Control

How This Combo Ranks

The Intel Core Ultra X7 368H paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile achieves a rank of 812 out of 3720 tested combos in Control. This places the configuration in the top 21.8% of all CPU-GPU pairings benchmarked for this title. The ranking reflects a balance where the GPU’s raw throughput does not completely overwhelm the CPU’s capabilities, nor does the processor hold the graphics card back to a degree that would sink the combo lower in the standings.

In the broader context of all tested systems, this combo sits ahead of the median but not among the elite top-tier setups. The rank is driven primarily by high average frame rates at 1440p and 4K, where the RTX 5090 Mobile’s memory bandwidth and shading power dominate. However, the CPU’s single-thread performance, while strong, is not exceptional enough to push the combo into the top 10% for this specific game. Control’s engine benefits from both high core counts and fast per-core speeds, and the Ultra X7’s 16 cores and 16 threads provide adequate parallelism, but the lack of multi-threading (16 threads for 16 cores) means certain engine tasks that rely on hyper-threading-like scaling may not fully saturate.

GPU Role

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5090 Mobile is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture using the GB203 chip, fabricated on a 5 nm process at TSMC. It houses 45,600 million transistors on a 378 mm² die, yielding a transistor density of 120.6M per mm². The GPU operates at a base clock of 990 MHz and a boost clock of 1515 MHz. Memory runs at 1750 MHz, translating to 28 Gbps effective, across a 256-bit bus. This configuration yields a bandwidth of 896.0 GB/s, which is crucial for Control’s high-resolution texture streaming and particle effects.

The GPU’s 24 GB of GDDR7 memory is more than sufficient for Control’s demands; even at 4K Ultra settings, the game’s asset footprint stays well below this capacity, leaving headroom for future patches or mods. The 10,496 shading units, 328 TMUs, and 112 ROPs deliver a pixel rate of 169.7 GPixel/s and a texture rate of 496.9 GTexel/s. FP32 throughput is 31.80 TFLOPS, with FP16 matching at 31.80 TFLOPS (1:1). These raw numbers explain why the GPU scales well from 1080p to 4K without collapsing.

In Control, the GPU is the primary performance driver at higher settings. The data shows a clear pattern: at 1080p Low, the combo hits 203 FPS, but at 4K Ultra, it drops to 57 FPS. This 3.56x reduction in frame rate from the lowest to the highest workload indicates that the GPU is fully engaged across the resolution spectrum. The RTX 5090 Mobile’s 82 RT cores and 328 tensor cores are also relevant, as Control supports ray tracing and DLSS, though the measured FPS data here does not isolate those features.

FAQ

Q: Does the RTX 5090 Mobile bottleneck at 1080p in Control?

A: No. At 1080p Low, the combo achieves 203 FPS, and at 1080p Ultra it still reaches 111 FPS. The CPU’s single-thread score of 4005 in Passmark and a Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3984 are sufficient to feed the GPU at these rates, so the GPU remains the limiting factor even at lower resolutions.

Q: How does the CPU’s core count affect Control’s performance?

A: The Ultra X7 368H has 16 cores and 16 threads, with a base clock of 2.00 GHz and a boost of 5.00 GHz. Control benefits from multi-core scaling, but the 1:1 core-to-thread ratio means no hyper-threading overhead. The Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 28221 shows strong parallel throughput, which helps maintain high minimum FPS in crowded scenes.

Q: What is the FPS difference between 1080p and 4K at High settings?

A: At 1080p High, the average FPS is 128. At 4K High, it drops to 65. This represents a 49.2% reduction in frame rate, which is significant but not catastrophic, indicating the GPU’s 896 GB/s bandwidth and 24 GB memory buffer mitigate resolution penalties.

Q: Is 24 GB of VRAM overkill for Control?

A: Yes. The game’s highest settings at 4K do not require anywhere near 24 GB. The measured FPS at 4K Ultra (57 FPS) is constrained by compute and bandwidth, not memory capacity. The GDDR7 memory’s 28 Gbps effective speed and 256-bit bus provide the necessary throughput, but the extra capacity is unused headroom.

Q: How does the RTX 5090 Mobile compare to its nearest GPU rival in this game?

A: The nearest rival is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, with an average benchmark score of 44795 versus the 5090 Mobile’s 45152, a delta of 0.8%. In Control, this translates to similar performance, but the 5090 Mobile’s higher bandwidth and VRAM give it an edge at 4K, where the measured 65 FPS at High settings is competitive.

Q: Does the CPU’s TDP of 25 W limit sustained performance?

A: The 25 W TDP is low for a 16-core processor, but the boost clock of 5.00 GHz is sustained via the 3 nm Panther Lake architecture. In Control, the CPU’s Passmark single-thread score of 4005 ensures that per-core performance does not throttle frame delivery at any resolution, even if power limits reduce all-core boost under heavy loads.

Measured FPS Breakdown

The measured data covers three resolutions and four settings levels, with average FPS recorded for all, plus min and max for Medium settings only.

