Control

# Control with Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus + AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX

The combination of the Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus and AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX delivers a compelling experience in Control, with measured average frame rates ranging from 63 FPS at 4K Ultra to 225 FPS at 1080p Low. The data shows a system that is clearly GPU-limited at higher resolutions, while at 1080p the CPU's strength becomes more apparent. This analysis breaks down the measured performance across resolutions and settings, contextualizes the combo's standing among 2,888 tested combinations, and examines the specific hardware attributes that drive these results.

Resolution Scaling

The measured FPS data reveals a predictable but steep decline as resolution increases, which is characteristic of a GPU-bound workload. At 1080p High, the combo produces 142 FPS; moving to 1440p High drops that to 107 FPS, a 24.6% reduction. Further scaling to 4K High yields 72 FPS, which is 49.3% below the 1080p figure. This pattern holds across all settings presets, with the scaling factor becoming more pronounced at higher quality levels.

Examining the Low preset illustrates the scaling most clearly. At 1080p Low, the system reaches 225 FPS, which drops to 170 FPS at 1440p (a 24.4% decrease) and then to 115 FPS at 4K (a 32.4% decrease from 1440p). The transition from 1440p to 4K produces a larger relative drop than from 1080p to 1440p, indicating that the GPU's pixel throughput becomes the dominant constraint as resolution climbs. At 1080p Low, the frame rate of 225 FPS suggests the CPU is capable of feeding the GPU well beyond what the graphics hardware can render at higher resolutions.

The Medium preset, which is the only one with full min/max FPS data, shows a similar trend: 160 FPS at 1080p, 121 FPS at 1440p, and 82 FPS at 4K. The min FPS values also scale proportionally—136 at 1080p, 103 at 1440p, and 69 at 4K—indicating consistent frame pacing without anomalous stutters. The Ultra preset follows the expected pattern: 123 FPS at 1080p, 93 FPS at 1440p, and 63 FPS at 4K, the latter being the lowest measured average across all configurations.

This scaling behavior points to the RX 7900 XTX as the limiting component at 4K, where even the fastest settings struggle to maintain 60 FPS. At 1080p, the headroom between presets (225 FPS Low versus 123 FPS Ultra) suggests the GPU is still the bottleneck, but the CPU's 24 cores and 5.80 GHz boost clock provide enough throughput to avoid capping the frame rate. The data does not show a scenario where the CPU becomes the primary limiter within these tested configurations.

How This Combo Ranks

Within the database of tested combinations for Control, this pairing holds the 362nd position out of 2,888 total combos, placing it in the top 12.5% of all tested systems. The percentile standing for the individual components reinforces this: the CPU ranks in the 96th percentile among all CPUs tested, while the GPU sits in the 64th percentile among all GPUs. The discrepancy between these percentiles is notable—the processor is far more exceptional relative to its peers than the graphics card is relative to its own competitive set.

The CPU's nearest rivals in average benchmark score provide context for its performance tier. The Intel Core Ultra 9 285K scores 83,807, a mere 0.2% lower than the 290K Plus's 84,003 average, making them effectively equivalent in synthetic workloads. The AMD EPYC 4584PX trails by 1.1% at 83,090, while the EPYC 9135 is 1.2% behind at 82,980. Interestingly, the AMD EPYC 7F72 leads the 290K Plus by 1.3% with a score of 85,072, showing that server-class parts can edge out this desktop flagship in aggregate benchmarks.

For the GPU, the nearest rivals reveal a more unusual competitive landscape. The RX 7900 XTX's average benchmark score of 19,410 is nearly identical to the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 3 GB (19,334, a 0.4% difference), the NVIDIA Quadro K5200 (19,602, 1% higher), and the AMD FirePro D300 (19,637, 1.2% higher). The NVIDIA TITAN Xp sits 1.2% below at 19,177. This clustering of scores around 19,300–19,600 suggests that the RX 7900 XTX's average benchmark performance is not as dominant as its 24 GB of memory and 61.39 TFLOPS FP32 rating might imply, at least in the synthetic test suite used to compute these averages.

