Counter-Strike 2

Resolution Scaling — how FPS drops from 1080p to 4K and what it says about the limiting component

The measured FPS data for Counter-Strike 2 with the AMD Ryzen 5 5600F and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 reveals a predictable but informative scaling pattern across resolutions. At 1920x1080 with Low settings, the combo produces 408 FPS average. Moving to 2560x1440 drops that to 270 FPS, a reduction of 138 FPS or roughly 34%. Pushing further to 3840x2160 yields 151 FPS, which is 257 FPS below the 1080p result — a 63% decline from the baseline. This steep falloff suggests that at 1080p, the system is operating in a CPU-bound regime where the graphics card has ample headroom, while at 4K the GPU becomes the primary constraint.

The Medium settings row provides the only complete min/max data across all resolutions, offering a clearer picture of frame time consistency. At 1080p Medium, the average is 339 FPS with a minimum of 288 FPS and maximum of 389 FPS. At 1440p Medium, the average drops to 224 FPS with a min of 190 FPS and max of 258 FPS. At 4K Medium, the average falls to 125 FPS with a min of 106 FPS and max of 144 FPS. The spread between min and max narrows proportionally as resolution increases, indicating that the frame pacing remains relatively stable even when the GPU is under heavier load.

What stands out is the non-linear nature of the scaling. From 1080p to 1440p, the FPS drop is approximately 20-25% across all settings. From 1440p to 4K, the drop is more severe, ranging from 40-45%. This accelerated decline at 4K is characteristic of a GPU that is running out of pixel throughput capacity. The RTX 5060's 48 ROPs and 119.9 GPixel/s pixel rate become the limiting factor at higher resolutions, particularly when visual effects demand more per-pixel work.

The Low settings trajectory is especially telling. At 1080p Low, the 408 FPS figure far exceeds what most displays can show, and even at 4K Low the 151 FPS average remains playable for competitive scenarios. The difference between 1080p Low and 4K Low — 257 FPS — represents the pure resolution scaling cost when the GPU is not burdened with complex shading. This suggests that Counter-Strike 2's engine has a relatively light base rendering load, and the FPS ceiling at lower resolutions is dictated more by CPU draw-call throughput than by GPU capability.

Settings Recommendations — which preset gives the best experience per the measured rows

For competitive play where frame rate is paramount, the 1080p Low preset delivers the highest measured average at 408 FPS. This is the clear choice for players with 240Hz or 360Hz displays who want to maximize responsiveness. The 1440p Low option at 270 FPS remains excellent for high-refresh 1440p monitors, offering a 38% reduction from 1080p but still far above typical display refresh rates. At 4K, Low settings produce 151 FPS, which is viable for 144Hz 4K panels but leaves less headroom for frame time spikes.

The Medium preset represents the best balance between visual quality and performance. At 1080p, the 339 FPS average is only 17% lower than Low, while providing noticeably improved lighting and texture filtering. The 1440p Medium result of 224 FPS remains comfortably above 144Hz refresh rates. The 4K Medium average of 125 FPS with a minimum of 106 FPS means that even the worst-case frame times stay above 100 FPS, making this the highest quality setting that maintains a triple-digit frame rate across all resolutions.

High settings show diminishing returns. At 1080p, High averages 253 FPS, which is 25% lower than Medium while offering modest visual improvements over Medium in most scenes. At 1440p, High drops to 167 FPS, still playable but approaching the threshold where 144Hz displays may see occasional dips below their refresh rate. The 4K High result of 94 FPS is below the 100 FPS threshold that many competitive players consider minimum for smooth gameplay.

Ultra settings are the most demanding and least recommended for this combination. The 1080p Ultra average of 196 FPS is respectable but represents a 42% penalty versus Medium. At 1440p Ultra, the 130 FPS average begins to feel constrained on 144Hz displays. The 4K Ultra result of 73 FPS is the only measured configuration that falls below 100 FPS, and it would likely produce noticeable stutter during intense firefights. The data suggests that Medium is the optimal choice for most users, with Low reserved for maximum competitive advantage and Ultra only suitable for players who prioritize visuals over frame rate at 1080p.

FAQ

Q: Can this combo maintain 144 FPS at 1440p with High settings?

A: The measured average at 2560x1440 High is 167 FPS, which exceeds the 144 FPS target. However, the margin is only 23 FPS, so players should be aware that demanding scenes could potentially dip below the refresh rate threshold.