At 1920x1080, the combo delivers 203 FPS on Low, 144 FPS on Medium (with min 122 and max 165), 128 FPS on High, and 111 FPS on Ultra. The spread from Low to Ultra is 92 FPS, which shows that settings scaling has a pronounced effect at this resolution. The Medium min of 122 FPS indicates that even in the most demanding scenes, the system stays well above 120 FPS, making high-refresh-rate displays viable.

At 2560x1440, the numbers are 153 FPS on Low, 109 FPS on Medium (min 93, max 125), 97 FPS on High, and 84 FPS on Ultra. The drop from 1080p to 1440p at each setting is roughly 25-30%, which aligns with the pixel count increase of 1.78x, but the GPU’s bandwidth ensures the scaling is sub-linear. The Medium min of 93 FPS shows that 1440p gameplay remains smooth, though not as consistently high as 1080p.

At 3840x2160, the averages are 103 FPS on Low, 73 FPS on Medium (min 62, max 85), 65 FPS on High, and 57 FPS on Ultra. The 4K Low result of 103 FPS is notable because it exceeds the 1080p High result of 128 FPS only by a narrow margin, indicating that at 4K, the GPU is the sole bottleneck. The Ultra setting at 57 FPS is playable but not ideal for competitive play, though it is smooth enough for a single-player action-adventure title like Control.

Resolution Scaling

The FPS progression from 1080p to 4K reveals the balance between CPU and GPU. At Low settings, the drop is from 203 FPS at 1080p to 153 FPS at 1440p (a 24.6% reduction) and then to 103 FPS at 4K (a 32.7% reduction from 1440p). This scaling is nearly linear with pixel count, suggesting that at Low settings, the GPU is not the only limiting factor—the CPU’s single-thread performance begins to cap frame rates at lower resolutions.

At Ultra settings, the progression is 111 FPS (1080p), 84 FPS (1440p), and 57 FPS (4K). The percentage drops are 24.3% from 1080p to 1440p and 32.1% from 1440p to 4K. The similarity in scaling percentages across settings indicates that the GPU’s compute and memory throughput are the dominant constraints at Ultra, with the CPU providing enough headroom even at 1080p Ultra’s 111 FPS.

The 4K to 1080p ratio at High settings is 65/128 = 0.508, meaning the frame rate halves when moving from 1080p to 4K. This is less than the pixel count ratio of 4x, which shows that the RTX 5090 Mobile’s 896 GB/s bandwidth and 24 GB VRAM prevent a catastrophic collapse. The limiting component at 4K is clearly the GPU’s shading units and ROPs, not memory capacity or CPU speed. At 1080p Low’s 203 FPS, the CPU’s boost clock of 5.00 GHz and Passmark single-thread score of 4005 are sufficient, but further CPU improvements would not yield higher FPS because the GPU’s 31.80 TFLOPS FP32 throughput becomes the ceiling.

CPU Role

The Intel Core Ultra X7 368H is a 16-core, 16-thread processor from the Core Ultra Series 3, based on the Panther Lake architecture on a 3 nm process. It has a base clock of 2.00 GHz and a boost clock of 5.00 GHz, with a TDP of 25 W. The cache hierarchy includes 192 KB L1 per core, 2.5 MB L2 per core, and 18 MB of shared L3 cache. Memory support is LPDDR5X on a dual-channel bus, yielding 153.6 GB/s of memory bandwidth.

In Control, the CPU’s role is significant at lower resolutions and settings. At 1080p Low, the 203 FPS average is likely near the CPU’s maximum frame delivery capability, given that Control’s engine has single-threaded bottlenecks for physics and AI. The Passmark single-thread score of 4005 and Cinebench R23 single-core score of 3984 indicate that per-core performance is above average but not top-tier. The nearest CPU rivals include the Intel Core 7 253PE (delta -0.1%) and AMD Ryzen 9 7940H (delta 0.2%), which have similar average benchmark scores, suggesting that swapping to these CPUs would yield negligible FPS changes in Control.

The CPU’s 16 threads (from 16 cores) are fully utilized in Control’s multi-threaded rendering paths, but the lack of SMT means that some engine tasks that benefit from logical threads may be under-served. However, the Cinebench R23 multi-core score of 28221 and Passmark multithread score of 32956 show robust parallel performance. At 4K Ultra, the CPU is not the bottleneck—the 57 FPS is dictated by the GPU’s 31.80 TFLOPS and 169.7 GPixel/s pixel rate. The CPU’s L3 cache of 18 MB is ample for Control’s working set, and the 153.6 GB/s memory bandwidth is sufficient to feed the GPU without stalling.

The CPU’s percentile of 87 vs all CPUs places it in the top 13% of processors, which aligns with the combo’s overall rank. In Control, the CPU’s boost clock of 5.00 GHz is the key enabler for high FPS at 1080p, but the 25 W TDP may limit sustained all-core boosts. The measured data does not show frame drops, suggesting that thermal or power constraints are not significant in this game’s workload. Overall, the CPU provides a solid foundation, but the GPU is the star of this combo in Control, especially at 1440p and 4K where the RTX 5090 Mobile’s 24 GB VRAM and 896 GB/s bandwidth shine.