The combo's rank of 362 out of 2,888 reflects both components working together. Given the CPU's top-tier percentile placement and the GPU's mid-pack percentile, the overall rank is heavily influenced by the graphics card's contribution in this specific game. The data suggests that pairing a less exceptional CPU with a stronger GPU could potentially yield a higher rank in Control, though the current combination still outperforms 87.5% of all tested systems.

Settings Recommendations

Based on the measured FPS values, the optimal settings depend on the target resolution and desired frame rate. At 4K, the High preset delivers 72 FPS, which is above the 60 FPS threshold commonly considered playable for action-adventure titles. The Ultra preset drops to 63 FPS, barely maintaining playability but with less headroom for demanding scenes. The Medium preset at 4K offers 82 FPS, providing a 13.9% improvement over High while likely sacrificing some visual fidelity—the tradeoff may be worthwhile for smoother gameplay.

At 1440p, the High preset achieves 107 FPS, which is excellent for most displays. The Ultra preset at 93 FPS remains highly playable and would be the recommended choice for users prioritizing visual quality over marginal frame rate gains. The Medium preset's 121 FPS offers the best balance for high-refresh-rate monitors, though the difference between Medium and High is only 11.6%, making High the more sensible default.

For 1080p, all presets exceed 120 FPS, with Low reaching 225 FPS and High at 142 FPS. The Ultra preset at 123 FPS still provides a smooth experience on 144Hz displays. Given that the gap between Medium (160 FPS) and High (142 FPS) is just 11.3%, the High preset appears to be the sweet spot for 1080p, offering substantial visual improvements without meaningful frame rate sacrifices. The Low preset's 225 FPS is only relevant for 240Hz displays or competitive play, which is less common for a single-player action-adventure title.

Across all resolutions, the Medium preset consistently provides the best balance of image quality and performance, with the only available min/max FPS data showing stable frame delivery. The Ultra preset never drops below 60 FPS in any tested resolution, but its margins are thin at 4K (63 FPS average). Users with variable refresh rate displays may prefer High at 4K or Ultra at 1440p to maximize visual fidelity while remaining well above playable thresholds.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The complete measured FPS dataset covers three resolutions and four settings presets, yielding twelve unique configurations. At 1920x1080, the Low preset produces the highest average at 225 FPS, followed by Medium at 160 FPS, High at 142 FPS, and Ultra at 123 FPS. The Medium preset records a minimum of 136 FPS and maximum of 184 FPS, showing a 35.3% spread between min and max. The 1080p results demonstrate that even the most demanding preset maintains a 123 FPS average, leaving substantial headroom for high-refresh-rate displays.

At 2560x1440, the Low preset achieves 170 FPS, Medium reaches 121 FPS, High hits 107 FPS, and Ultra manages 93 FPS. The Medium preset again provides the only complete min/max data: 103 FPS minimum and 139 FPS maximum, a 34.9% spread. The transition from 1080p to 1440p costs between 24.4% (Low) and 27.8% (Ultra) of average FPS, showing that the resolution increase has a relatively uniform impact across settings.

At 3840x2160, the Low preset delivers 115 FPS, Medium 82 FPS, High 72 FPS, and Ultra 63 FPS. The Medium preset's min and max are 69 FPS and 94 FPS respectively, a 36.2% spread. The 4K results show that the Ultra preset barely clears 60 FPS, while Low provides enough performance for high-refresh-rate 4K displays. The scaling from 1440p to 4K costs between 32.4% (Low) and 32.3% (Ultra) of average FPS, indicating that pixel count becomes the dominant factor at this resolution.

The min FPS values at Medium settings—136 at 1080p, 103 at 1440p, and 69 at 4K—show that frame dips are proportional to average performance, with no evidence of anomalous stutters or driver-level hitches. The max FPS values (184, 139, and 94) suggest that the system has headroom to burst above averages, which is typical for scenes with varying complexity.

GPU Role

The AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX is built on the RDNA 3.0 architecture with the Navi 31 chip, featuring 6,144 shading units, 384 texture mapping units, and 192 raster operation pipelines. The GPU's boost clock of 2498 MHz and game clock of 2365 MHz contribute to its measured performance, though the base clock of 1929 MHz is less relevant for sustained workloads. The 24 GB of GDDR6 memory on a 384-bit bus provides 960.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is substantial for 4K textures and high-resolution rendering.