Q: Is the RTX 5060's 8 GB VRAM sufficient for Counter-Strike 2 at 4K?

A: The measured data shows playable performance at 4K Medium with 125 FPS average and 106 FPS minimum. The game does not appear to be VRAM-limited in these measurements, as the 8 GB GDDR7 memory with 448.0 GB/s bandwidth handles the tested presets without catastrophic frame drops.

Q: What is the highest FPS achievable with this hardware?

A: The maximum measured average is 408 FPS at 1920x1080 with Low settings. The maximum frame rate recorded across all tests is 389 FPS, which occurs at 1080p Medium.

Q: How does the 4K Ultra performance compare to 1080p Low?

A: The 4K Ultra average of 73 FPS is 335 FPS lower than the 1080p Low average of 408 FPS. This represents an 82% reduction in frame rate, illustrating the massive cost of both resolution scaling and maximum visual effects.

Q: Should players use Medium or High settings for a 240Hz 1080p monitor?

A: Medium at 1080p delivers 339 FPS average, which exceeds 240Hz refresh rates with 99 FPS of headroom. High at 1080p produces 253 FPS, which only provides 13 FPS of margin above 240Hz. Medium is the safer choice for consistent frame delivery.

Q: Does the combo rank well among tested configurations?

A: The combo ranks 1211 out of 2870 tested combinations for Counter-Strike 2, placing it in the 58th percentile. This indicates it outperforms the median tested system while not being among the top-tier configurations.

Measured FPS Breakdown — resolution by resolution, settings by settings, exact numbers

1920x1080:

• Low: 408 FPS average
• Medium: 339 FPS average, 288 FPS minimum, 389 FPS maximum
• High: 253 FPS average
• Ultra: 196 FPS average

At 1080p, the scaling from Low to Medium costs 69 FPS (17%), from Medium to High costs 86 FPS (25%), and from High to Ultra costs 57 FPS (23%). The progression is relatively consistent, though the Medium-to-High step is the largest absolute drop. The 408 FPS Low result is the highest measured value in the entire dataset, and the 196 FPS Ultra result still provides excellent performance for any display technology currently available.

2560x1440:

• Low: 270 FPS average
• Medium: 224 FPS average, 190 FPS minimum, 258 FPS maximum
• High: 167 FPS average
• Ultra: 130 FPS average

The 1440p results show a similar pattern to 1080p but with compressed absolute values. Low to Medium drops 46 FPS, Medium to High drops 57 FPS, and High to Ultra drops 37 FPS. The minimum frame rate at Medium (190 FPS) remains above 144Hz, but the Ultra average of 130 FPS falls below that threshold. The gap between Low and Ultra at 1440p is 140 FPS, representing a 52% reduction.

3840x2160:

• Low: 151 FPS average
• Medium: 125 FPS average, 106 FPS minimum, 144 FPS maximum
• High: 94 FPS average
• Ultra: 73 FPS average

At 4K, all settings except Low fall below the 144 FPS mark. The Medium minimum of 106 FPS is the lowest recorded minimum across the entire dataset, though it remains playable. The drop from Low to Medium is 26 FPS, Medium to High is 31 FPS, and High to Ultra is 21 FPS. The 4K Ultra result of 73 FPS is the only measured configuration that could be considered marginal for competitive play, though it remains above 60 FPS for general use.

How This Combo Ranks — use comboRankInGame vs other tested combos

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600F paired with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 achieves a combo rank of 1211 out of 2870 tested combinations in Counter-Strike 2. This places the system in the upper half of the field, specifically at the 57.8th percentile — meaning it outperforms roughly 58% of all tested combos while trailing the remaining 42%. Given that Counter-Strike 2 is a competitive esports title where frame rate is paramount, this ranking suggests the combo is well-suited for the game but not at the modern.

The CPU's individual benchmark percentile is 85th among all processors, which is significantly higher than the combo's overall game ranking. Similarly, the GPU's percentile of 72nd among all graphics cards exceeds the combo's game-specific position. This discrepancy implies that Counter-Strike 2's performance characteristics are not perfectly aligned with synthetic benchmark scores, or that other tested combos leverage hardware features that benefit this particular game engine more substantially.

The nearest rival CPUs in synthetic benchmarks — the Intel Core Ultra 5 225, AMD Ryzen 5 5500X3D, AMD Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450, and Intel Core i9-12900T — all score within 0.5% of the 5600F's average benchmark score of 36945. The Ryzen 5 5500X3D, with its 3D V-Cache, could potentially offer better gaming performance in memory-sensitive titles, though this is not reflected in the provided data. The GPU's nearest rivals include the AMD Radeon 860M, NVIDIA GeForce MX550, AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary, and AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT, with the RTX 5060's average score of 26331 sitting within 1.2% of its closest competitor.

