74 FPS is also viable for those seeking better visual fidelity, but Ultra at 65 FPS is the highest preset that stays above 60 FPS. Low at 118 FPS is unnecessary unless chasing maximum refresh rates on high-Hz monitors.

At 1440p, the recommendations shift. Low at 89 FPS is the only preset above 60 FPS, making it the safest choice for smooth gameplay. Medium at 63 FPS barely clears the 60 FPS threshold and offers better visuals, but the 54 FPS minimum means there will be moments where frame rate dips below 60. High at 56 FPS and Ultra at 49 FPS are playable but require accepting sub-60 FPS averages, which may be acceptable for slower-paced segments of Control's action-adventure gameplay.

At 4K, the options are limited. Low at 60 FPS is the only preset that hits the 60 FPS target, making it the recommended choice for 4K displays. Medium at 43 FPS is a compromise for better visuals, but the 36 FPS minimum could result in noticeable stutter during intense scenes. High at 38 FPS and Ultra at 33 FPS are below the threshold for comfortable gameplay—these presets are best reserved for screenshot-taking or non-action moments.

The overall recommendation is to prioritize 1080p Medium or High for the best balance of visual quality and performance. This pairing is clearly optimized for 1080p gaming, with 1440p requiring a settings compromise and 4K limited to Low preset for acceptable frame rates. The data indicates that players should target 1080p to get the most out of this combo, as the RX 6600 XT's strengths are best utilized at this resolution. Upgrading the GPU would be necessary to unlock higher resolutions and settings without sacrificing playability.