The GPU's 61.39 TFLOPS FP32 compute rating and 479.6 GPixel/s pixel rate are theoretical maxima that contextualize its raw capability. In Control, the measured FPS at 4K Ultra (63 FPS) suggests the GPU is the primary limiter at this resolution, as the CPU's percentile ranking would predict higher frame rates if the workload were CPU-bound. The 64th percentile ranking among all GPUs is surprising given the hardware specifications, but the nearest rival scores—clustering around 19,300–19,600 in average benchmark scores—indicate that the RX 7900 XTX's synthetic test performance does not fully reflect its gaming capabilities.

The 24 GB memory capacity is notable, though Control likely does not require that much VRAM even at 4K Ultra. The memory bandwidth of 960.0 GB/s is more impactful for this game, as it enables high-resolution texture streaming without bandwidth bottlenecks. The GPU's 96 ray tracing cores support the game's DirectX 12 Ultimate features, though the measured FPS data does not isolate ray tracing performance. The end-of-life production status and launch MSRP of 999 USD are historical details; the current benchmark results represent the hardware's performance as measured in this database.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra 9 290K Plus features 24 cores and 24 threads, with a base clock of 3.70 GHz and a boost clock of 5.80 GHz. The 3 nm process node from TSMC and Arrow Lake Refresh codename place this in the Core Ultra Series 2 lineup. The CPU's cache hierarchy includes 192 KB L1 per core, 3 MB L2 per core, and 36 MB shared L3, which supports the high single-threaded performance evidenced by its Cinebench R23 single-core score of 7,303 and multi-core score of 51,731.

In Control, the CPU's role is to feed the GPU with draw calls and physics calculations. At 1080p Low, the 225 FPS average indicates the CPU can sustain very high frame rates, and the 96th percentile ranking among all CPUs suggests it has ample headroom. The 24-thread configuration may be underutilized in this game, as Control typically scales well with strong single-core performance rather than massive thread counts. The PassMark single-thread score of 4,823 and multi-thread score of 60,860 provide context for its general compute capability.

The CPU's nearest rivals—all within 1.3% in average benchmark score—show that the 290K Plus competes with both desktop and server parts. The 0.2% lead over the Core Ultra 9 285K is marginal, suggesting that the "Plus" variant offers minimal additional performance. The 5.80 GHz boost clock is among the highest available, and the memory bandwidth of 115.2 GB/s via dual-channel DDR5 provides sufficient bandwidth for gaming workloads. The 125 W TDP and Intel Socket 1851 are specifications that affect system integration but do not directly impact measured FPS in this dataset.

FAQ

*Q: What is the best resolution to play Control with this combo for maximum visual quality?*

A: Based on the measured data, 1440p Ultra delivers 93 FPS average, which provides high visual quality while maintaining well above 60 FPS. At 4K Ultra, the average drops to 63 FPS, which is still playable but offers less headroom for demanding scenes.

Q: How much performance is lost when upgrading from 1080p to 4K at High settings?

A: The measured FPS at 1080p High is 142, while 4K High is 72 FPS. This represents a 49.3% reduction in average frame rate, indicating that the GPU becomes significantly more stressed at higher resolutions.

Q: Does the Ultra preset ever drop below 60 FPS?

A: The lowest measured average is 63 FPS at 4K Ultra, which is above the 60 FPS threshold. However, the margin is thin, and the absence of min FPS data for Ultra settings means transient dips below 60 FPS cannot be ruled out.

*Q: How does this combo rank among all tested combinations in Control?*

A: This pairing holds the 362nd position out of 2,888 tested combos, placing it in the top 12.5% of all systems. The CPU ranks in the 96th percentile while the GPU is in the 64th percentile, showing the processor is more exceptional relative to its peers.

*Q: Is the CPU or GPU more likely to bottleneck this system in Control?*

A: The data indicates the GPU is the primary bottleneck at 4K, where even Low settings achieve only 115 FPS. At 1080p Low, the 225 FPS result suggests the CPU can sustain very high frame rates, making the GPU the limiting factor across most tested configurations.

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

A: The Medium preset averages 121 FPS while High averages 107 FPS, a difference of 11.6%. Given the relatively small gap, High settings provide a better visual experience without a significant frame rate penalty.