The rank of 1211 out of 2870 means the combo is not in the top tier for Counter-Strike 2, but it is far from the bottom. The measured FPS data shows that the system can handle competitive settings at all resolutions, which aligns with a mid-to-upper-tier placement. For players who prioritize frame rate over visual fidelity, the 1080p Low result of 408 FPS would outperform many higher-ranked combos that focus on 4K Ultra presets.

CPU Role — cores, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The AMD Ryzen 5 5600F brings 6 cores and 12 threads based on the Zen 3 architecture, with a base clock of 3.00 GHz and a boost clock of 4.00 GHz. This 5000-series processor uses the AM4 socket and features 32 MB of shared L3 cache, with 64 KB L1 and 512 KB L2 per core. The 7nm process node from TSMC houses 4,150 million transistors on a 74 mm² die, and the CPU supports dual-channel DDR4 memory with 51.2 GB/s bandwidth.

In Counter-Strike 2, which is known to be CPU-sensitive at lower resolutions, the 5600F's single-thread performance is critical. The PassMark single-thread score of 2872 places the CPU in the 85th percentile among all processors, and this strong single-core capability directly explains why the 1080p Low result of 408 FPS is achievable. The game's engine relies heavily on a single main thread for game logic and player input, so a boost clock of 4.00 GHz with Zen 3's efficient instruction pipeline provides the necessary headroom.

The multi-threaded performance, measured at 19236 in PassMark, is less relevant for Counter-Strike 2 but still contributes to background tasks such as audio processing, network handling, and the Source 2 engine's job system. The 12 threads allow the game to distribute secondary workloads without impacting the primary rendering thread. The 32 MB shared L3 cache is particularly beneficial for cache-sensitive workloads, as it reduces memory latency when the game accesses frequently used data structures.

The CPU's memory bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s over dual-channel DDR4 is adequate for this game. Counter-Strike 2's maps are relatively compact, and the data shows that the CPU is not the bottleneck at higher resolutions — the FPS drop from 1080p to 4K at Low settings (408 to 151 FPS) is far larger than what a CPU limitation would produce. This indicates that the 5600F has sufficient headroom to feed the RTX 5060 even at 4K, where the GPU's pixel throughput becomes the limiting factor.

GPU Role — VRAM, clocks, and how they relate to this game's results

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 is built on the Blackwell 2.0 architecture with the GB206 chip, manufactured on a 5nm process at TSMC with 21,900 million transistors on a 181 mm² die. The GPU operates at a base clock of 2280 MHz and a boost clock of 2497 MHz, with memory running at 1750 MHz (28 Gbps effective). The 8 GB of GDDR7 memory on a 128-bit bus provides 448.0 GB/s of bandwidth, which is substantial for a card in this class.

The GPU's 3840 shading units, 120 TMUs, and 48 ROPs deliver 19.18 TFLOPS of FP32 performance and a texture rate of 299.6 GTexel/s. The pixel rate of 119.9 GPixel/s is the specification most relevant to high-resolution performance. The measured FPS data shows that at 4K, the GPU becomes the primary constraint — the drop from 1080p to 4K at Low settings (408 to 151 FPS) reflects the pixel throughput ceiling.

The 8 GB VRAM capacity is sufficient for Counter-Strike 2 at all tested settings. The game's Source 2 engine is not particularly VRAM-hungry, and the 448.0 GB/s bandwidth ensures that texture streaming does not become a bottleneck. The 4K Ultra result of 73 FPS suggests that the GPU's compute resources, rather than memory capacity, are the limiting factor at maximum settings.

The RTX 5060's percentile ranking of 72nd among all GPUs, with an average benchmark score of 26331, places it above the median but below high-end cards. Its nearest rivals in synthetic tests are the AMD Radeon 860M (delta -0.3%), NVIDIA GeForce MX550 (delta -0.3%), AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT 50th Anniversary (delta -0.8%), and AMD Radeon RX 6750 XT (delta +1.2%). The RTX 5060's 30 RT cores and 120 tensor cores support DirectX 12 Ultimate and Vulkan 1.4, though Counter-Strike 2 does not heavily utilize ray tracing features in the tested presets.